By Pamela Collins
The Foundling
By Ann Leary
Softcover by MARYSUE Rucci Books
The Foundling is an historical novel that combines serious social issues concerning women’s rights with a hilariously funny fiction that will make you laugh out loud and leave you feeling that justice has been served on a platter with sides of kindness and love.
This book may make you think differently about philanthropists or those who claim to work toward social reform. It may make you angry with corporate corruption and hypocrites.
But it is 1927 and a young Mary Engle, raised by nuns in an orphanage, takes a job as secretary at a remote institution for mentally disabled women called The Nettleton State Village for the Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age.
She is immediately in awe of her beautiful, classy employer, Dr. Agnes Vogel, the first woman in America to earn a medical degree in psychiatry. Dr. Vogel campaigned for the suffrage movement and promoted her study of eugenics. Mary soon learns that all is not as it appears when she finds that another girl from the same orphanage is actually an inmate at the asylum.
What follows is a captivating story of courage, compassion and hope. You will fly through the pages!
My first impression was impatience with the naivety and loyalty of our protagonist and I had to keep reminding myself that she was raised by nuns and it was the 1920s when women didn’t even have the right to vote. I was soon caught up in a raucous and, yes, even raunchy escapade with fascinating characters and twists of plot as Mary tries to help her friend. I don’t want to spoil your read but I know you will love the climax and finale.
The author, Anne Leary, wrote this novel when she found out that her own grandmother had worked as a secretary at one of many asylums for “Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age.”
This term will outrage you as it is so politically incorrect, but it was a medical term in its time, for people with intellectual disabilities – as were “moron,” “idiot” and “imbecile.” Eugenics asylums segregated women (usually poor, vulnerable and without family ties) who were viewed as morally or mentally defective so they couldn’t produce children who would pass on the gene and create future criminals or paupers.
This included women whose behaviour was judged as racy, but would be perfectly acceptable in our time. A doctor, husband or family member could deem a woman feebleminded and have them committed. The women would be kept for decades or until they reached menopause or became infertile, then released. These asylums were not treatment centres but more like prisons and work farms.
The Foundling explores the limitations of women in the early 20th century, even educated ones like Dr. Vogel, without the power to vote or the right to personal property. It is historical but when it comes to the regulations of women’s bodies, sex and reproduction, it is still very timely.
This book will both shock you and warm your heart with the power of friendship, loyalty and hope and of women helping each other no matter the cost.
Ann Leary is also the author of The Good House, which was adapted to film in 2022 and starred Sigourney Weaver and Kevin Kline.