A decade ago, Laurie Strongin and her husband, Allen Goldberg, lived on the edges of reproductive technology. Their son Henry was born with a rare and fatal disease, Fanconi anemia. They used a method called preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) to try to conceive another child who would not have the disease and be a bone marrow donor to Henry. The ordeal, chronicled in the New York Times Magazine , made them objects of fascination and sometimes horror: Was it OK to have one child to save another? Was this a distortion of parental love or its ultimate manifestation?
In her new book, Saving Henry , Strongin answers the question. Her answer is, essentially, how could you not try ? She convinces us of this by lovingly recreating Henry’s childhood in its mundane and dramatic moments, making it clear that if you see the picture from inside the intimacy of a loving family, no parent would do it any differently.
