anyone have good book recommendations?

Started by hopflyacptd123
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hopflyacptd123

hopflyacptd123

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looking to do some leisure reading before medical school starts, since there won't be too much time for it later on.

I was wondering if anyone could recommend any books they have read that they truly enjoyed.

It can be about medicine, science or anything really, just looking for something good.

Thanks!
 
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I Just finished When The Air Hits Your Brain a couple days ago and I thought it was a great read. Just an entertaining and interesting collection of stories from a neurosurgeon. I also thoroughly enjoyed The House of God which many people on here will likely recommend (you may want to pass on it if you don't like dark humor.) I personally HATED When Breath Becomes Air which is supposed to be a true story but is riddled with ridiculous naive BS, and is filled with the author bragging about how great he was. I couldn't get through it, luckily audible accepts returns!

I'm currently reading The Emperor of All Maladies, which has so far been good, although long.
 
partypantss said:
I personally HATED When Breath Becomes Air which is supposed to be a true story but is riddled with ridiculous naive BS
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What experiences in your years as a pre-med give you the right to deem a brilliant physician - who attended Stanford for undergrad and grad school, Cambridge for more grad school, medical school at Yale, and neurosurgery residency at Stanford - "naive"?

partypantss said:
and is filled with the author bragging about how great he was
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It's not really bragging if it's objectively true and directly related to the important messages he was trying to convey.

Is it really so offensive to you that a dying man believe and admit that he made a difference in the world before he passed away?
 
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Certainly not anything related to the medical field, but I'd recommend either "Angle of Repose" or "Big Rock Candy Mountain" by Wallace Stegner
 
aalamruad said:
When Breath Becomes Air
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Seconded. Highly recommend. It is a really quick read.
partypantss said:
The Emperor of All Maladies, which has so far been good, although long.
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Also seconded, especially if you have any interest in oncology. It is definitely dense and has high level vocabulary. I didn't really enjoy it when I was reading small bits each day, but when I sat down and committed some time to it, it was much easier to digest.

Other medicine related books that are good: Mountains Beyond Mountains; anything by Atul Gawande.

Don't feel you need to read all medically related books. I just finished The Martian, and it was surprisingly better than the movie/freaking hilarious!
 
Oscar Wilde. His most famous work, The Picture of Dorian Gray, is clever, though I prefer his fairy tales/short stories, especially "The Star Child."

I personally have not read but intend to read The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down which is about medicine.

Spent the past year working through Les Miserables bit by bit and I really enjoy it.

If you haven't finished all of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, or Narnia (there are 7 Narnia books!) then that should be your first priority. Obviously.
 
Anything by Bernard Cornwell
Laura Joh Rowland's Sano Ichiro detective novels
Any of the Easy Rawlins or Leonid McGill novels by Walter Moseley

For something more medicine related:
The Emperor of all Maladies by
The Greatest Benefit to Mankind by Roy Porter by Siddhartha Mukherjee
These stories by Berton Roueche: The Medical Detectives; The Medical Detectives II; The Man Who Grew Two Breasts: And Other True Tales of Medical Detection; A Man Named Hoffman and Other Narratives of Medical Detection and Eleven Blue Men, and Other Narratives of Medical Detection



hopflyacptd123 said:
looking to do some leisure reading before medical school starts, since there won't be too much time for it later on.

I was wondering if anyone could recommend any books they have read that they truly enjoyed.

It can be about medicine, science or anything really, just looking for something good.

Thanks!
Click to expand...
 
The intelligent investor by benjamin graham should be required reading for everyone but especially if plan to be rolling in dough as a doc

I also second the LotR trilogy too
 
When I was a freshman in undergrad, I read Blessed Days of Anaesthesia by Stephanie J. Snow. It is a very easy read and is a fascinating tale of the origins of anaesthetics and of the modern operating room as we know it.
 
Still Alice. It's about a middle aged woman who is diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's and the story is told from her point of view. It's a quick read, I couldn't put it down and finished it in a day, but very emotional.
 
Novel: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Non-fiction: The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson (Great Migration of African Americans from the South)

Short stories: The Coast of Chicago by Stuart Dybeck

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (her subsequent book My Name is Lucy Barton, is short but takes a long time to unpack... she has a new book out featuring some of the peripheral characters in the Lucy Barton book. It is titled Anything is Possible and at the moment it is only in hardback.)
 
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I'm a fan of The Spark of Life by Frances Ashcroft, but I'm a bit of an ephys nerd so maybe I'm biased. Not science related, I'm a big Vonnegut fan.
 
aalamruad said:
What experiences in your years as a pre-med give you the right to deem a brilliant physician - who attended Stanford for undergrad and grad school, Cambridge for more grad school, medical school at Yale, and neurosurgery residency at Stanford - "naive"?


It's not really bragging if it's objectively true and directly related to the important messages he was trying to convey.

Is it really so offensive to you that a dying man believe and admit that he made a difference in the world before he passed away?
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The dude did have a lot of amateur philosophizing in the book, the tone and cadence of the book also left a lot to be desired. Credentials are not what impress me about an author, it is rather the ideas conveyed in their book and the manner in which they are conveyed.
 
libertyyne said:
The dude did have a lot of amateur philosophizing in the book, the tone and cadence of the book also left a lot to be desired. Credentials are not what impress me about an author, it is rather the ideas conveyed in their book and the manner in which they are conveyed.
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I'm not saying you must be impressed by the book or the author, I'm saying it's ridiculous to call someone of his caliber "naive."

Just out of curiosity, what parts of the book did you think included amateur philosophizing (other than the few pages detailing his return to Christianity and his reasons for believing in God, which I found a bit lacking, but perhaps necessary rationalizations for someone trying to cope with his own mortality)?
 
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I'll throw in another plug for the Emperor of All Maladies. It really is a great sort of "biography" of cancer and the progression of its treatment throughout history.

I actually really liked When Breath Becomes Air, and while there may have been some "amateur philosophizing" @libertyyne I don't think any of it was intended to be taken in contrast as "professional philosophizing." His story was compelling and resonated, at least in my opinion.

Another great book is "Thinking Fast and Slow."

I know you asked for books, but I'm going to give you some articles I think every future physician should keep in mind. These three articles provide a nicely contrasting, and I think beneficial, paradigm to our predominantly biomedical view on disease and illness:
  1. Social Conditions As Fundamental Causes of Disease on JSTOR
  2. The Questionable Contribution of Medical Measures to the Decline of Mortality in the United States in the Twentieth Century on JSTOR
  3. The Social Construction of Illness: Key Insights and Policy Implications
If you're interested and would like some more articles like these, PM me.
 
These are all fiction and non-medical because honestly, take a break before med school:

If you like funny/clever mysteries, anything by Dorothy Sayers (the Lord Peter Wimsey series has long and short stories--the Nine Tailors is my fav)
The Amelia Peabody Series by Elizabeth Peters is historical fiction (victorian era Egyptology) murder mysteries?? Sounds crazy, but a great read and amazing if you like really accurate history (the author is an actual egyptologist)
If you want to laugh, literally anything by Carl Hiaasen
I think the Importance of Being Ernest is one of Oscar Wilde's best and less well known works.
If you like urban-fantasy-slash-hardboiled-detective Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden series is good (gets darker farther in but the first handful are pretty light and entertaining)
For scifi, Dune. (Skip the sequels)

Oh and one (mostly) non-fiction, Travels with Charlie by Steinbeck. A brilliant look at the character of America and its people, and way less stodgy than some of his more academic works.
 
aalamruad said:
I'm not saying you must be impressed by the book or the author, I'm saying it's ridiculous to call someone of his caliber "naive."

Just out of curiosity, what parts of the book did you think included amateur philosophizing (other than the few pages detailing his return to Christianity and his reasons for believing in God, which I found a bit lacking, but perhaps necessary rationalizations for someone trying to cope with his own mortality)?
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It has been a while since I read this but I am just stating the impression I got reading through and that it left with me. Here are some of the things that seemed not hashed out or fairly rudimentary in his thought process that were touched upon in the book.

Religion,
Nature of Consciousness
Children
Grief

I dont know if it was the amateur philosophizing that left a bitter taste in my mind. His discussion about those topics and how he dealt with his own mortality didn't scream deep thought to me. The writing style/cadence was also not pleasing to read.

I would argue that the chapter written by his wife at the end was much more touching and thoughtful, even written better IMHO.

Once again this is just my opinion.
 
aalamruad said:
What experiences in your years as a pre-med give you the right to deem a brilliant physician - who attended Stanford for undergrad and grad school, Cambridge for more grad school, medical school at Yale, and neurosurgery residency at Stanford - "naive"?


It's not really bragging if it's objectively true and directly related to the important messages he was trying to convey.

Is it really so offensive to you that a dying man believe and admit that he made a difference in the world before he passed away?
Click to expand...
Well, lets look at an example.. There's a scene where he's describing anatomy lab and the professor (or lab proctor?) is reading basic info about the cadaver, and comes to the age which is 71 and this stops him in his place, he says "that's my age" puts down the probe and walks out of the room.. As if lab instructors are having existential crises every time a cadaver comes in who is their age or younger:eyebrow:. I showed that and some other passages to my parent who in fact teaches an anatomy block and often is an instructor for lab as well at a med school and she thought it was ridiculous. I'm not saying the writer himself is naive, I'm saying it's written for the naive reader IMO.

There's another one where he's like 2 weeks into his internship year and the patient he's assigned to codes while he's sleeping, and he gets a phone call in bed and he immediately shouts a string of commands and of course ends it with shouting "stat!" *barf* There are many other examples of things written that came off as cringy to me.

I don't think "offensive" is the right term, it certainly didn't offend me, I just didn't enjoy the book. That doesn't mean other people can't enjoy it, that's why I said it was my personal opinion.
 
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+1 on "When Breath Becomes Air" and Bill Bryson. His book "A Walk in the Woods" is a personal favorite and hilarious.
Also:
Bossypants by Tina Fey. The audiobook is read by Tina Fey.
Yes Please! by Amy Poehler. The audiobook is also read by Amy Poehler.
Watch "Extremis", a short documentary, on Netflix. Then read the book "Extreme Measures" by Jessica Nutik Zitter, the physician featured in "Extremis". I am currently listening to the audiobook, read by the author, and it is enthralling.
Into the Wild by John Krakauer
I am Malala by Malala Yousafzai
 
The Emperor of alll Maladies and The Gene are both really good books, although they are long. I also really like The House of God. That was hilarious. Cosmos by Carl Sagan is also really thought provoking. It's crazy to see how deeply he thought about certain subjects.
 
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Totally didn't realize the Emperor of all Maladies was a good book. One of my interviewers for UG gave it to me (weird, I know), and it's been sitting on my shelf ever since. Maybe i should actually read it 🙄.

OP, this might be kind of a weird recommendation, but right now I am reading "The Real Grey's Anatomy" by Andrew Holtz. It compares the show with the realities of real-life surgical residents. As an avid watcher, I have found it fascinating thus far. But def don't read it if you don't watch the show.
 
Absolutely recommend A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. Bonus points if you finish before July 16th when the new season comes out.
 
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace if you are able to dedicate a lot of time- read this book 4 years ago and still think about it regularly
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Princess Bride- if you are a fan of the movie you will love the book too
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for exciting mystery (first half is slow second half I read in hours)
Fight Club
The Perks of Being a Wallflower or the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night time for an afternoon read
A Prayer for Owen Meany
 
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