Unwind

In a chilling future America, a civil war over abortion is resolved by an agreement allowing parents to retroactively "unwind" their children between the ages of thirteen and eighteen. This process involves surgically harvesting every body part for transplantation, making the child 'not dead, but alive in a divided state.' Connor, a rebellious teen, is scheduled for unwinding by his parents. Risa, an orphan whose care is deemed too expensive, faces the same fate. Lev, a 'tithe,' has been raised from birth to be unwound as a religious offering. Thrown together by desperate circumstances, these three unlikely runaways embark on a perilous cross-country journey, attempting to evade the authorities and survive until their eighteenth birthdays, when they are safe from unwinding. Their struggle forces them and the reader to confront profound questions about life, personhood, and the morality of sacrificing individuals for the perceived greater good, in a world where every piece of them is coveted.