A masterpiece of reporting on the Supreme Court’s most divisive case, Roe v. Wade, and the unknown lives at its heart.

Despite her famous pseudonym, “Jane Roe,” no one knows the truth about Norma McCorvey (1947–2017), whose unwanted pregnancy in 1969 opened a great fracture in American life. Journalist Joshua Prager spent hundreds of hours with Norma, discovered her personal papers—a previously unseen trove—and witnessed her final moments. The Family Roe presents her life in full. Propelled by the crosscurrents of sex and religion, gender and class, it is a life that tells the story of abortion in America.

An epic work spanning fifty years of American history, The Family Roe will change the way you think about our enduring American divide: the right to choose or the right to life.

Joshua Prager has written for the Atlantic, Vanity Fair, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal. A former Nieman Fellow at Harvard, he is the author of The Echoing Green (a Washington Post Best Book of the Year) and lives in New Jersey.

Mary Alice Williams is an Emmy Award-winning, pioneering television journalist.  She was the first woman Prime Time anchor of a network news division and first woman to hold the rank of Vice President of a news division.

She most recently served as the anchor of New Jersey’s Public television’s NJTV News.  As one of the primary architects of the first worldwide television network, Williams oversaw the construction of CNN’s New York Bureau at the World Trade Center prior to the launch of Cable News Network (CNN) in 1980. And served as New York Bureau Chief, before being named anchor and Vice President.
Her career included anchor roles at NBC News and Discovery Health.  She produced and anchored special broadcasts for PBS, Lifetime, Hearst and the Hallmark Channel.  She also worked at CBS news and CBS Radio.  Williams has been recognized with numerous television awards including Emmys, Gracie Allen Awards and 15 honorary doctorates for her work.
Williams was a tenured professor at SUNY Purchase and adjunct professor at Seton Hall University and Montclair State University.
She is most proud of having raised her three daughters in New Jersey.

Joshua Prager, "The Family Roe" with Mary Alice Williams