MY HEART HAS SEVENTEEN ROOMS

by Carol Bartholomew ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 2, 1959

The ""seventeen rooms"" of this pleasantly written book belong to the small hospital in Nangal in the northern Punjab where the author, wife of an American construction engineer, worked for two and a half years under a brilliant and dedicated Indian surgeon, Dr. Babbar, who with limited funds was successfully fighting disease, dirt, flies and superstition. Arriving in Nangal in 1954 with her three small boys and her husband, who was working on the huge Bhakra Dam, the author encountered Indian village life face to face, not as a tourist. With affection and understanding she writes of friends and devoted servants, the everlasting flies, the birth of her fourth son; of the dam and the men who came to it: Nehru, who opened it, Khrushchev, the Dalai Lama, and his brother, whose emergency appendectomy nearly wrecked the tiny hospital -- and above all, of the hospital itself. This charming and unpretentious book should appeal to those who know India and to armchair travelers who do not, to doctors and nurses interested in foreign medical developments, and to casual addicts of books on life in far countries; government officials may profit from its comments on Indian man-in-the-street reactions to America and Americans.

Pub Date: June 2, 1959

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Macmillan

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1959

Categories: NONFICTION