My contribution examines two recent German dystopian novels, Corpus Delicti (2009) by Juli Zeh and Das weiße Schloss (2018) by Christian Dittloff. I show how both take a careful, even warning stance with regard to possibilities offered by recent discoveries and developments in reproductive medicine and genetics. Zeh imagines a society that strictly controls who may reproduce by matching couples based on genetic compatibility, thus ensuring optimal health of the next generation. In Dittloff’s novel, couples select the ideal birth and surrogate mother in order to optimize their own life experiences and careers as well as the prospects of their child. The article argues that both novels feature extrapolations of issues seen in today’s societies in Germany and other high-income countries, namely consequences of hormonal contraceptives on mate selection, attempts to control the genetics of one’s child, and pregnancy by gestational carrier.
