{"product_id":"9781471163975-flesh-and-blood","title":"Flesh and Blood","description":"\u003cmeta content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\" http-equiv=\"Content-Type\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eA History of My Family in Seven Maladies\u003cbr\u003eA uniquely personal and insightful delve into one man’s family history, as seen through the prism of two-hundred years of medicine in the British Isles.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eHis family survived famine-ravaged Ireland in the 1850s.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e His ancestors settled in poverty-rife Victorian Liverpool, working to survive and thrive.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Some of them became soldiers serving in Gallipoli and on the Western Front.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e One would be the last man to step off the SS Titanic as it sank beneath the icy waves. He would testify at the inquest.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e This is their story.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Stephen McGann is \u003cb\u003eDoctor Turner \u003c\/b\u003ein the BBC hit-drama series \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCall the Midwife\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eFlesh and Blood \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eis the story of the \u003cb\u003eMcGann\u003c\/b\u003e family as told through \u003cb\u003eseven maladies\u003c\/b\u003e – diseases, wounds or ailments that have afflicted Stephen’s relatives over the last century and a half, and which have helped mould him into what he now perceives himself to be. It’s the story of how health, or the lack of it, fuels our collective will and informs our personal narrative. Health is the motivational antagonist in the drama of our life story - circumscribing the extent of our actions, the quality of our character and the breadth of our ambition. Our maladies are the scribes that write the restless and mutating genome of our self-identity.\u003cbr\u003e   \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eFlesh and Blood \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003ecombines McGann’s passion for \u003cb\u003egenealogy\u003c\/b\u003e with an academic interest in the social dimensions of medicine – and fuses these with a lifelong exploration of drama as a way to understand what motivates human beings to do the things they do. He looks back at scenes from his own life that were moulded by medical malady, and traces the crooked roots of each affliction through the lives of his  ancestors, whose grim maladies punctuate the public documents or military records of his family tree. In this way he asks a simple, searching question: how have these maladies helped to shape the story of the person he is today?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Rarewaves","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56451481239926,"sku":"9781471163975","price":5.37,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0092\/7504\/8033\/files\/stand_31849185.jpg?v=1760462698","url":"https:\/\/www.rarewaves.com\/products\/9781471163975-flesh-and-blood","provider":"Rarewaves.com","version":"1.0","type":"link"}