Wildly successful book written by an ex-doctor about his experiences in the NHS. I had high hopes of this.

The audiobook is narrated by the author, who's a bit chirpy. I think he fancies himself as a comic writer (he's now moved to a career as a comedy writer I think).

It started off with anecdotes that take a chapter each, but are only a couple of minutes long. I thought this would be a reasonable amuse-bouche for the meat of the book - but in fact that is basically what the whole book is: one or two minute disjointed anecdotes which are sometimes mildly amusing but rarely chuckle worthy. There's hardly any running “plot” except for his difficulty making time to see his other half and a phone relationship he has with a friend who suffers from depression and needs someone to talk to. It reminds me of the sort of writing I did as a teenager when I was trying to be funny.

One example paraphrased from memory "The first time I had a patient texting during an examination I was a bit weirded out. But now it doesn’t seem unusual. Today I had a patient doing a FaceTime call while I was performing a cervical smear"

Various stories of patients with objects stuck up their bum etc. Can’t help being interesting but he doesn’t really make them very funny even though he tries to write them in a witty and arch style.

The book ends with with a heartfelt plea for the nhs which you can’t argue with.

I'm very surprised that this book has done so well: I mean, I can see the appeal of the book in principle but in practice I think it’s extremely weak.

Completed : 28-Sep-2019 (audiobook)