Call the Midwife

Call the Midwife : Call the Midwife

  • by Jennifer Worth
  • Narrated by Nicola Barber
  • Series: Call the Midwife
  • 12 hrs and 2 mins
  • Unabridged Audiobook
4.43 (4574
Ratings.
)

Publisher's Summary

Audie Award Nominee, Solo Narration - Female, 2013
At the age of 22, Jennifer Worth left her comfortable home to move into a convent and become a midwife in postwar London’s East End slums. The colorful characters she met while delivering babies all over London - from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lived to the woman with 24 children who couldn't speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city’s seedier side - illuminate a fascinating time in history. Beautifully written and utterly moving, Call the Midwife will touch the hearts of anyone who is, and everyone who has, a mother.

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What the Critics Say

"A charming tale of deliveries and deliverance." (Kirkus Reviews)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful

This is one I didn't want to put down!

Call the Midwife was a truly gripping book for me. I am interested in birth and so reading about how births were conducted 60 years ago was so fascinating.

Yet, Jennifer Worth's story went far beyond that of the stories of the births she attended. It was the story of her maturing as a nurse and midwife, and of her strongly held notions about what was right and acceptable being challenged. She began her midwifery training at an Anglican convent in the dockland area of London's East End with not much more than disdain for people who were strongly motivated by love of God and called to service because of it. She grew to understand the women who mentored her, and to respect the ones whom she wrote off as just nasty or odd in the beginning. Seeing her dawning understanding of faith was lovely.


She also learned so much from the families of the poor and down trodden of an area so different from what she knew before.

Some of the stories she tells in this book are hilariously funny, and others are completely heartbreaking and painful to read. Worth certainly was a gifted storyteller, reminiscent of James Herriott. I hope the other books she wrote will be released on Audible soon.

Nicola Barber is a competent narrator, and not one who will put me off a book, so I was okay at first. But, I was very surprised; she seemed to really enjoy doing this book, and the characters came alive through her excellent narration. I was very pleased!

I don't think guys should be put of by a book about birthing babies, just as Herriott's books are more about the people than the animals. Give it a go.
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- Kathy

My favorite this year... but not for all...

Slices of life as experienced by a young midwife in postwar London slums. Similar to James Herriot books, with feel of Potato Peel Pie Literary Society. However, "real life" is shared and it isn't always pretty. It includes several step by step delivery of babies, the story of how a young girl is drawn into prostitution, ups and downs of married life and child raising, a few babies born with "unexpected" color, some heartbreaking abuse, poverty, adoption and horrors of poor house relief. The only portion which is lewd is during the "entertainment" at the brothel, you know it is coming and a 3 minute fast forward would remove it easily without messing with the plot. Language is clean and although some of the experiences are heartbreaking the whole feeling of the book is the beauty of the cycle of life - aptly named birth, joy and hard times. You will smile a lot!
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- Jan

Book Details

  • Release Date: 09-10-2012
  • Publisher: HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books
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