Handle with Care

In a small town in New Hampshire, there lives what seems to be the most ordinary family: a father, a mother, and two daughters. But unfortunately, the younger daughter, five-year-old Willow, suffers from a rare genetic disorder, and any careless movement can lead to a fracture. So Charlotte and Sean O’Keefe’s life consists of sleepless nights, growing bills, humiliating pity from other parents, and obsessive thoughts about what if… What if Charlotte had known about her daughter’s illness before she was born? What if everything had been different? What if their beloved Willow had never been born? And how valuable is every human life? And in her painful attempt to make ends meet, to cover the costs of her daughter’s treatment, Charlotte makes a desperate move. She files a wrongful-birth lawsuit against her doctor—for not warning her in advance that the child would be born with a severe disability. If the case is successful, the financial payouts would ensure care for Willow for the rest of her life. A difficult moral and ethical problem comes to the forefront for Charlotte, because the doctor she decides to sue is her best friend… “Handle with Care” is a deeply moving novel that raises the question of the value of human life and what we are willing to do to protect it.