While lunching on fried avocados with my writerly friend Mary DeMuth at Rockwall's Chiloso, I learned about the PBS series,  Call the Midwife. 

Based on the late Jennifer Worth's best-selling memoirs by the same title (handled by voiceovers from Vanessa Redgrave), the drama series follows the experiences of home health midwives and nursing nuns in 1950s East London. 

Considering my history of infertility and pregnancy loss, birth-related stories generally fall low on the priority list for means of personal entertainment. But Mary raved about season one's episode three and its depiction of grace. So I roped my hubby into watching the series with me, and we gave it a try. Yes, despite its girly title and topics, he consented to watch with me. What a guy!

To our surprise, the series has some compelling male characters to complement the terrific female ones. We found it totally worth our time—especially that episode Mary mentioned. Check it out.