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A review by booksare42
Belly Woman by Benjamin Oren Black
3.5
Thank you to The Write Reads for inviting me to join this tour and for providing me with the materials for it. Thank you to the publisher, Neem Tree Press, for providing me with a digital copy of this book through NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Belly Woman is a non-fiction book that is mostly set in Sierra Leone during the Ebola outbreak from 2014 to 2016. This book is not the kind of book I would normally reach for, but I’m glad that I read it because it was very eye-opening.
Belly Woman is not an easy book to read. It contains a lot of triggering content, including graphic descriptions of medical procedures, miscarriages, and lots of death. It was difficult to read about so many people dying because the system wasn’t properly equipped to handle the situation. I often found myself taking breaks between chapters to process what I had just read, but to also step away from the suffering depicted in this book.
Writing wise, I found Belly Woman to be easy to read and understand. It wasn’t bogged down with technical or medical terms. Even when medical procedures were being described and technical language was being used, it was easy enough to follow what was going on.
I learned a lot while reading this book, not just about Ebola and maternal medicine in Sierra Leone, but also a lot about humanitarian work and MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders)). This book opened my eyes to the balancing act between different international organizations and the governments of the countries they are assisting in.
I enjoyed meeting the people whose stories were told in this book. A lot of their stories were tough to read and lots of them ended in tragedy. I also enjoyed meeting Dr. Black’s colleagues, both the expats and the local professionals that worked at the sites. Meeting these people, learning their names, and hearing parts of their story added a human element to the crisis depicted in Belly Woman. This human element did make the book more difficult to read, but it also made it more powerful.
Overall, I thought Belly Woman was a very well-written and powerful read. I learned a lot while reading it and it also gave me a lot to think about and reflect upon.
Belly Woman is a non-fiction book that is mostly set in Sierra Leone during the Ebola outbreak from 2014 to 2016. This book is not the kind of book I would normally reach for, but I’m glad that I read it because it was very eye-opening.
Belly Woman is not an easy book to read. It contains a lot of triggering content, including graphic descriptions of medical procedures, miscarriages, and lots of death. It was difficult to read about so many people dying because the system wasn’t properly equipped to handle the situation. I often found myself taking breaks between chapters to process what I had just read, but to also step away from the suffering depicted in this book.
Writing wise, I found Belly Woman to be easy to read and understand. It wasn’t bogged down with technical or medical terms. Even when medical procedures were being described and technical language was being used, it was easy enough to follow what was going on.
I learned a lot while reading this book, not just about Ebola and maternal medicine in Sierra Leone, but also a lot about humanitarian work and MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders)). This book opened my eyes to the balancing act between different international organizations and the governments of the countries they are assisting in.
I enjoyed meeting the people whose stories were told in this book. A lot of their stories were tough to read and lots of them ended in tragedy. I also enjoyed meeting Dr. Black’s colleagues, both the expats and the local professionals that worked at the sites. Meeting these people, learning their names, and hearing parts of their story added a human element to the crisis depicted in Belly Woman. This human element did make the book more difficult to read, but it also made it more powerful.
Overall, I thought Belly Woman was a very well-written and powerful read. I learned a lot while reading it and it also gave me a lot to think about and reflect upon.