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Nightingales #11
Nightingale Wedding Bells
East London, 1917. War rages on, but for the Nightingale nurses, wedding bells are ringing…
Anna is over the moon when her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. As he recovers from injuries sustained in war, they make plans to be married. But the horrors of the trenches cast a long shadow.
Caring for shell-shocked soldiers brings untold challenges for Grace, and her parents have very different dreams for her future. Will she have the strength to forge her own path?
Meanwhile Dulcie has her sights firmly set on her own happy ending. Yet sometimes we find love where we least expect to.
Each nurse has her own battle to fight but they must pull together to find true happiness.
Anna is over the moon when her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. As he recovers from injuries sustained in war, they make plans to be married. But the horrors of the trenches cast a long shadow.
Caring for shell-shocked soldiers brings untold challenges for Grace, and her parents have very different dreams for her future. Will she have the strength to forge her own path?
Meanwhile Dulcie has her sights firmly set on her own happy ending. Yet sometimes we find love where we least expect to.
Each nurse has her own battle to fight but they must pull together to find true happiness.
413 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 3, 2019
116 people are currently reading
255 people want to read
About the author
Donna Douglas
35 books255 followersWelcome to my Goodreads page.
I'm the author of the Nightingale novels, a series of stories set in an East End hospital in the 1930s, published by Arrow.
The first in the series, The Nightingale Girls, follows the lives of three girls from very different backgrounds as they join the Nightingale Hospital as students. The second, The Nightingale Sisters, will be published next spring.
I'm originally from London, but I now live in the beautiful city of York.
I'm the author of the Nightingale novels, a series of stories set in an East End hospital in the 1930s, published by Arrow.
The first in the series, The Nightingale Girls, follows the lives of three girls from very different backgrounds as they join the Nightingale Hospital as students. The second, The Nightingale Sisters, will be published next spring.
I'm originally from London, but I now live in the beautiful city of York.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews
February 19, 2022
Ganz große Nightingale Schwestern Liebe!
April 21, 2022
Großartig!!!
October 8, 2019
Another lovely story following the lives of the nurses at the Nightingale Hospital,Anna,Grace,Dulcie,Miriam,Mary and Sylvia are looking after the injured soldiers and coping with life during the war,the friendships they have made help them cope.Dulcie is still determined to marry a wealthy Doctor and flirts with anything in a white coat while Grace always told she would never find a man to marry her as she is clumsy and tall but there s a man out there for everyone.This book has had me laughing,angry and emotional a BRILLIANT 5*
December 10, 2022
Lovely end to the series
October 29, 2019
I have loved all the books in this series and this one didn’t let me down at all it’s brilliant and full of romance heartbreak and weddings and of course plenty based in the hospital as well. Such a heartwarming read and worth far more than five stars.
Anna is so pleased as her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. He is in hospital recovering from injuries but they are making plans to get married. Her mother decides to move to Germany so she can be with her husband as he can’t stay in the country but he gives his bakery to Anna. Edward and Anna get married but the horror of the trenches really effects him and how will he be in his marriage does she realise she’s made a mistake in marrying him and has she left it to late. Then you have nurse grace who’s parents have dreams for her future and want her to marry someone they want her to be with but will she be able to make her own decisions about who she wants to marry or not. Then there is Dulce and she has the person she wants to marry in her sights but will he be the right person for her and will she realise she loves someone she isn’t expecting.
A fantastic read from start to end.
Anna is so pleased as her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. He is in hospital recovering from injuries but they are making plans to get married. Her mother decides to move to Germany so she can be with her husband as he can’t stay in the country but he gives his bakery to Anna. Edward and Anna get married but the horror of the trenches really effects him and how will he be in his marriage does she realise she’s made a mistake in marrying him and has she left it to late. Then you have nurse grace who’s parents have dreams for her future and want her to marry someone they want her to be with but will she be able to make her own decisions about who she wants to marry or not. Then there is Dulce and she has the person she wants to marry in her sights but will he be the right person for her and will she realise she loves someone she isn’t expecting.
A fantastic read from start to end.
October 10, 2019
Amazing
Another triumph Ms Douglas!!!! I have read all the Nightingale books, and they are all amazing. Please can we have more!!!!!
Another triumph Ms Douglas!!!! I have read all the Nightingale books, and they are all amazing. Please can we have more!!!!!
October 27, 2019
Absolutely brilliant . Love the Nightingale series and this is no exception .
October 25, 2020
What a range of events! Loved this book too, Donna is a truly great author! I hope theres another book coming....
December 21, 2019
I’ve knocked this down to 3 stars because I’m annoyed with all the errors in it. Was the editing process bypassed?
Major characters from the previous book are shoved to the periphery (Sadie Sedgewick, Eleanor Copeland, Dr. Carlyle); so don’t look for much more on them. This book focuses on Anna Beck, Grace Duffield, and Dulcie Moore. Their storylines are somewhat predictable, with some character growth, but not a lot. Other minor characters pop up by name every now and again leaving you to wonder who they are and where they came from.
Overall okay but not terrific.
Major characters from the previous book are shoved to the periphery (Sadie Sedgewick, Eleanor Copeland, Dr. Carlyle); so don’t look for much more on them. This book focuses on Anna Beck, Grace Duffield, and Dulcie Moore. Their storylines are somewhat predictable, with some character growth, but not a lot. Other minor characters pop up by name every now and again leaving you to wonder who they are and where they came from.
Overall okay but not terrific.
September 24, 2021
East London, 1917.
Anna is over the moon when her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. As he recovers from injuries sustained in war, they make plans to be married. But the horrors of the trenches cast a long shadow.Caring for shell-shocked soldiers brings untold challenges for Grace, and her parents have very different dreams for her future. Will she have the strength to forge her own path?
Meanwhile Dulcie has her sights firmly set on her own happy ending. Yet sometimes we find love where we least expect to.
Each nurse has her own battle to fight but they must pull together to find true happiness.
The Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) was a voluntary unit of civilians providing nursing care for military personnel in the United Kingdom and various other countries in the British Empire. The most important periods of operation for these units were during both World Wars. Although VADs were intimately bound up in the war effort, they were not military nurses, as they were not under the control of the military, unlike the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps, the Princess Mary's Royal Air Force Nursing Service, and the Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service. The VAD nurses worked in field hospitals, i.e., close to the battlefield, and in longer-term places of recuperation back in Britain.Neurasthenia is a term that was first used at least as early as 1829 for a mechanical weakness of the nerves and became a major diagnosis in North America during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The flow of casualties from the various theatres of war soon overwhelmed the existing medical facilities in Great Britain and Ireland. Many civilian hospitals and large buildings were turned over to military use. Shell shock is a term coined in WWI by British psychologist Charles Samuel Myers to describe the type of PTSD many soldiers were afflicted with during the war. It is a reaction to the intensity of the bombardment and fighting that produced a helplessness appearing variously as panic and being scared, flight, or an inability to reason, sleep, walk or talk.
Anna is over the moon when her sweetheart Edward returns from the front line. As he recovers from injuries sustained in war, they make plans to be married. But the horrors of the trenches cast a long shadow.Caring for shell-shocked soldiers brings untold challenges for Grace, and her parents have very different dreams for her future. Will she have the strength to forge her own path?
Meanwhile Dulcie has her sights firmly set on her own happy ending. Yet sometimes we find love where we least expect to.
Each nurse has her own battle to fight but they must pull together to find true happiness.
The Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) was a voluntary unit of civilians providing nursing care for military personnel in the United Kingdom and various other countries in the British Empire. The most important periods of operation for these units were during both World Wars. Although VADs were intimately bound up in the war effort, they were not military nurses, as they were not under the control of the military, unlike the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps, the Princess Mary's Royal Air Force Nursing Service, and the Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service. The VAD nurses worked in field hospitals, i.e., close to the battlefield, and in longer-term places of recuperation back in Britain.Neurasthenia is a term that was first used at least as early as 1829 for a mechanical weakness of the nerves and became a major diagnosis in North America during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The flow of casualties from the various theatres of war soon overwhelmed the existing medical facilities in Great Britain and Ireland. Many civilian hospitals and large buildings were turned over to military use. Shell shock is a term coined in WWI by British psychologist Charles Samuel Myers to describe the type of PTSD many soldiers were afflicted with during the war. It is a reaction to the intensity of the bombardment and fighting that produced a helplessness appearing variously as panic and being scared, flight, or an inability to reason, sleep, walk or talk.
October 21, 2019
I love love love this series. From book one in the 1930's to the end of the war, to the two prequel books and I can only hope that this is not the end of this wonderful captivating series. I admit I was disappointed that there were only two books following these young women during WWI, but I'll take what I can get. We follow the same group as last time, although Kate the doctor from the last book is sadly hardly mentioned except for her opening a ward for the men with shell shock. But we still have Anna, Dulcie and Grace to follow. Anna is running herself ragged between work at the hospital and helping her mother keep the family bakery up and running. But soon her mother will drop a bombshell on her that will devastate and change everything. Dulcie is still determined to marry a rich doctor and when one of her fellow nurses becomes engaged to one of her old flames she becomes determined to win him back, until a new doctor arrives on the scene. Grace is still the lovable clumsy girl she always was. Thinking herself a hopeless and lost cause, a trip home for the holidays looks to change everything for her. The usual dramas unfold. Anna is thrilled when her fiance Edward returns from the front. She of course has no idea what he is really like and that he was the cause of so much of her troubles in the previous book. The book sees each character find her place in the world, and each gets their own romantic storyline, even though there are many obstacles to overcome to get there. In say this each time, but I think this had to be the best one up on the series yet and had me reading until well into the night. I hope this isn't the end. I want, no I need more from this series.
October 19, 2019
I have absolutely loved the Nightingale series, and Donna Douglas’ latest story delighted as usual.
I liked the way in which the soldiers of WWI who were suffering from shell shock had the story of the book woven around them. I was incredibly moved. In 1914-18, shell shock was something new for everyone to absorb. More often than not the Army accused them of LMF. Senior Officers had no time for soldiers not up to the mark. The conditions the men had to live in, the things they saw, it was a wonder anyone came back sane. You only have to think of the number of young boys ‘Shot at Dawn,’ for cowardice who were probably more often than not suffering from shell shock. I loved Duffield’s story, she was the right nurse to look after these men and she got a happy ending
My only criticism would be that she dispatched WWI in just two books. Also, to me, I wish she had written these two first and run the story in time order. I kept forgetting what had happened in the previous book and all too often the nurses/Sisters of the earlier Nightingale books who in fact are the Sisters of 20 years down the line like Trott and Hanley floated foremost in my mind.
I do hope though the author will write some more Nightingale books, possibly set after WWII and the introduction of the NHS; or further back again - now that era I would enjoy. Late Victorian/Edwardian period. Long live the Nightingales. (Maybe I should now reread the series)
I liked the way in which the soldiers of WWI who were suffering from shell shock had the story of the book woven around them. I was incredibly moved. In 1914-18, shell shock was something new for everyone to absorb. More often than not the Army accused them of LMF. Senior Officers had no time for soldiers not up to the mark. The conditions the men had to live in, the things they saw, it was a wonder anyone came back sane. You only have to think of the number of young boys ‘Shot at Dawn,’ for cowardice who were probably more often than not suffering from shell shock. I loved Duffield’s story, she was the right nurse to look after these men and she got a happy ending
My only criticism would be that she dispatched WWI in just two books. Also, to me, I wish she had written these two first and run the story in time order. I kept forgetting what had happened in the previous book and all too often the nurses/Sisters of the earlier Nightingale books who in fact are the Sisters of 20 years down the line like Trott and Hanley floated foremost in my mind.
I do hope though the author will write some more Nightingale books, possibly set after WWII and the introduction of the NHS; or further back again - now that era I would enjoy. Late Victorian/Edwardian period. Long live the Nightingales. (Maybe I should now reread the series)
February 14, 2023
Omg I nearly cried when I hit the last page, I have loved this series, kept the festive ones for Christmas and the wedding one for Valentine.
This was absolutely a perfect ending, just so sad it's over.
Anna finally gets reunited when he returns home from the war, clumsy yet sweet Grace finally gets some luck in love and Dulcie is determined to bag her doctor husband but suddenly she falls for someone totally unexpected.
I have loved all the characters, all the dramas, relationships, heartbreaks and tie in novellas.
The series often had me in tears but in a good way as if a book can move you, you really care about the characters and what you are reading.
I soooo hope these characters will be revisited in the future somehow as I've taken them all to my heart.
What more can I say?
Haven't enjoyed a series of books like this in a while.
This was absolutely a perfect ending, just so sad it's over.
Anna finally gets reunited when he returns home from the war, clumsy yet sweet Grace finally gets some luck in love and Dulcie is determined to bag her doctor husband but suddenly she falls for someone totally unexpected.
I have loved all the characters, all the dramas, relationships, heartbreaks and tie in novellas.
The series often had me in tears but in a good way as if a book can move you, you really care about the characters and what you are reading.
I soooo hope these characters will be revisited in the future somehow as I've taken them all to my heart.
What more can I say?
Haven't enjoyed a series of books like this in a while.
June 6, 2024
Anna's fiance Edward has returned from the war. As they make plans for marriage, we see that the Edward who come home is very different. Grace is offered a chance to help her family, but at the cost of sacrificing her chance of happiness and finding true love. Dulcie is determined to find a rich man and sees her chance when a handsome new doctor joins the staff. However, we can't choose who we fall in love with. This was a great read, full of thrills and surprises.
December 26, 2025
Having read the first one in this series I really enjoyed it and reading again it didn’t disappoint. I liked that it wasn’t a forgone conclusion about who each of them would end up with. Though Anna really did do my head in with how pathetic and delusional of her husband she was. She knew deep down but just didn’t want to admit it out loud.
I’ve enjoyed them so much that I’ve got the first two books in the main series. Looking forward to starting it.
I’ve enjoyed them so much that I’ve got the first two books in the main series. Looking forward to starting it.
October 15, 2019
Brilliant easy read
Loved every book in this great series. Following the lives of the Nightingale nurses and the patients they care for can have you laughing one minute and in floods of tears the next. Though they always end well. Hope there will be more from the Nightingale Nurses
Loved every book in this great series. Following the lives of the Nightingale nurses and the patients they care for can have you laughing one minute and in floods of tears the next. Though they always end well. Hope there will be more from the Nightingale Nurses
October 28, 2019
Lives devastated by war and loss
A story of love’s lost and found, lives forever changed because of the War, horror and hope. This story brings to life those years toward the end of WWI in England and the lives of nursing friends working to overcome all odds. It is pathos and hope combined in a well told, realistic story I enjoyed
A story of love’s lost and found, lives forever changed because of the War, horror and hope. This story brings to life those years toward the end of WWI in England and the lives of nursing friends working to overcome all odds. It is pathos and hope combined in a well told, realistic story I enjoyed
October 10, 2019
Another fabulous book about the Nightingales in WW1.
We catch up with Anna Grace and Dulcie as the War draws to a close and I was impressed with the way Anna's difficult marriage was described .
More books soon please
We catch up with Anna Grace and Dulcie as the War draws to a close and I was impressed with the way Anna's difficult marriage was described .
More books soon please
October 30, 2019
A great rea
I really enjoyed this book,it goes back in time to the Nightingale in WW1 ,when all the characters were young. I hope eventually this set of stories will come full circle to WW2
I really enjoyed this book,it goes back in time to the Nightingale in WW1 ,when all the characters were young. I hope eventually this set of stories will come full circle to WW2
January 19, 2020
I have completed all of the books in this series! It is powerful, intriguing and uplifting with characters that inspire me in love, braving war times and in the challenging but courageous career of nursing. Well done Donna Douglas!❤👩⚕️
October 23, 2020
I think this is the last in the series which makes me sad as its so good. This centres on Dulcie, Anna and Grace. Dulcie dreams of bagging herself a doctor for a husband, Anna dreams of working in the family bakery and Grace just wishes she wasn't so clumsy. Loved it as usual!
November 1, 2021
This is pretty much Call the midwife but set in WW1 with soldiers instead of babies. It's quite entertaining, but I would have liked a little more depth. And the end was very rushed - after all that build we suddenly skipped along to the happy ever after - what happened to the romantic climax?
October 8, 2019
Nightingale
This is the second ww1 book every bit as good as book 1 the faces and names become as familiar as any nightingale book a fantastic read 5 STARS.
This is the second ww1 book every bit as good as book 1 the faces and names become as familiar as any nightingale book a fantastic read 5 STARS.
October 18, 2019
Good but not as good as the previous ones
November 19, 2019
Lovely read for christmas
November 22, 2019
Fantastic as I expected
January 24, 2020
Love
Donna Duglas never fails to deliver I feel I know all the characters and loo forward to reading the next chaps of their lives
Donna Duglas never fails to deliver I feel I know all the characters and loo forward to reading the next chaps of their lives
April 9, 2020
Donna Douglas is one of my favourite historical fantasy writers and this book continues in the world of the nightingale hospital. Great for fans of her work!
May 5, 2020
Loved this series loved reading all the books in ww1 following the lives of all the nurses and doctors a brilliant read x
May 10, 2020
A wonderful book and a perfect end to the nightingale books
Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews