Call the Nurse: True Stories of a Country Nurse on a Scottish Isle
Being a nurse can be challenging at the best of times, but being a nurse on a remote Scottish island is something else altogether. In this charming memoir, MacLeod recounts her adventures as a nurse in the Hebrides in the 1970s. With MacLeod as a trusty guide, readers are welcomed into the island inhabitants’ crofts with their smoky peat fires. The book feels like a letter from a friend who has an eye for travel writing (despite employing clichéd phrases like “Little did I know” and overusing exclamation points). With a nurse’s no-nonsense manner, MacLeod relays tales of adventure, finding humor and humanity in her experiences but rarely revealing more of herself than necessary. She ably describes the quirks and generosity of the islanders as they face a series of emergencies and celebrate happy occasions. Instead of an overall narrative, this book reads, as the introduction attests, more like looking through a photo album, with a gloss of nostalgia that readers will enjoy. For James Herriot fans, without the animals. --Bridget Thoreson