Spell the Month in Books - March

Spell the Month in Books is hosted by Reviews From the Stacks and occurs on the second Saturday of each month or maybe the third!

The Midwife by Jennifer Worth (2002). In 2013, I watched a season of Call the Midwife and was drawn to the memoir that inspired the series.

The Nightingale Girls (Book Review)

Title:  The Nightingale Girls (Book 1)
Author:  Donna Douglas

Publication Information:  Arrow, 2012, available in paperback or digital edition

Genre: Historical Fiction/Nursing 

Plot:  Three very different young women attend nursing school at Florence Nightingale Hospital in London’s East End in 1934 and become friends.   Dora Doyle is an inarticulate young woman from the slums whose enthusiasm and work ethic impresses the new matron sufficiently to gain her a place in the training class. 

Call the Midwife: suggested reading list for fans

For those who enjoyed the PBS series* (and if you missed it, here is an article from Time Magazine to change your mind) and are eager to read more about midwives:

Nonfiction

Call the Midwife: a True Story of the East End in the 1950s – Jennifer Worth
This is the first of a trilogy about the author’s work in post-WWII London as a midwife, and inspired the PBS series. Like the characters in the series, Worth left a comfortable home to live in a convent and minister to London’s slums.

Midwife’s Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812 – Laurel Ulrich
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for History, this fascinating book is based on the diaries of a midwife and healer in 18th century Maine.

Fiction

The Midwife - Gay Courter

An old NAL bestseller: Hannah Blau and her family emigrate from Russia (where she received her medical training) to the Lower East Side of New York where she faces a harsher world than that of All of a Kind Family.