Conspicuously Silent: The Excesses of Religion and Medicine in Emma Donoghue’s Historical Novels The Wonder and The Pull of the Stars

Abstract This chapter explores Emma Donoghue’s The Wonder (2016) and Pull of the Stars (2020) as texts that address wrongs male-dominated institutions religion medicine, silently complicit various kinds female invisibility. As will be discussed from a cultural memory approach, , story tinted with religious fervour scientific scepticism, probes into so-called fasting-girls phenomenon ultimately exposes diseased culture nurtured by toxic practices silence. Similarly, novel set in Dublin ward during 1918 Great Flu pandemic which depicts struggles several characters their attempts to save lives labouring women, is analysed text concerned retrieving historically suppressed body, controlled male regulatory health care morality.