This is Going to Hurt: Now a major BBC comedy-drama

Adam Kay

Sep 2017 · Pan Macmillan

About this ebook

A Major BBC Series Starring Ben Whishaw. The multi-million copy bestseller and Book of the Year at The National Book Awards.

‘Painfully funny. The pain and the funniness somehow add up to something entirely good, entirely noble and entirely loveable.' - Stephen Fry

Welcome to the life of a junior doctor: 97-hour weeks, life and death decisions, a constant tsunami of bodily fluids, and the hospital parking meter earns more than you.

Scribbled in secret after endless days, sleepless nights and missed weekends, Adam Kay's This is Going to Hurt provides a no-holds-barred account of his time on the NHS front line. Hilarious, horrifying and heartbreaking, this diary is everything you wanted to know – and more than a few things you didn't – about life on and off the hospital ward.

Sunday Times Number One Bestseller for over eight months and winner of a record FOUR National Book Awards: Book of the Year, Non-Fiction Book of the Year, New Writer of the Year and Zoe Ball Book Club Book of the Year.

This edition includes extra diary entries and an afterword by the author.

Ratings and reviews

This is one of the most boring books I have ever ready in my entire life. Couldn't get past page 30, as I found the author's "sense of humor" a tad silly. The stories depicted in the book seem too exaggerated to be true, the author himself claims his boxers had once been soaked in blood, since his patient's genitals were spurting blood all over the area, yet the patient perfectly survived (I can't quite understand how can a patient suffer such a dramatic loss of blood, yet be "perfectly fine" after an hour's time). The story lacks coherence & seems more like a diary, its short notes of which were written down on a daily basis over the course of several years, much like a teenager would do. Needless to say the author's sense of humor is on the very silly end of the spectrum. Save yourself the bucks & the time.

A brief history of time, trauma and heart-rending honesty from the doctors chair, just bursting with grab your belly hilarious moments, toe-curling gross anecdotes, and most importantly, a frank account of the white-knuckle ride that being a junior doc for the NHS really involves. If it helps us to really recognise the stress they are under, that can only be a good thing. Don't forget to say thank you the next time you find yourself at the sharp end. It really does matter. Thanks Adam Kay for this wonderful book.

A book absolutely every single person needs to read. The funny is proper funny and the sadness is heartbreakingly sad But above all, the people who work in the NHS need ordinary people like you and me to advocate on their behalf and to Thank them for everything they do.

About the author

Adam Kay is an award-winning comedian and author of the multi-million-copy bestseller This is Going to Hurt and the festive diaries Twas the Nightshift Before Christmas. He previously worked as a junior doctor, which is hopefully clear by now. He lives in Oxfordshire.