Check out the full review at Kritters Ramblings

The third in a series and this is one of those series where you should start at the beginning, so I may say some spoilers below, so warning you now!

Patience Hester is a midwife in a small community in West Virginia and as World War II is looming she is trying to help her community in any way she can. Patience is married to a veterinarian, Daniel, and although they are mostly in the same work field they feel completely different about this war. Daniel still has visions of World War I and they haunt him, so he can't imagine joining the draft and going to war again. This book is about their views on World War II and how their family survives this moment in time.

I was entertained by the first two books of the series, but not this one. What I liked most about the first two books were the midwife stories and how the author was able to weave in the history of the Great Depression. I was thinking this book would be more of the same but with World War II. There were fewer midwife stories and the World War II storyline was frustrating for me. I’m sure it’s my modern perspective but I really struggled with how Patience and other towns people treated Dan and his decision not to sign up for the draft, afterall he did serve in WWI. Isn’t that enough?! The ending also felt abrupt.

A solid 2,5 stars.

The third book in the Hope River series is set during the Second World War and midwife Patience Hester returns as the first person narrator. This book focuses mostly on the Hesters' domestic life as a family of six and how the outbreak of WW2 affects the small West Virginia community they live in.

This third book was a disappointment. The narration lacked the eloquence of the first book and we get exposed to one event after another and a lot of characters coming in and telling stories of what they have been up to over the past few years. There is a weak attempt at an overarching plot line, but it's very predictable. There is also a lot of repetition with dialogue and actions from the characters, which made them feel a little one-dimensional.

Harman has tried to make this book work as a standalone read and has chosen to run quick summaries here and there of events that took place in the first two books. Some of the background information is significant and it was sensible to have it recapped but a lot of it bore no relevance to the plot of this book. It ended up looking like clumsy reminiscing from Patience and the other characters.

I wish I could award this a higher rating because I enjoyed the first Hope River novel so much and I am still very fond of the characters and invested in what happens to them (I was delighted to see Bitsy return to Liberty!) Thus, I am fully intending on reading the fourth book in the series.

Not what I expected. Not enough births, too much revisiting past story lines, too much war.
Or maybe the book took too long to come in from the library

A good installment of the Hope River Midwife novels. This latest book is not my favorite of the three but is still a good, engaging story.

My primary issues with Once a Midwife are two.

First, I think she glosses over the race related stories. In the back commentary, she is asked about this and states that she believes WV was unique and people judged people more on their work ethic and goodness. This is a white woman speaking and I don’t know if the black people in the community would have the same opinion. No spoiler, but the issue is an interracial marriage and public celebration honoring it. I just don’t see this happening anywhere in the US in the 1940’s. My own interracial marriage in 1987 in the NE US had detractors enough. I think Harman was very naive here.

Second, I didn’t follow Harman making Patience’s character so much more dependent and whiny than the earlier books. She does have her get her “warrior midwife” back, but I wasn’t sure about this angle of the story. However, this was the author’s decision and wasn’t fantastical like the race topic.

I loved the birth stories again, especially the retained placenta story. Patience sure runs into a lot of women randomly giving birth here and there where she saves the day. Can’t say I’ve run into this much in my daily life, but hey, it’s a novel about a midwife.

By far my favorite book in this series! I wasn’t completely thrilled with the ending-kind of abrupt. Overall it was a great read adventuring through a ‘battle’ within a marriage. It was a great continuation of the other books. There was some reflecting back on things that had happened in the previous books but it could also stand alone.