The One I Saw

'I never told anyone about my ghost, the one I saw . . .' 
 
In this short, spine-tingling story, author of The Midwife's Daughter and Aren't We Sisters? Patricia Ferguson tells the tale of a nurse who remembers her early days working in a neonatal unit. 
 
Praise for Patricia Ferguson: 
 
'She draws on years of experience working as a nurse and midwife to produce acute, skilful descriptions' FT 
 
'Hugely enjoyable, classic storytelling' Red 
 
Patricia Ferguson trained in nursing and midwifery, and her first book, Family Myths and Legends, won the Betty Trask, David Higham and Somerset Maugham awards. It So Happens and Peripheral Vision were both longlisted for the Orange Prize. Her most recent books, The Midwife's Daughter and Aren't We Sisters? are published by Penguin. Patricia Ferguson lives in Bristol.

Patricia Ferguson trained in nursing and midwifery, and her first book, Family Myths and Legends, won the Betty Trask, David Higham and Somerset Maugham awards. It So Happens and Peripheral Vision were both longlisted for the Orange Prize. Her most recent books, The Midwife's Daughter and Aren't We Sisters? are published by Penguin. Patricia Ferguson lives in Bristol

'I never told anyone about my ghost, the one I saw . . .' 
 
In this short, spine-tingling story, author of The Midwife's Daughter and Aren't We Sisters? Patricia Ferguson tells the tale of a nurse who remembers her early days working in a neonatal unit.

The Midwife's Daughter

A BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime. The new novel from Orange Prize listed author Patricia Ferguson is a deeply moving tale about two sisters and the young black orphan who changes their lives - for anyone who loves Call the Midwife or Andrea Levy. 
 
Violet Dimond, the Holy Terror, has delivered many of the town children - and often their children - in her capacity as handywoman. But Violet's calling is dying out as, with medicine's advances, the good old ways are no longer good enough. 
 
Grace, Violet's adopted daughter, is a symbol of change herself. In the place where she has grown up and everyone knows her, she is accepted, though most of the locals never before saw a girl with skin that colour. For Violet and Grace the coming war will bring more upheaval into their lives: can they endure it, or will they, like so many, be swept aside by history's tide? 
 
A moving tale of prejudice, struggle, love, tragedy, bravery and the changing lives of women in the twentieth century, The Midwife's Daughter grips the reader all the way to its heartstopping conclusion. 
 
Praise for Patricia Ferguson: 
 
'Strong, affecting, vividly depicted . . . It is a pure pleasure to read' Lionel Shriver, Telegraph (on Peripheral Vision by Patricia Ferguson) 
 
'One of the most brilliant novelists around . . . funny, gripping, wonderfully shrewd' Independent 
 
Patricia Ferguson trained in nursing and midwifery, and her first book, Family Myths and Legends, won the Betty Trask, David Higham and Somerset Maugham awards. Her most recent books, It So Happens and Peripheral Vision were both longlisted for the Orange Prize. She lives in Bristol.

The Midwife's Daughter is warm and wise, heart- breakingly sad and yet somehow uplifting too.I've been a big fan of Patricia Ferguson for many years - and I think this is her finest novel yet.

A masterfully detailed, compassionate and enthralling story, rich in surprising revelations and beautifully plotted.

She is precisely the kind of writer whose novels you'd expect to find advertised on tube billboards and selling in the hundred thousands - plotty, emollient, fluent, concerned with relationships and what fosters or thwarts them, and capable of making you root for the characters

Strong, affecting, vividly depicted . . . It is a pure pleasure to read

One of the most brilliant novelists around . . . funny, gripping, wonderfully shrewd

Moving seamlessly between characters, she shines light on barely-conscious thoughts and feelings to great, often ironic effect . . . a sympathetic, psychologically acute and thoroughly involving tale

Ferguson should be better known . . . she draws on years of experience working as a nurse and midwife to produce acute, skilful descriptions

Patricia Ferguson trained in nursing and midwifery, and her first book, Family Myths and Legends, won the Betty Trask, David Higham and Somerset Maugham awards. Her most recent books, It So Happens and Peripheral Vision were both longlisted for the Orange Prize. She lives in Bristol.

There was no escaping change at the beginning of the twentieth century, not even in Cornwall . . . 
 
Violet Dimond, the Holy Terror, has delivered many of Silkhampton's children - and often their children - in her capacity as handywoman. But Violet's calling is dying out as, with medicine's advances, the good old ways are no longer good enough. 
 
Grace, Violet's adopted daughter, is a symbol of change herself. In the place where she has grown up and everyone knows her, she is accepted, though most of the locals never before saw a girl with skin that colour. For Violet and Grace the coming war will bring more upheaval into their lives: can they endure it, or will they, like so many, be swept aside by history's tide? 
 
A moving tale of prejudice, struggle, love, tragedy, bravery and the changing lives of women in the twentieth century, The Midwife's Daughter grips the reader all the way to its heartstopping conclusion.

Patricia Ferguson

Aren't We Sisters? is that rare thing, a novel which is intelligent, gripping and - quite unexpectedly - cheering.

There is a real warmth...to the story of how three women from different backgrounds rally round when one of them gets into trouble

With dialogue and characters that sound authentic for the era, Ferguson has conjured up a thought-provoking plot

Another page-turner...an unusual and clever novel.

Norah Thornby can no longer afford to live in her grand family home in the centre of Silkhampton. Unless, perhaps, she can find a respectable lodger. 
 
But Nurse Lettie Quick is not nearly as respectable as she seems. What's really going on at the clinic she has opened? And why has she chosen Silkhampton? 
 
Meanwhile the beautiful Rae Grainger has found the perfect place to stay, in an isolated house miles away from the town. It's certainly rather creepy, especially at candlelit bedtime, but Rae knows that all she has to do is stay out of sight, until others - paid, professional others - are ready to take her little problem away. Then she can just forget the whole ghastly business . . . can't she? 
 
No one guesses, of course, that there's a killer quietly at work in Silkhampton; that in one way or another all three women are in danger . . .

Patricia Ferguson

Praise for Aren't We Sisters?

Aren't We Sisters? is that rare thing, a novel which is intelligent, gripping and - quite unexpectedly - cheering.

There is a real warmth...to the story of how three women from different backgrounds rally round when one of them gets into trouble

With dialogue and characters that sound authentic for the era, Ferguson has conjured up a thought-provoking plot

Aren't We Sisters? is that rare thing, a novel which is intelligent, gripping and - quite unexpectedly - cheering.

There is a real warmth...to the story of how three women from different backgrounds rally round when one of them gets into trouble

With dialogue and characters that sound authentic for the era, Ferguson has conjured up a thought-provoking plot

Aren't We Sisters? is that rare thing, a novel which is intelligent, gripping and - quite unexpectedly - cheering.

There is a real warmth...to the story of how three women from different backgrounds rally round when one of them gets into trouble

With dialogue and characters that sound authentic for the era, Ferguson has conjured up a thought-provoking plot

Books by Patricia Ferguson

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