Strongest advocate, best friend, expert, cheerleader and chief photographer. Before, during and after labour the role of a midwife is second to none. The Secret Midwife reveals the highs and lows on the frontline of the maternity unit, from the mother that tries to give herself a DIY caesarean to the baby born into witness protection, and from surprise infants that arrive down toilets to ones that turn up in the lift.

Life on the NHS front line, working within a system at breaking point, is more extreme than you could ever imagine. From the bloody to the beautiful, from moments of utter vulnerability to remarkable displays of strength, from camaraderie to raw desperation, from heart-wrenching grief to the pure, perfect joy of a newborn baby, midwife Leah Hazard has seen it all. 

Amity Reed became a midwife to serve women, but the reality of working in overstretched and underfunded NHS maternity services soon shattered her illusions. She’s not alone - for every 30 midwives that train, 29 will leave the profession. Overdue is both the devastating personal story behind the statistics, and a call for change in the NHS. 

Birth is a feminist issue. It’s the feminist issue nobody’s talking about. For too long women have been told, ‘a healthy baby is all that matters’. This book dares to say women matter too. Finally blasting the feminist spotlight into the labour ward, Milli Hill encourages women everywhere to stand and deliver, insisting that birth is no longer left off the list in discussions about female power, control and agency. 

The First Breath is the first popular science book about the pioneering fetal and neonatal medicine bringing a new generation into the world - a generation of babies without precedent, who would not have lived if they had been born only a few decades ago. Olivia Gordon explores the female experience of medicine through her own personal story and sensitive, intimate case histories of other mothers’ high-risk births. She details the relationship mothers develop with doctors who hold not only life and death in their hands but also the very possibility of birth.

Each time she knelt to "catch" another wriggling baby - nearly 3,000 times during her remarkable career - California midwife Peggy Vincent paid homage to the moment when pain bows to joy and the world makes way for one more. With every birth, she encounters another woman-turned-goddess: Catherine rides out her labor in a car careening down a mountain road. Sofia spends hers trying to keep her hyper doctor-father from burning down the house. Susannah gives birth so quietly that neither husband nor midwife notice until there's a baby in the room.

Welcome to the life of Dr Max Skittle. Therapist, relationship counsellor, social worker, friend, parent-figure - and, yes: doctor. Join Max - and his patients - as he takes us on a rollercoaster journey through a year in the life of a doctor: from infected toenails, to wonky elbows, to erectile disfunction, to bed bugs; the happy couple expecting a surprise new baby; the teenage girl struggling with body image issues; the loving family grappling with grief, Max shows us all the highs and crushing lows that come with being a GP. 

What do you do when the unthinkable happens? Elle Wright had an admittedly easy pregnancy - her scans went well, she and her baby were healthy throughout, and in May 2016, she and her husband welcomed their son, Teddy, into the world. Just a few hours after giving birth, they woke to find a nurse holding a cold and unresponsive Teddy, who had stopped breathing during the night. The happiest day of Elle's life had turned into every parent's worst nightmare, and she had to let her beautiful baby boy go.

Mary Vale, a grand and imposing Mother and Baby Home, sits on the remote Fylde coast in Lancashire. Its doors are open to unmarried women who come to hide their condition and find sanctuary. Women from all walks of life pass through Mary Vale, from beautiful waitress Emily, whose boyfriend has vanished without trace, to young Isla, cast out by her wealthy family after her first year at university goes horribly wrong. Awaiting them is Nurse Ada and Sister Anne who work tirelessly to aid the mothers and safely deliver the babies. 

After serving as a nurse in WW2, Molly Corbally joined the brand-new NHS and became one of the first official District Health Visitors, attending to mothers and babies from all walks of life in the picturesque village near Coventry she came to call home. Social work was uncharted territory at the time, and Britain was very much worse for wear - TB, polio, measles and whooping cough were just some of the hazards new babies faced. Social conditions could also add to the problems, when poverty and alcoholism were rife. 

A hysterical and sometimes tragic portrayal of a doctor’s interactions with a captivating array of patients contrasted against the frustrations and humdrum of being a junior doctor in the National Health Service. From being the savior of a man’s anus to being mistaken for the milkman, Tom describes the complexity and absurdity of today’s medical practice with humor and aplomb.

There are two ways to open a child's head. The pretty way and the quick way. Usually I shave the hair, use a scalpel to nick the skain then apply an electro-cautery device to burn down to bone level. It's a slow, precise method and it leaves almost no scarring. But it takes time. Time, the interminable single note of the heart monitor reminds me, I don't have....

After the death of her three-day-old son, Teddy, in 2016, Elle Wright never expected what came next - that the path to bringing home a living child could be so winding. Elle's loss was followed by three and a half years of endless waiting. She and her husband waited for test results, hospital appointments and so many new procedures to help with their experience of secondary infertility. This wait included friends announcing their happy news whilst Elle was experiencing three rounds of IVF and the loss of three more babies.

A man who has injured himself trying out his girlfriend's waxing treatment. The inimitable curiosity of a boy whose cactus has left his hand in a mess. More Googled self-diagnoses than one can count. These are the cases that Rudd faces daily. As hilarious as they are poignant, the memoirs showcase some of the most baffling as well as heartbreaking stories that any doctor and their patients have had to experience. 

Jennifer Worth came from a sheltered background when she became a midwife in the Docklands in the 1950s. The conditions in which many women gave birth just half a century ago were horrifying, not only because of their grimly impoverished surroundings but also because of what they were expected to endure. But while Jennifer witnessed brutality and tragedy, she also met with amazing kindness and understanding, tempered by a great deal of Cockney humour.