Expecting Adam

By MARGARET CARLSON

When Beck, a Harvard grad student with multiple degrees, discovers she's pregnant for the second time, she's optimistic that she can still have it all because she has always had it all. By the time she discovers her unborn child has Down syndrome, she's already in love with the baby, and she and her husband decide against the abortion everyone recommends. Slyly ironic, frequently hilarious, Beck's memoir charts the journey from being smart to becoming wise, along the way drawing a believable portrait of a marriage in which two people root entirely for each other. In raising a child that isn't perfect, they find a life that is better than they could have imagined when they were sitting atop the ivory tower.

--By Margaret Carlson