This continues the theme for February of reading biographies.
Adam Kay was one half of comedy musical act Amateur Transplants, very funny and very sweary. Check out their song London Underground for possibly their finest hour.
These days he's writing for TV while he's not touring with his music. Before that, he was a doctor in London. This book is extracts from his diary during that time.
This is without doubt the funniest thing I've read in years. It reduced me to helpless tears of laughter several times, and at least one uncontrollable giggling fit that lasted nearly 10 minutes.
Kay has a knack for phrasing in a way that makes almost anything funny. Some of the stories in this really shouldn't be quite so hilarious, but the way he tells them makes it, as per the Stephen Fry quote on the cover, painfully funny.
It is also heartbreaking as per the Jonathon Ross quote. Whilst the majority of the book keeps you giggling out loud, every now and then, he pulls the rug out from under you with a genuinely sad story. The story of why he quit as a doctor is particularly sad.
Another thing this book does his highlight exactly how much stress our NHS staff are under (and this was back in the noughties, it's only gotten worse in the intervening years). As well as making us laugh, this is a heartfelt plea to save the NHS. The point is made repeatedly how vital the NHS is to the country, and how pressured the doctors and nurses are. Humour is a great weapon to show the absurdities and truth behind the kind faces you see when you enter an NHS hospital.
I work in IT for the NHS as my day job, and so much about the way the organisation runs rings true. I'm lucky in having a 9-5, but my job roles over the years have given me insight into how the wards run. This book really threw open any blinds that were still closed to me.
So this isn't just one of the funniest books you'll ever read, it's one of the most important if you value the health service in this country.
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