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A review by katiealex72
Emotional Female by Yumiko Kadota
5.0
I was so keen to read this book that I bought it online just before I got a copy for my birthday....oops! So now I have 2 copies, which is ace because I can give one away to another medical friend. Are there any female doctors who WON’T relate to Yumiko’s story, I wonder. I was never a wannabe surgeon and I was never the kind of high-flyer that Yumiko obviously was, so I didn’t have the same kinds of experiences she did. However, her experiences of being rejected over and over again, being told that certain people or teams just “didn’t like you” for an unspecified reason, watching people not as good as you (or certainly no better) be promoted and mentored and given all kinds of helping hands ... oh yeah, that’s completely familiar. Being a woman, being a lesbian, in medicine, when you’re the first generation of your family at uni and you have no friends or family in the profession : it is hard and it can take years to realise the advantages others in your cohort had.
I really like the way this book is written and edited. It’s too easy to sound whiny when your story is about being a bright-eyed, possibly brilliant young doctor and being ground down to dust; but Dr Kadota has cleverly managed to avoid this, and by the end your heart just really goes out to her, with no (understandable) self pity at all.
I think this book would be enjoyable and relatable for anyone, non medical or medical alike, possibly excepting the kind of white establishment type private school kid who still believes in a meritocracy, or anyone who recognises themself in the pages. I hope the follow up book is about the next phase of Dr Kadota’s amazing career as she clearly has too much to offer to let her life be wasted.
I really like the way this book is written and edited. It’s too easy to sound whiny when your story is about being a bright-eyed, possibly brilliant young doctor and being ground down to dust; but Dr Kadota has cleverly managed to avoid this, and by the end your heart just really goes out to her, with no (understandable) self pity at all.
I think this book would be enjoyable and relatable for anyone, non medical or medical alike, possibly excepting the kind of white establishment type private school kid who still believes in a meritocracy, or anyone who recognises themself in the pages. I hope the follow up book is about the next phase of Dr Kadota’s amazing career as she clearly has too much to offer to let her life be wasted.