Call the Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times (The Midwife Trilogy Book 1)

I hate it, I love it.... I can't decide! ahhh! The book is so good, and yet so devastatingly real. I feel sick after some chapters, I cry....and some I laugh out loud. I could give it 5 stars or 1! The chapter on prostitution could have left out a page or two and I wouldn't have minded....don't want those pictures in my head. The heartbreaking stories of mothers and their children being ripped away from them, leaves me aching. I guess I know these things have happened, and still do, but I don't neccessarily want to "know" it. But, at the same time, I couldn't put it down for long. I thoroughly enjoyed the stories and reading about how people lived not so long ago (1950's london) I love midwifery and have delivered several babies at home myself, maybe that is why the mother and children being ripped apart stories felt as though they would break me. I love my kids! I can't imagine enduring what so many people have. The writing is magnificent, detailed and medically accurate. I love history....it was so good here with description....vivid. Be warned....this book is not for the faint of heart. I rated a 1 simply for the fact that everyone else gives a 4 or 5 and i really would have liked to have seen a different opinion and someone warning me of the intensity of emotion i would feel while reading it. i am here, looking for anyone else who may have felt the way i am feeling and only see a short line in one or two of the comments. Maybe I am overly sensitive?Anyways, really it's a 5, but not if you can't enjoy it. Right now, I am nearly finished and I feel sick. had to take a break, but I am sure I will return to finish the book. Just have to gather my thoughts.And, how could anyone stand by and let so many people suffer back then, in that area? and the workhouses? REally? Why? How could that have been ok?makes you grateful for your own life and circumstances for sure, and then makes you wish you could help someone else out in their life.

Call the Midwife is a collection of interesting human interest entertaining stories about being a midwife in the poor docklands area of London in the 1950s. The stories are about a time and place no longer with us as midwifes, home births, London docks are things of the past. Container ships and the pill have changed things. SMOG in London is not the same with absence of steam engines and coal fired power stations.The stories touch on the nature of humanity. How humans treat each other is brought to light in an entertaining way – husbands abuse wives physically, nurse and nuns who care. Is it part of the human condition to emphasise as David Hume has suggested or is it part of the condition for the strong to dominate and abuse the weak? We see again how lives can gain meaning by helping others and making a difference.Although the nuns in the stories are clearly of religious faith others (Doctors, Police, Midwives) are not always religious so it is not only religion that drives people to extraordinary action to care for others.The stories are generally very positive and of the “feel good” type although the pain and mess associated with childbirth might tend to put some readers off sex. Personally I had to skip some of the medical details. I enjoyed reading the evocative description of the hospital Christmas procession.Great Books however give the reader something to think deeply about his or her own life and I don’t think it is in that category. It is however an entertaining look at the past with strong themes of love, dignity and empathy.

I first watched the series and then read the book. It is very interesting to learn how midwifery and how life was for women during the 1950s and 1960s in England. I believe that everyone should read this. They will very much have a better appreciation of the work of women in healthcare.

Most reviewers seem to think that it is their job to outline the plot of the book that they are reviewing. I'm not going to do that. What I am going to do is tell you that I am an avid reader. I am 69 years old and I read about 3 books a week. Sometimes more. I have now read all three of Jennifer Worth's books and I have found all of them to be outstanding! If you're like me, you will learn an incredible amount about Post-War life in the lower East side of London. I had no idea that such abject poverty existed there during my lifetime. When I was little, whenever the bills came in, my father would always moan, "Off to the poor house!" I had not a clue that there really were such things, nor could I have imagined the horrors that they held within. Worth writes eloquently about life before the Pill, the Polio vaccine, and indoor plumbing. All things that we take for granted.I can't imagine a novel being any more captivating than these memoirs. The characters all come alive--they literally seem to leap off the pages and you can almost smell the streets of the lower East side as the midwives furiously pedal to assist their next mother-to be. I think what amazed me the most was the quality of the writing. Often memoirs are ghost-written, or they are interesting but the writing is amateurish. In this case, the author is one of the midwives and I have to say that her writing is as good as any accomplished author. Her stories are mesmerizing, heart-wrenching, at times humorous, but always beautifully written. Jennifer Worth died recently and I am so sorry that I never had the chance to write to her and tell her how much I loved her books.

I read this series after watching the television show based on the life of midwives. The book was just as fascinating, with more detail, as the books. Decades are covered, and much explanation of the vast medical advances wrought in the 60s and 70s in the 20th century. Truly an informative and entertaining read.

O livro é excelente. Revela uma faceta, em geral desconhecida, do trabalho insano das parteiras nas zonas mais pobres de Londres depois da Segunda Guerra. Mostra sua luta contra a pobreza, a ignorância e a sujeira dos moradores de prédios bombardeados e quase em ruínas, invadidos pela população miserável que neles se abrigou pela absoluta falta de moradia naquele difícil período da História do país.

Es una alegría leer parte de la historia de la Salud Pública en la Inglaterra del medio siglo XX, a través de las vivencias cotidianas de unas enfermeras, unas religiosas, un médico y el trabajador del convento, todos con un gran compromiso con sus pacientes y toda la comunidad; con amplio criterio, comprensivos e incluyentes. Me encanta que sean unas memorias de hechos reales, muy bien escritas y que intercalan los problemas y triunfos personales de cada protagonista. Es de mis libros y series de TV favoritas

Couldn't stop reading

Thank you

Das Buch ist von einer Frau geschrieben, die in den 1930-er Jahren geboren worden sein dürfte. Und zwar in einem "very educated English" und der Zeitfärbung der 1950-er Jahre. Auch mit sehr guten Englischkenntnissen eine gewisse Herausforderung. Mein Kindle half mir mit der Übersetzungsfunktion.Die sehr anschaulich beschriebenen Episoden, die üblen Wohn-Zustände der Arbeiterklasse im London der 1950-er Jahre, der damals wohl wirklich furchtbare, eklig-schweflige und absolut undurchdringliche Nebel, die harten Arbeitsbedingungen der Hebammen, alles wird eindrücklich beschrieben. Eine Frau, die 25 Kinder auf die Welt bringt und sogar ein Frühchen selbst durchbringt (und sich damit womöglich auch das eigene Leben rettete), Geschlechtskrankheiten, Prostitution, alles kommt zur Sprache. Detailreich und durch die schönen Dialoge nachvollziehbar und realistisch. Vermutlich hat die Autorin Tagebuch geführt. Ohne das wäre eine so exakte, alltagsnahe Beschreibung wohl kaum möglich.Das Buch gibt einem einen echten Einblick in das Leben damals, in die Art wie die Menschen dachten und handelten und in das Leben einer jungen Hebamme und ihrer teils drastischen Erlebnisse. Dabei wird die Autorin niemals anklagend, auch wenn sie dazu mehr als einen Grund hätte. Absolut empfehlenswert und mit jeder Seite interessanter und spannender. Klasse!!