(theme music) - I'm Toni Halleen, this is "The Surrogate."

This is the story of a woman who is a surrogate for another couple, but she changes her mind and takes the baby on the run.

An infertile couple hires a young woman to carry their baby, using her egg and the husband's sperm.

And this young woman needs the money because she wants to enroll to college, but she's never had a child before, and she's very inexperienced, two days after giving birth she changes her mind and has trouble turning over the baby, so she makes a lot of bad decisions, she jumps out the window with the baby and she goes on the run with her ex-boyfriend, to hide the baby and figure out what she's gonna do.

Meanwhile, the couple is on the run looking for her.

- In "The Surrogate" you give us four perspectives, the husband's perspective, the wife's perspective, the parents who are actually hiring the surrogate, then you have the surrogate perspective Cally, and her ex-boyfriend.

What got you into giving us four different perspectives, what was the reason for giving us those perspectives?

- Every time I write in that person's voice, I believe they are the one who is quote unquote right, and also at the same time, I also always believe there is no quote unquote right.

All of it is gray, all of it is rich, all of it is difficult.

But, when I'm writing in that person's voice, I really care for that person, I want to respectfully bring their voice forward.

I try really hard to be honest as them speaking, and I try to walk in their shoes as carefully as I can.

- Thank you Toni Halleen for being with us today.

- Oh, thank you so much, thank you Alka.

This has just been so much fun.

- And thank you for watching "A Word on Words."

For more of our conversation, visit awordonwords.org.

I'm Alka Joshi, keep reading.

- [Toni] And that gives, that's what's fun about writing for me, is getting in all those shoes, and it's emotional, sometimes it's hard to let it be, as I go into the rest of my life I'm still feeling that person inside me.

So it's kind of strange but it's kind of beautiful.