Brave New Humans

An astonishing real-life whodunnit and investigative exposé, Brave New Humans reveals the uncomfortable realities of assisted reproduction and its very human fallout.

Journalist Sarah Dingle was twenty-seven when she learned that her identity was a lie. Over dinner one night, her mother casually mentioned Sarah had been conceived using a sperm donor. The man who’d raised her wasn’t her father; in fact, she had no idea who her father was. Or who she really was.

As the shock receded, Sarah began to investigate her own existence. Thus began a ten-year journey – digging through hospital files, chasing leads and taking a DNA test – that finally led to her biological origins. What she discovered along the way was shocking: hospital records destroyed, trading of eggs and sperm, women dead, donors exploited, and hundreds of thousands of donor-conceived people who will never know who they truly are.

Brave New Humans shines a light on the global fertility business today – a booming and largely unregulated industry that takes a startlingly lax approach to huge ethical concerns, not least our fundamental human need to know who we are, and where we come from. But there’s one thing this industry hasn’t banked on: the children of the baby business taking on their makers.

‘An exceptional and personal narrative that exposes the appalling ethical standards of industry and governments worldwide.’ QUENTIN DEMPSTER

‘Sarah Dingle has courageously turned her journalistic skills to the secrets of her own birth, throwing a spotlight on the complicated world of donor conception.’ LEIGH SALES

‘Gripping. Vitally important. A quest like no other – to discover who you are!’ ROBYN WILLIAMS, AO

‘Superbly balances cold fury, grief and the professional focus of an experienced journalist.’ NORMAN SWAN