Today on Book Break we are celebrating some of our biggest heroes: doctors and
nurses. And of course there are so many heroes that we're so grateful for,
especially at this time, everyone from hospital porterss to care workers and
social workers to every kind of essential worker, but in this video we
are celebrating doctors and nurses from history to the present, who have always
done so much for us to keep us safe. And I've got a mixture of fiction and
nonfiction in this video, quite a lot of books
because there are so many to celebrate these amazing people, so settle in. So
let's start with nonfiction, and I first of all want to mention a book that is
coming out in October. That is A Nurse's Story by Louise Curtis with Sarah
Johnson. So that is Louise Curtis's first-person account of being a
frontline nurse during the COVID-19 crisis, so absolutely
nail-biting stuff, and just her incredible account of what NHS staff are
going through every day. So that one is going to be amazing when it comes out in
October. But next I'll talk about some books you can get your hands on right
now. First up, War Doctor by David Nott. So
David Nott is a surgeon who works within the NHS, but he also volunteers to work
as a doctor in disaster zones and war zones, and he's been doing this for over
25 years. He's now considered the most experienced trauma surgeon in the world,
and in 2015 he actually set up a foundation to train other doctors to
deal with the same disasters, so this book is his memoir and it is incredibly
passionate and moving. And then for a classic memoir, The Wonderful Adventures
of Mrs. Seacole in many lands is the memoir of the nurse Mary Seacole
who was born in Jamaica and travelled through many countries, through the
Caribbean, through the Bahamas, through Central America, all the way to England
and she came to offer her support to troops during the Crimean War, and for a
long time was really really underappreciated, but she was so driven
by her desire to help people. So again this is an amazing memoir. And then of
course there's This is Going to Hurt by Adam Kay, a really famous one. Adam Kaye
was a doctor for many years, and this book is a collection of his diaries that
he kept as a junior doctor. So they are very very funny, unsurprisingly, because
Adam Kay did go on to become a comedy writer, but they're also very moving.
There are some stories in this book that will just absolutely take your breath
away, thinking about what doctors and nurses go through every single day, and
will make you even more grateful than you hopefully already were for our NHS.
And another very famous medical book is When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi,
which was sadly published posthumously. So this book is the memoir
of the neurosurgeon Paul Kalanithi. It's about his career, but also about his
own battle with lung cancer, which he died from at only 38 years old. So it's
particularly touching on that relationship between a doctor and
patient, written by somebody who has been both. And then there's The First Breath
by Olivia Gordon. So Olivia Gordon is a mother whose child was diagnosed with
this condition called hydrops fetalis via a scan while he was still in the
womb. So the book is about the surgery that he had to have while still in the
womb, as well as the first five months of his life spent in neonatal care after he
was born prematurely and very unwell. And so in the book Olivia Gordon, who's a
journalist, explores fetal and neonatal medicine, and the amazing doctors and
nurses who save and look after such fragile lives. s
So again, very moving. Then
a really interesting book is Black Man in a White Coat by Damon Tweedy. So Damon
Tweedy is a doctor who discovered himself that when he started medical
school that race and medicine intersected in so many more ways than he
imagined. So he faces racism himself as a Black doctor, but also came across so
many conditions and illnesses that were described as being much more common in
Black people, but without any proper research being done into why that was. So
the book is this investigation into the really complex economic and social
factors that might lead into a lot of the health problems within the Black
community. And Damon Tweedy himself is actually diagnosed with a chronic
condition that is known to be more common in Black patients. So he's really
exploring this issue from all sides, as a doctor and a patient. And it's this call
to action for more research that's needed, as well as more compassionate
care and better treatment of Black patients. So it's really eye-opening
stuff. For fans of shows like House, who love that intersection where medicine
meets mystery and almost detective work, you will love Unnatural Causes by Dr.
Richard Shepherd, who is a forensic pathologist. So he has performed
thousands of autopsies, including on really high-profile cases, and the book
is all about where medicine meets crime investigation. And then my last
nonfiction recommendation is Toxic Childhood Stress by Dr. Nadine Burke
Harris, which is a book that really highlights the importance of the medical
research going on behind the scenes. Dr. Burke Harris is the Surgeon General of
California, and this book is her groundbreaking research into the link
between childhood trauma and one's present and future health. And the book
also comes with a test where you can examine your own childhood experiences
and the effect that they might still be having on you now. Moving into fiction, a
book coming out this month is The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue. This is
set during the great flu epidemic, so a lot of parallels to our current
situation. It's set in a hospital in Ireland on a maternity ward, and it's
about a doctor, nurse and a volunteer, looking after these pregnant women who
are all being quarantined together after coming down with the flu.
So really scary stuff, but it is absolutely a story of hope and survival.
And then a classic fiction book is The Citadel by AJ Cronin. This is actually a
book which is credited with inspiring the creation of the NHS. It's about a
newly qualified doctor who goes to work in a Welsh mining town and discovers the
limitations of practicing medicine there, as well as the massive unfair contrasts
between the very exclusive expensive medical practices in London. A book that
was talked about a lot a few years ago was Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult. So
this is about an African-American delivery nurse who was told she's not
allowed to touch one of the babies in her nursery because the parents are
white supremacists. So when this baby goes into cardiac arrest when she's
the only nurse on duty, she hesitates for a moment before performing CPR because of
this order. And because of this she is then charged with a very serious crime.
So the book is about her going through this court case with a lawyer who
insists that they shouldn't even mention race at all.
Winter Soldier by Daniel Mason is a really heartbreaking book set in 1914
and it's about a young medical student called Lucius, who's only about 22, who
enlists to go to the war as a doctor and ends up being sent to this really remote
outpost where the soldiers are being looked after in a church, and are
completely infected with typhus, and all of the other doctors have fled. And
Lucius is still a student, he's never even so much as lifted a scalpel himself,
so he has to learn everything from the one nurse who remained, this amazing
woman called Sister Margarete. And then one day Lucius will make a decision that
ends up changing his life, the nurse's life, and the patient's life forever.
And then let's go a little bit more lighthearted for my final two
recommendations. The Temperance Brennan series by Kathy Reichs is the book
series that the TV show Bones is based on, it's loosely based on the books and
partly actually based on Kathy Reichs's life herself. So this is one of those
medical crime crossover series, it's a lot of fun. The series started in 1997
and there are 20 books so far, and they're still going. And then one more
series on that theme: the Kay Scarpetta series by Patricia Cornwell. David Baldacci
is a massive fan of this series. These books are about Kay Scarpetta who
is a medical examiner who solves murders, often using very recent forensic
technology, so again a really exciting series. So I would love to know your
favorite recommendations on this theme. And again we are just so grateful for
the amazing doctors and nurses who look after us, so I love books that really
shine a light on what they do. So leave us your recommendations, I will link here
to a playlist of loads more of our book recommendation videos for you to browse
through and I'll see you next time!