Adam Kay

my goodness, it's so true.

My mum, there's a book by Adam Kay and it's called something like This Is Gonna Hurt or...

Something I think is this is going to hurt.

And it's basically an ex-doctor or an ex-nurse who gives all of the weird and wonderful stories of their time as a doctor on us.

And also illustrating books then became a bit of an option in podcasts.

That's when I started illustrating Adam Kay's kids' books.

It was all around about that time.

And then so I was doing live shows with Adam Kay for kids.

So when you do kids' books, you go around and you do shows for kids to pump sort of PR for the book.

And what happens is the author talks and the illustrator has a little machine called a visualizer where it's just a little camera that points down on the table and you draw pictures and it comes up on the screen as you're drawing it.

No, it's not as good.

What's Adam Kay's hospital murder one called? Just pull

it up on the hollow screen.

Yeah, I'll

The main thing you do with your time is go on the internet.

Not to say those were ghostwritten.

Adam Kay is a wonderful writer.

Yeah, he's a wonderful writer.

They are also seeing significant growth.

The former, in particular, benefited from the success of books by authors including Adam Kay or Reese Witherspoon.

Mm-hmm.

Two other areas I find particularly interesting, classic crime and mystery fiction, as well as fiction in translation.

I don't know.

Well, we were saying-- I'll tell you who else was there, was Adam Kay.

Are you familiar with Adam Kay?

The writer?

Yes, and comedian.

And I think there is something in that.

And there are people that have gone before me that have made careers from being doctors and comedians, people like, especially in the UK, someone like Adam Kay, who's sort of done shows and written books and even had a TV adaptation.

And there are other people who... didn't stay with their medical backgrounds when they'd gone into comedy but were doctors i used people like sam and brodkin or harry hill or mike wozniak even she wasn't a doctor but she was a psychiatric nurse joe brand so there are people who have made sort of substantial careers in the comedy world so i can look at people like that and be like okay there is There is scope if things go my way to join that list.

I'm not oblivious to the fact that I can strongly influence that, but I'm not completely in control.

And that's really, you know, it's an interesting kind of thing to see.

I know you've talked to other, I know Adam Kay, you know, and when you read his book, it's like, wow, this guy's gone.

He is so burnt out, you know, it's a negative experience.

So what do you think of that?

...

I was reading Adam Kay's book on holiday, and it got so rallied, I had to fucking throw it out and b- buy...

Well, actually, I, I didn't throw it out, I lost it, uh, and buy a new one, 'cause I, it, it, it... [laughs]

Have you ever gotten through a book and just read the whole book without having to buy a replacement?

[laughs] And it's just really, really fascinating.

If anybody's read Adam Kay's book, This Is Going To Hurt, it's a similar tone, but not...

I mean, Adam Kay's a comedian, so his is very comedic.

But it is that kind of behind doors look at a job that anybody who doesn't do that job probably assumes it's really depressing, like they could never do it, that on a day-to-day basis they'd be miserable doing that job.

Th- These people don't dislike their jobs.

And oftentimes that will be to sort of make them comfortable for their f- their last sort of days or weeks or months, um, of life.

And her memoir is talking about, uh, the different ways that people approach death.

Um, she sets it out in their little vignettes about people that she's had personal experience with, so a little bit like the Adam Kay book, and she talks about the completely different way in which people approach, uh, this, how different, different experiences she's had with different families where people disagreed, um, how she and the nurses have to kind of navigate this.