by Lucilla Andrews

‘Nurse, you are holding a hypodermic syringe, not brandishing a harpoon. And look what you’ve done to that needle! Possibly you might be able to use it as a crochet-hook ‒ you can certainly never use it again for an injection. Put it all away now and make a linseed poultice. You have just time to get one made before the test ends.’

I found this one on my Kindle while looking for another title. I have no idea why I originally downloaded it. Probably due to a long ago recommendation or maybe related to my flirtation with Betty Neels a while back. Published in 1960, it is a real nugget of social history and of the nursing profession the way it used to be. Contrary to many readers, the age gap between the two male and female leads (22 years) did not bother me. What did bother me was his constant cigarette smoking! He was a real fiend!

Frances Dorland is our heroine, a new student nurse, learning on the job. I guess you didn’t have to get a degree in Nursing back then, at least in England. Apparently you learned on the job while attending classes on the side while living at the hospital with your “set.” Most of the book is about her and her friends challenges navigating the political gauntlet of dealing with the Nurses (or Sisters) that outrank them. Which is everybody. Always obedient, eyes down, never explain or give excuses, or be anything less than subservient at all times. It was very eye-opening. Nursing back then appeared to be mostly cooking and cleaning and keeping their patients company.

She becomes best friends with a very rich debutante, Estelle Dexter, who has eschewed her former shallow life to do something substantial and meaningful and nursing is in her blood. Her other good friend is “The Professor” whom she meets by chance on the hospital grounds. He is a loyal and wise advisor whom she mostly communicates with via letters. Every so often, not very often, they meet in person. But nevertheless, despite his age and lack of sex appeal, it is not long at all before she begins to fall in love with him. I honestly didn’t blame her. I would have too. Later in the book, Frances becomes the target of gossip and hostility on the part of some of her peers and superiors and undeserved deference in others. This mystery fuels much of the latter part of the book. Frances thinks it is because of her close relationship with Estelle, her rich friend whose grandfather is a large benefactor of the hospital. It turns out that it is not that relationship that is the source of all the speculation and gossip.

I thought the romance was very sweet. I would have loved to see them as an established couple navigating their differences and dealing with the reactions of others in their circles. they had an interesting dynamic. There is a secondary romance between Estelle and a young doctor trainee as well, whom the professor thinks is interested in Frances and vice versa. And I liked Frances who was very down to earth and was just spirited and irreverent enough to mitigate some of the meekness that was required with her superiors . The book is told in First Person and I liked her breezy, humorous and forthright tone. Unfortunately, the book suffers from an excess of not very memorable characters who I had a difficult time keeping straight as Frances is transferred to different posts in the same hospital. Also there was way too much out of date and specialized terminology tossed around which even Google couldn’t help with, that were like little speed bumps on a road. And also some out of date British slang was mildly irritating. All of the young medical students persist in referring to Estelle’s wealth as her “cash” or “lolly” . As in “Why can’t you just forget her cash, and treat her like a human being?” I don’t know it just took me out of the story. Not really the book’s fault.

The author, Lucilla Andrews, was one of those unsung female heroines who had to step up to the plate when the going got rough and at a time where women were, in our more enlightened eyes, discounted and scorned unless in their prescribed traditional roles. She began nursing during WWII and married a doctor who turned out to be a drug addict. When her husband was institutionalized, she turned to writing to support herself and her little daughter. In 1952, she sold her first short story for 25 guineas, equivalent to a month’s pay as a staff nurse. From then on she became an author of “hospital fiction.” One of her 37 books was autobiographical, No Time for Romance, about her experiences nursing in London during the Blitz. The Booker Prize winning British Novelist, Ian McEwen, based part of his 2001 Novel Atonement ( the basis of the Academy Award Winning movie), on her “superb reportage”. Even though he duly credited her in the acknowledgements, in some circles he was accused of plagiarism. Ms. Andrews was amused when she learned of his indebtedness to her memoir. Her reaction? “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.” According to her Obituary, Lucilla Andrews was “strong-minded, considerate, kind and great fun. She made friends wherever she lived…. She was fond of both whisky and cigarettes…and was famed for her elegance and enthusiasm for hats.”