There are a lot of books that women can buy during pregnancy. There are books on nutrition, books on managing expectations, and books that tell the expecting mother want they need to know about the process of childbirth. So, needless to say, mothers have a lot of choices when it comes to these books. Unfortunately, there no book that tells pregnant women how to choose the best pregnancy book. However, there is this guide and we’re going to go over the books that we feel should be on any expecting mother’s bookshelf. Let’s take a look at them together and see what they have to offer the mother to be.

Quick Summary of the Best Pregnancy Books

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Best Overall Prenatal Health: Mayo Clinic Guide To A Healthy Pregnancy

Expecting mothers have a lot of information to sort through with all of the books and websites dedicated to the subject of pregnancy, so it can be difficult to keep straight what’s good information and what’s bad information. And that’s the reason why this book is so important. It’s an authoritative book that will help women make the healthiest decisions for their pregnancy, but it isn’t so big that it’s hard to search through. It provides just the essential information that mothers-to-be need for ensuring that their baby is as healthy as possible. It’s also a book that’s easily referenced, even when the expecting mother is on the go.

The information in this book has been written and provided by Myra Wick, an M.D with a Ph.D. who is a specialist in the Dept. of Obstetrics & Gynecology and the Depart of Clinical Genomics. She is also an associate professor at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine & Science. And if those qualifications aren’t enough, it should be said that she also has four children of her own. It’s for all of these reasons, and because this is some of the most seminal work on healthy pregnancies available, we’ve decided to give this book an enthusiastic two thumbs up.

What we liked about it
  • One of the most important books for an expecting mother to read.

Best Prenatal Nutrition: Real Food For Pregnancy

This book is written by Lily Nichols, a registered dietitian, and nutritionist who wanted to write a book with all of the prenatal nutrition information that expecting mothers want. Using only the most current scientific information available to her at the time, along with the time-honor wisdom of traditional cultures, she has created a book for the modern mother. And unlike other books on the subject, this one isn’t based on generally accepted ideas of what women should or shouldn’t eat during pregnancy. No, it only has information that is backed by the latest research. And anyone who wants to independently verify that face can look at this book’s over 930+ citations.

Inside of this book, she starts with the basics and then expounds from there so expecting mothers can easily take in the information as she gives it out. The first few chapters deal with the importance of eating real food, whether the mother should eat for two or not, and all the information an expecting mother could want on salt, fat, protein and micronutrients. From that point, she moves on to the foods that do and don’t build a healthy baby, meal plans, supplements, exercise, lab tests, toxins, stress and mental health, and the fourth trimester. It also features healthy recipes, although we do feel that a few more could’ve been included that what it had.

What we liked about it
  • It provides an in-depth examination of prenatal nutrition.

Best Pregnancy Book For Father: We’re Pregnant! The First-Time Dad’s Pregnancy Handbook

Pregnancy isn’t just stressful for the mother but is also stressful for the father as well. That’s why this book is so important. It’s a great introduction for father’s to the wonderful world of pregnancy and helps them to understand what they should expect out of the process. Although we didn’t feel that it had enough information for fathers beyond the second trimester, we still thought that it was a good introduction for fathers. And it’s written in an informal tone that helps to keep the father relaxed as they begin to contemplate the arrival of their new son or daughter.

Some of the things that fathers will find in this book include advice on meeting helpful family goals, keeping the household happy, as well as keeping the relationship healthy. It also has useful tips for the father who wants to bond with their newborn, what temperature bottles should be, and making a healthy family nest. And it also has a datebook that fathers can use to track important milestones and pregnancy vitals for the baby. All things considered, it’s a good book that will help guide new fathers through the first two trimesters.

What we liked about it
  • It’s a good introductory pregnancy book for first-time fathers.

Best Baby Journal: Bump To Birthday

For any parent looking for a way to keep track of all of their medical information on a developing baby through the newborn’s first year of life. It allows the parents to enter all of their vital information from their full name to their date and place of birth, hair color, eye color, and both parent’s mother’s and father’s names. It also features prompts where the expecting mother can put down why they first thought they were pregnant, their hopes and fears, family’s medical history, doctor’s name, and address, and other types of information that may be pertinent to the pregnancy.

Interspersed between the places where the mother can add information are facts about the pregnancy. All of these come together to make this a great future keepsake that mothers will be able to cherish for years to come. This book isn’t just good for parents to buy themselves, however, it’s also a good gift for people to give to their friends or family for Christmas or baby showers. It’s a cute baby journal, but we do wish that it had some lined, blank pages in it that could be used for journaling purposes. Other than that little oversight, it’s otherwise a great book.

What we liked about it
  • It’s a cute baby journal.

Best Mom’s Journal: The First-Time Mom’s Pregnancy Journal

As this journal says so eloquently on its first page: “Let’s make pregnancy an occasion when we appreciate our female bodies.” And that’s exactly what this journal does so well. It’s filled with monthly checklists, activities, and journal prompt that allow the mother to journal her progress through the pregnancy. There are also placed for baby bump photographs, as well as size comparisons that compare the size of the baby. For example, there’s a comparison between the baby at the end of the first month and things like poppy seeds, glitter specks, and grains of salt. And if the mother doesn’t like any of those comparisons, she can add her own.

There’s also a pregnancy stats trackers. In these sections, the mother can chronicle her reaction to the pregnancy. There are entries for her to write down things such as answers to the following questions: What are your feelings toward your new pregnant body? Have you noticed any changes in your body? Are you giving up any foods for the health of the baby? By the time the mother-to-be fills out their journal, they will have a timeline of their entire pregnancy that they can pass down through the generations. This book might cost more than comparable journals, but in our opinion, this well-made journal is worth it.

What we liked about it
  • It’s a very well made book.

Best Pregnancy Advice: Expecting Better

Mothers who are tired of some of the wishy-washy advice from their doctor concerning their morning latte or other bits of advice might want to look at this book. This is a book that isn’t condescending to the expecting mother, but instead offers solid advice on what they can and can’t do during pregnancy. It’s a pregnancy guide that’s driven purely by data and was written by Emily Oster—a professor of economics at Brown University who is also a mother of two. She was also a speaker at a 2007 TED conference and some of her work has been featured in publications such as the Esquire, The New York Times, and Forbes.

Some of the chapters that mothers-to-be can expect to see in this book include Miscarriage Fears, Beware of Deli Meats!, Nausea and my Mother-in-Law, The Surprising Perils of Gardening, Drug Safety, To Epidural or to Not Epidural, and The Vices: Caffeine, Alcohol, and Tobacco. And that’s only a small selection of the chapters that can be found in this book. All of this makes this pregnancy book one that not only challenges some of the conventional wisdom surrounding pregnancy but also puts the mother’s fears to ease. We highly recommend this book.

What we liked about it
  • Provides solid pregnancy advice.

Best Pregnancy Timeline: Nuture: A Modern Guide To Pregnancy, Birth, Early Motherhood & Trusting Yourself & Your Body

This book is written by Erica Chidi Cohen, the co-founder, and CEO of Loom in L.A., and she is a birth and postpartum Doula. She wrote this book as a gift to expecting mothers, to give them the information they need and do it without any judgment. It’s an all-in-one pregnancy and birthing book designed for modern-day mothers and their partners. And it’s designed in an easy-to-read way, yet provides the expecting mother with the information they so dearly need during their pregnancy. Because she has assisted an innumerable number of women with their births, she has firsthand experience to offer all of her readers.

Readers can expect a treasure trove of information in this book. Although we do think that some of the months could’ve been supplemented with a little bit more information, this book had most of the basics that expecting mothers need to be covered. In this book, readers will find forty helpful lists, illustrations, and charts. This book also covers an assortment of different topics including making the right choices for a hospital or birth center, whether to choose home or a hospital, an overview of breastfeeding basics and postpartum tips.

What we liked about it
  • It’s a good pregnancy book for expecting mothers.

Best Pregancy Basics Overview: Cribsheet: A Data-Driven Guide to Better, More Relaxed Parenting, from Birth to Preschool

This book is written by Emily Oster, an author whose books we’ve reviewed before. She’s an economics professor at Brown University, a 2007 TED conference speaker, and her work was featured in the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Esquire and Forbes. She’s also the mother of two children. Since we reviewed one of her books before, which can be found further up on this list, we kind of knew what we were getting with this book. However, we were expecting it to provide information on pregnancy and childbirth that we didn’t already know. Unfortunately, we were disappointed.

Now, don’t get us wrong, we’re not saying that this book is bad. We’re just saying that it feels incomplete to us. We think that it would probably be good for a first-time mother-to-be who hasn’t read a lot of other pregnancy books and is just looking for basic information. In that regard, it works very well. For people who don’t need the basics covered, however, it might not be worth their time. This book is 352 pages long, is filled with data-driven charts and graphs, and covers topics such as taking the baby home, sleep training, potty training, and a few other topics.

What we liked about it
  • It’s a decent book for expecting mothers who need some of the basics covered.

Best General Advice: What to Expect When You’re Expecting

Because of its popularity, we think that we would be hard-pressed to find an expecting mother that hasn’t heard about this book. After all, it’s been the number one bestseller and has even been featured in several romantic comedies and other movies. And this may prompt our readers to ask: if it’s so popular, then why isn’t higher on our list? Well, it’s not higher on our list because we didn’t feel that it was well written. We found it full of puns and parentheticals, and sometimes difficult to read through. However, once we were able to slug our way through this book, we did find some good information.

This book has often been called America’s pregnancy bible, and while we don’t agree with that assessment, we did find that it answered some of the most frequently asked questions. Questions that answer when the expecting mother should take a pregnancy test, whether or not they can keep their spinning classes if it’s possible to work until they deliver and when they should quit their job. And of course, it answers one of the most frequently asked questions of all time: When will I know that I’m in labor? All of those questions, and many more, are answered in this pregnancy book.

What we liked about it
  • It’s full of useful information.