Investigates the dynamics of male power and female autonomy, and the role of women's bodies in society and how they have been historically subjected to a range of patriarchal acts of violence, both symbolical and physical. Drawing on the dubious and dark history of gynecology, obstetrics, and medicine in the United States and Europe in the 1800s, Caesaria explores the idea and mechanisms of care--as a vehicle and potential both for love and for exploitation, violence, domination, discipline, and repression. Nordenhok is hailed as an important writer of contemporary Swedish literature whose work explores the psychological mechanisms of power and subordination. For fans of My Dark Vanessa by Elizabeth Russell and Trust Exercise by Susan Choi. Also for readers of Fernanda Melchor, Marguerite Duras, and Lois Duncan. A fitting contemporary contribution to the well-established genre of books about men abusing their power and taking advantage of young girls, such as Oleanna by David Mame and Lolita by Nabokov. This fictionalized story was inspired by a historical case Nordenhok discovered about a baby that was delivered by one of the first caesarian sections in Sweden; when the impoverished and unmarried mother died, the doctor became the baby's legal guardian and named her "Caesaria." Main themes: girlhood, womanhood; history of obstetrics; male violence; patriarchal fantasies and notions of female bodies; the possibility of freedom and autonomy within a repressive system; the question of care as exploitation; and disciplinary violence.