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Best Birth Books
  • Gentle Birth Choices
    Gentle Birth Choices
    by Barbara Harper
  • Birthing from Within: An Extra-Ordinary Guide to Childbirth Preparation
    Birthing from Within: An Extra-Ordinary Guide to Childbirth Preparation
    by CNM, MA, Pam England, PhD, Rob Horowitz

  • Heart & Hands: A Midwife's Guide to Pregnancy & Birth
    Heart & Hands: A Midwife's Guide to Pregnancy & Birth
    by Elizabeth Davis
  • Ina May's Guide to Childbirth
    Ina May's Guide to Childbirth
    by Ina May Gaskin

  • Birth As We Know It
    Birth As We Know It
  • Prenatal Yoga and Natural Childbirth, Third Edition
    Prenatal Yoga and Natural Childbirth, Third Edition
    by Jeannine Parvati Baker
  • CALMS A Guide to Soothing Your Baby
    CALMS A Guide to Soothing Your Baby
    by Carrie Contey PhD; Debby Takikawa DC
  • The Business of Being Born
    The Business of Being Born
    starring Ricki Lake, Dr. Michel Odent, Abby Epstein, Cara Muhlhahn, Dr. Marsden Wagner
  • Sacred Birthing: Birthing a New Humanity
    Sacred Birthing: Birthing a New Humanity
    by Sunni Karll
  • What Babies Want
    What Babies Want
    starring Noah Wyle;Joseph Chilton Pearce:Sobonfu Some';David Chamberlain
  • Creating Your Birth Plan: The Definitive Guide to a Safe and Empowering Birth
    Creating Your Birth Plan: The Definitive Guide to a Safe and Empowering Birth
    by Marsden Wagner, Stephanie Gunning
  • Mothering Magazine's Having a Baby, Naturally: The Mothering Magazine Guide to Pregnancy and Childbirth
    Mothering Magazine's Having a Baby, Naturally: The Mothering Magazine Guide to Pregnancy and Childbirth
    by Peggy O'Mara
  • Gentle Birth, Gentle Mothering: A Doctor's Guide to Natural Childbirth and Gentle Early Parenting Choices
    Gentle Birth, Gentle Mothering: A Doctor's Guide to Natural Childbirth and Gentle Early Parenting Choices
    by Sarah Buckley
  • Bountiful, Beautiful, Blissful: Experience the Natural Power of Pregnancy and Birth with Kundalini Yoga and Meditation
    Bountiful, Beautiful, Blissful: Experience the Natural Power of Pregnancy and Birth with Kundalini Yoga and Meditation
    by Gurmukh Kaur Khalsa
  • The Natural Pregnancy Book: Herbs, Nutrition and Other Holistic Choices
    The Natural Pregnancy Book: Herbs, Nutrition and Other Holistic Choices
    by Aviva Jill Romm
  • Naturally Healthy Babies and Children: A Commonsense Guide to Herbal Remedies, Nutrition, and Health
    Naturally Healthy Babies and Children: A Commonsense Guide to Herbal Remedies, Nutrition, and Health
    by Aviva Jill Romm
  • Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife
    Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife
    by Peggy Vincent
  • The Birth House: A Novel (P.S.)
    The Birth House: A Novel (P.S.)
    by Ami Mckay
  • Born in the USA: How a Broken Maternity System Must Be Fixed to Put Women and Children First
    Born in the USA: How a Broken Maternity System Must Be Fixed to Put Women and Children First
    by Marsden Wagner
« John Robbins on Becoming a Grandfather | Main | Tea for Two: Herbs for the Nursing Mom »
Monday
06Nov

The Birth House

birthhouse.jpgThe Birth House by Ami McKay is a spellbinding novel of a young girl who becomes a traditional midwife in rural Nova Scotia in the early 1900's. Through the story Dora Rare grows in maturity, experience, and commitment to support women with their fertility, pregnancies, and homebirths.

Meanwhile, the community struggles with the loss of their young men to the war. Dora also has a cultural battle on the women's health front, as a new obstetrician moves to the area campaigning to eliminate midwives and deliver all babies with anesthesia and forceps. Her teacher, herself, and the other loyal homebirthing women must defend their right to birth where and with whom they want to.

I absolutely loved this book, and whipped through it in two days barely putting it down. Who needs sleep when you have a great novel to read? My family immigrated from Canada two generations ago, so I personally found it wonderful to read stories that reminded me of my paternal grandmother who grew up Newfoundland, and my maternal great-grandmother who was a traditional midwife in Quebec in the late 1800's.  As a historical Canadian novel, The Birth House ousted The Da Vinci Code from the #1 spot of the bestseller list in Canada!

As a homebirth advocate, I am thrilled to read a novel that honors the sanctity of birth and portrays a conceited and ignorant obstetrician as the antagonist. In addition to homebirth midwifery, women's issues are woven throughout the story illuminating the struggles of that era, including women's suffrage, arranged marriages, the diagnosis of hysteria (for any women who didn't behave in a way considered proper), and the origin of vibrators to treat hysteria. The novel is written as a "literary scrapbook" interspersing the story with journal entries by Dora Rare, and old advertisements and newspaper articles about the war, women's health, and social events.

Ami McKay has an informative website for The Birth House, with a recipe for groaning cake, which in the novel, the birthing women and her attendants would make during labor. There is also a hysteria quiz to find out how many treatments you may require. Check it out and read this fabulous book!!!

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