Title: Milk
Author: Emma Rosen
Type: Non-Fiction
Page Count: 326
Rating: 3.75/5
I was sent a copy of this book by the author in exchange for a copy of one of mine, but while I think it’s important to include a disclaimer here, it doesn’t affect my opinion of the book. In fact, I was a little worried that I wasn’t going to be able to enjoy it purely because of the subject matter. It’s basically a mixture between a memoir and a how-to guide for breastfeeding, but there are a few things to it that I think make it accessible to a more general readership than new and expectant mums.
For a start, there’s the research that Rosen carried out, and indeed at the end of the book there’s a comprehensive list of all of the sources that were used if you want to read more. This is coupled with Rosen’s own reminiscences, so you get just the right mixture of anecdotal versus scientific evidence. For me, that’s something that I actively try to seek out in the books that I read, and I think that Rosen did a cracking job of things.
The only thing that I can really complain about here is the fact that it felt a little bit top heavy, in that the first half of the book dealt with her first child, then the following third dealt with her second and the final sixth of it covered her third and final child. But I suppose that can’t be helped because of the nature of the book – by the time that she had her third child, there was less for her to learn, although there were still a few bits here and there that she still had to discover.
All in all, I’m sure that this book isn’t for everyone, but then I thought it wouldn’t be for me and I was pleasantly surprised. Good stuff!
