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Book of the Week

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Serialised book readings, featuring works from various genres

Serialised book readings, featuring works of non-fiction, biography, autobiography, travel, diaries, essays, humour and history

BBC Radio 4 LW

Book of the Week: The Language of Kindness

Teresa Gallagher

Christie Watson

Penny Leicester

Elizabeth Allard

Book of the Week: The Language of Kindness: Episode 1

Episode 1

The Language of Kindness

BBC Radio 4 - Book of the Week, The Language of Kindness, Episode 1

Christie Watson's compassionate account of her 20-year nursing career.

Christie Watson's account of her nursing career is also an intimate portrait of hospital life where small acts of kindness make all the difference. Teresa Gallagher reads.

In her illuminating memoir, Christie Watson gives an account of her twenty year nursing career. At the heart of her intimate portrait of hospital life are the small acts of kindness and compassion that all of us will receive when we inevitably experience illness, whether it be ourselves or our loved ones. 

We accompany Christie when she becomes a student nurse filled with anxiety as she cares for a teenage boy who is about to receive a new heart and lungs. We'll be there when she qualifies and takes up a post in the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit where the children in her care are especially fragile. As the years progress, we'll discover how Christie's expertise develops. It's not long before she's mentoring junior nurses, responding to crash calls, and playing a pivotal role in caring for those at the end of their lives and those who are just beginning. As she nears the end of her years as a nurse the tables are turned when her father loses his fight to cancer and she receives the kindness and compassion that underpin what it means to nurse and to be nursed.

Christie Watson was a registered nurse for twenty years before becoming a full time, critically acclaimed and award winning writer. Her first novel, Tiny Sunbirds Far Away won the Costa First Novel Award. 

Read by Teresa Gallagher
Abridged by Penny Leicester
Produced by Elizabeth Allard.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Christie Watson's compassionate account of her 20-year nursing career. Read by Teresa Gallagher.

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