This image is the cover for the book Patron Saint of Pregnant Girls

Patron Saint of Pregnant Girls

Three mothers are brought together through tragedy and rebirth in this “deeply compassionate . . . surprisingly sunlit tale” set in nineteenth century Germany (The Washington Post).

In the summer of 1878, the Ludwig Zirkus arrives on Nordstrand in Germany, to the delight of the island’s people. But after the show, a Hundred-Year Wave roars from the Nordsee and claims three young children.

Three mothers are on the beach when it happens: Lotte, whose children are lost; Sabine, a Zirkus seamstress with her grown daughter; and Tilli, just a girl herself, who will give birth later that day at St. Margaret’s Home for Pregnant Girls. The sudden tragedy brings these women together as it upends each of their lives.

As full of joy and beauty as it is of pain, and told with the luminous power that has made Ursula Hegi a beloved bestselling author for decades, The Patron Saint of Pregnant Girls is a shining testament to the ways in which women hold each other up in the most unexpected of circumstances.

Ursula Hegi

Ursula Hegi is the author of over a dozen books, including Stones from the River, Children and Fire,Floating in My Mother’s Palm, and Tearing the Silence. A German-born writer, she immigrated to the United States at eighteen. She has served as juror for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle. Ursula lives with her family on Long Island and has taught writing at Stony Brook, USC Irvine, and Barnard College.

Flatiron Books