Tracy Hogg: Secrets of the Baby Whisperer

Vermilion

$34.95

For those of us lucky enough to raise our babies around experienced Plunket nurses, this book will simply confirm much of their astute advice. It offers kind common sense over ideology, and is in favour of routine as a means of ensuring the well-being of both baby and parents.

The author is an English nurse who specialised in maternity and neo-natal care before moving to Los Angeles where she founded a private consultancy for the parents of new babies. But her moniker, the Baby Whisperer, seems mere LA myth-making, and Hogg's English motherliness and phraseology (luv, dear and how about a cup of tea, then?) must also have contributed to her success in her brash new environment.

In the end, her secret is simply that we should communicate with and respect our babies as if they are actually human.