The Rosie effect

Don Tillman and Rosie Jarman are married and living in New York, where Don has taken a position at Columbia and Rosie is completing her medical degree alongside a PhD. When Rosie unexpectedly becomes pregnant, Don throws himself into preparing for fatherhood with his usual scientific rigor — researching parenting methods, monitoring nutrition, and taking in decidedly mixed advice from his old friend Gene, who has moved into their apartment mid-separation from his own wife.

Don's literal-minded approach to the Baby Project repeatedly collides with Rosie's expectations, and a series of well-intentioned missteps puts real strain on a marriage that was never going to be conventional. The second novel in the Don Tillman trilogy follows Don's attempt to prepare for parenthood without losing sight of what made his relationship with Rosie work in the first place.