Did you miss this book review from Roy Lilley?
The book Roy reviews has been been written by our Fab Ambassador, Jennie Negus
Let’s cheer ourselves up. Goodness knows, we all deserve a bit of cheer. Something good.
Something that that cranks up a notch on the scale of the warmth-of-human-kindness.
Restores your faith in people. Reminds you; the world is full of the good-stuff.
This is a book. A unique book, that arrives, lovingly wrapped in tissue paper, with a thank-you card.
It’s all the work of Jennie Negus. A former nurse. Who, from humble beginnings, made it to the top of her profession.
Yes, I know, there are...
... books about the nursing profession....
... books that document its history, and...
... books that campaign for its future...
... this book, called 'Holding Their Stories' does something rarer and more valuable.
It quietly opens the door into the lived reality of nursing and allows us to stand alongside someone who devoted her life to caring for others. Jennie Negus writes beautifully, personally with warmth, honesty and a deeply authentic voice.
From her nervous arrival as an eighteen-year-old student nurse at The London Hospital in Whitechapel in 1978, through decades of NHS life, she takes us on a journey that is at once personal, emotional and profoundly human.
This is not a glossy account of heroics or nostalgia. It’s something much better… a truthful memoir of what nursing actually felt like.
The great strength of the book lies in its detail. Negus remembers the smell of hospital laundry drifting through open sash windows. The starch of uniforms, the rituals of ward life and the camaraderie that sustained exhausted young nurses through impossible shifts.
The result is not merely description. It’s immersion; the reader is transported into a vanished world of Nightingale wards, caps and aprons, strict ward Sisters and long nights on duty.
Yet, beneath the humour and vivid storytelling runs a deeper current.
Again and again, the book returns to the central truth that nursing is fundamentally about people.
Patients are never reduced to diagnoses or bed numbers. They are individuals carrying fear, courage, vulnerability and humour into moments of illness and uncertainty.
Some encounters are funny, some heartbreaking, and many will linger in your memory long after the chapter ends.
Negus is also refreshingly honest about her own mistakes and insecurities as a young nurse...
... lesser memoirs smooth away these moments, but here they become part of the emotional backbone of the book.
The result is a portrait not of perfection, but of growth. Of someone learning, shift by shift, how to care, how to cope and how to remain human in an environment that could often be physically and emotionally overwhelming.
Importantly, Holding Their Stories is more than a memoir for nurses. Anyone interested in the NHS, in healthcare, or simply in the ordinary acts of compassion that shape people’s lives will find something here.
The book captures not only how much nursing has changed over the decades, but also what must never be lost… kindness, dignity, humour and...
... the importance of simply being present.
At a time when healthcare is often discussed in terms of targets, systems and crises, Jennie Negus reminds us of the human stories at its heart. This is a generous, moving and deeply readable memoir. One that deserves a wide audience.
Above all, it will leave you with enormous respect for the profession and for the people who quietly carry the stories of others throughout their lives.
These days a lot is said about the future of nursing. Technology, skills, finance … all and any of which will force changes.
Of course they will, but…
… if the foundations are based on what is in Jennie Negus’ book we have nothing to fear. This book is what nursing is. Should be and always must be.
The book comes gift wrapped with a personal message from Jennie, making it an ideal present, a gift for someone starting out. A keepsake for someone who, like Jennie has been-there-done-it-got the T-shirt.
For someone like me, hard-boiled and cynical I can only suspect there is something more than print on the pages, that brought a tear to my eye, and made me laugh out loud…
… that’s not easy to do.
Jennie has self published her immaculate book and her pictures, and gives away with it, her heart and soul… and... it is the best ten quid you’ll ever invest in a book. Enjoy!
You can buy the book directly from Jennie's Etsy store
This is a message from Jennie about her book :
"Following an overwhelming response to the launch of my book I sold out the first print run in pretty much one morning!!! I am sorting a second print run and hope to be able to dispatch from Monday 22nd June.
For forty-seven years, I worked as a nurse in the NHS — and this book is a reflection of the people, moments, and experiences that shaped that journey.
Holding Their Stories is a deeply personal memoir about care, connection, and what it really means to be there for others — from my early days on the ward through to senior leadership, and the extraordinary challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Self published and with 296 pages I hope this will resonate with nursing colleagues and non-nursing too - the fact is we are all patients at some stage in our lives.
Each copy is carefully wrapped by me and includes a handmade bookmark from my shop"