‘Unforgettable’ GUARDIAN
‘Poignant, funny and enlightening’ DAILY EXPRESS
‘Gripping, moving and convincing from beginning to end . . . a powerful evocation of a long-gone world’ LITERARY REVIEW
THE BESTSELLING BOOK THAT INSPIRED THE AWARD-WINNING BBC TV SERIES
In this extraordinary account of life as midwife in 1950s London, Jennifer Worth recounts her experiences – and those of the women she helped – in all their stark, colourful and at times shocking reality.
Life in London’s East End in the 1950s was tough. The brothels of Cable Street, the Kray brothers and gang warfare, the meths drinkers in the bomb sites – this was the world that Jennifer Worth entered when she became a midwife at the age of twenty-two. Babies were born in slum conditions, often with no running water.
In Call the Midwife, Worth describes the romance and beauty of London as well as the bug-infested tenements, the spectre of disease, the sense of community and the incredible resilience of women who often bore more than ten children. Funny and moving, it brings to life a world that has now changed beyond measure.
‘Superbly moving but also witty’ CLOSER
‘The characters . . . stay with you for a long time’ WOMAN MAGAZINE
‘Poignant, funny and enlightening’ DAILY EXPRESS
‘Gripping, moving and convincing from beginning to end . . . a powerful evocation of a long-gone world’ LITERARY REVIEW
THE BESTSELLING BOOK THAT INSPIRED THE AWARD-WINNING BBC TV SERIES
In this extraordinary account of life as midwife in 1950s London, Jennifer Worth recounts her experiences – and those of the women she helped – in all their stark, colourful and at times shocking reality.
Life in London’s East End in the 1950s was tough. The brothels of Cable Street, the Kray brothers and gang warfare, the meths drinkers in the bomb sites – this was the world that Jennifer Worth entered when she became a midwife at the age of twenty-two. Babies were born in slum conditions, often with no running water.
In Call the Midwife, Worth describes the romance and beauty of London as well as the bug-infested tenements, the spectre of disease, the sense of community and the incredible resilience of women who often bore more than ten children. Funny and moving, it brings to life a world that has now changed beyond measure.
‘Superbly moving but also witty’ CLOSER
‘The characters . . . stay with you for a long time’ WOMAN MAGAZINE
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Reviews
A poignant, funny and enlightening book
If you loved the TV adaptation, why not read the original books of Jennifer Worth's stories of being a midwife in London in the '50s? The characters you will meet, both colleagues and patients, stay with you for a long time
Re-released to tie in with a new BBC adaptation, you must read this superbly moving but also witty story.
This is a funny, at times disturbing, memoir of a world that has now changed beyond measure.