Top 5 Tuesday – Top 5 Books about a Birth

Welcome to this week’s Top 5 Tuesday post. Top 5 Tuesday was created by Shanah at Bionic Book Worm, and it is now being hosted at Meeghan reads!! For details of all of the prompts for April to June see Meeghans page here.

The theme for this week is Top 5 books about births as births are really the start of everything. I immediately thought of fantasy novels. The number of fantasy books that feature the birth of a ‘special’ child is too many to even think of so I then tried to think of less obvious choices.

After having this one rumbling around in my head for the past few days, these are the 5 that I have come up with.

This is one of my favourite dystopian novels. It is set in 2021, 26 years after the last child was born. Society is crumbling as there seems to be no hope for humankind but then one woman becomes pregnant. I guess maybe this isn’t really about a birth but rather the prospect of new life after giving up hope.

This is another dystopian book. This time it is set in a near future where no female children for over 30 years. Then a single girl is born and aptly named Eve. The book and the sequel deal with how society has developed and what Eve’s role will be as she approaches adulthood. My main quibble with this is that the first books were issued quite quickly but there is still no sign of the final book in the trilogy.

Possibly the very first story of a ‘chosen child’ was the story of Merlin orchestrating the birth of the future King Arthur. I loved all the Arthurian legends as a child and Mary Stewarts Crystal Cave trilogy is one of my favourites. T H White’s version of the legend is a great read and immortalised by Disney in The Sword in the Stone animation.

A true life story about a birth or at least the need for one. Henry VIII’s desire for a male heir to the throne changed English history. Because he needed a divorce, he broke with the Catholic church in Rome and founded the Church of England. Hilary Mantel’s brilliant Wolf Hall tells the story of Thomas Cromwell who was instrumental in helping Henry achieve his aims.

I don’t read horror stories as a general rule but I read this when I was still at school less than 10 years after it was first published and it has stayed with me ever since. The gradual build up of unease and menace was something I had never come across in a book before and the ending was truly shocking. I’m not sure if still has the same impact today but it’s still in print so obviously it’s still being read.

Thanks Meeghan, I really enjoyed thinking about my choices for this week’s theme.

Advertisement