Gabbe, by comparison, is easier to read and covers essentially the same material. This text is written in a way that that I feel you don't have to be an OB Geek to follow the various points. This is NOT to say that Gabbe is "OB for Dummies" or a cliff-notes version of an OB text: As Department Head of OB/GYN at a Major Hospital, I find Gabbe both authoritative and complete.

Cutting to the chase: Gabbe is easier to read than Williams, and if you need info more in-depth, you should already be a fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology anyway (or at least a junior fellow), which means that you're accessing the ACOG website on-line anyway.

Each of the chapters are relatively easy to read, but the
coverage tends to vary in depth. It is clearly not the
intention of the authors to provide the reader with last
word on each topic, but ample references show the

way further. Statistical data, when provided, are up to
date and consistent with the quoted references.

I particularly liked the chapters on labor and delivery,
malpresentations and caesarians. A lot of chapters are
dedicated to pregnancies complicated by (maternal) pathologies
and there is even a chapter on neonatal care. Some of the
authors tend to "overdo it a bit" when fulminating against
unneccessary caesarians, but considering the incidence data
in America compaired to the rest of the developed world, they
do have a point.

I can recommend this book to anyone looking for an excellent
starter in obstetrics, but I tend to disagree with another
reviewer calling it "the Nelson (in pediatrics) for OB",
because it has much less the intention to be comprehensive.