Three women reading in beach chairs facing the ocean
Books

The Surgeon’s Shelf

A growing collection of books that have shaped how I think about care, communication, and culture in medicine.

“We read to know we are not alone.”
— William Nicholson, Shadowlands

Becoming a Surgeon — Training, Identity & Transformation

Becoming a surgeon is a series of transformations shaped by both skill and system — technical, cultural, and personal.

Forged by the Knife — Patricia Dawson, MD

A qualitative account of residency from the perspective of a woman of color. It shows how race and gender shape evaluation, opportunity, and persistence.

Forgive and Remember: Managing Medical Failure — Charles L. Bosk

A foundational sociological study of surgical residency that examines how surgeons-in-training are taught to interpret and manage failure. Bosk distinguishes technical errors from moral ones and shows how the culture of surgery shapes accountability, learning, and identity formation across years of training.

Great Joys, Great Sorrows — Michael Meguid

A memoir of surgical residency’s emotional and physical intensity. It captures long hours, responsibility, and the meaning drawn from the work.

Intern — Sandeep Jauhar, MD

A memoir of a doctor’s first year of residency. It captures exhaustion, identity formation, and the emotional disorientation of becoming a physician.

Mastering the Knife — Michael Meguid

An early-stage training narrative focused on identity formation. It explores uncertainty, ambition, and the first steps toward mastery.

Scrubbed — Nikki Stamp

A candid look at surgical culture, hierarchy, and burnout. It examines the costs of training alongside its privileges.

Women in Surgery — History, Identity & Belonging

Belonging in surgery has never been passive — it has been built, challenged, and redefined across generations.

Founders & Early Access

The Doctors Blackwell — Janice P. Nimura

A narrative history of Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman to earn a medical degree in the U.S., and her sister Emily. It shows how they created institutions and training pathways when none existed for women, expanding who could practice medicine.

A Woman Surgeon — Rosalie Slaughter Morton

A 1937 memoir from an early American woman surgeon and leader. Morton documents clinical work, wartime organization, and how women built legitimacy through leadership and outcomes.

Early Practice & Lived Experience

Petticoat Surgeon — Bertha Van Hoosen

Born on a farm in 1863, Bertha Van Hoosen built a surgical career at a time when women were routinely excluded from medicine. She taught sex education, established a breast milk bank, and advocated for the use of scopolamine-morphine anesthesia for childbirth, while also speaking out against discrimination within the medical establishment and co-founding the American Medical Women’s Association in 1915. Her memoir captures training, bias, and the work of earning trust case by case, alongside a broader commitment to expanding women’s roles in medicine.

Woman Surgeon — Else K. La Roe

A memoir by Else Kienle (later Else K. La Roe), a German physician who was prosecuted in 1931 for her abortion-rights work, later fled Germany, and emigrated to the United States. It captures what it meant to practice medicine under political threat — where clinical skill and moral conviction were inseparable, while also offering unfiltered insight into daily practice, expectations, and constraints of the era.

Proof of Capability & Leadership

Women as Army Surgeons — Flora Murray

A firsthand account of women surgeons running military hospitals during WWI. It demonstrates large-scale clinical and administrative leadership under extreme conditions.

Modern Perspectives & Pathways

Every story here is distinct. The goal is not to reduce them into a single narrative — but to show that there is no single way to become, live, or lead as a surgeon. The more these stories accumulate, the more the idea of a “typical” surgeon begins to dissolve.

Behind Her Scalpel — Cathy Hung

A practical guide paired with narratives from women in OMFS. It offers concrete pathways, mentorship insights, and career navigation.

Being a Woman Surgeon — edited by Preeti R. John, MD

A collection of personal stories from women surgeons across stages and specialties. It reveals common barriers alongside varied paths into the field.

The Making of a Woman Surgeon — Elizabeth Morgan

A classic memoir of training in a male-dominated era. It shows how identity, perception, and persistence shape becoming a surgeon.

Oh! To Be A Lady Surgeon — Reina Khadilkar

A memoir from an Indian woman surgeon. It highlights cultural and gender barriers and how context shapes the training experience.

Surgeon on the Edge cover

Surgeon on the Edge — Frances Mei Hardin, MD

A contemporary memoir of surgical training and identity. It offers a candid look at what it means to navigate the demands of becoming a surgeon while remaining true to oneself.

The Scalpel and the Silver Bear — Lori Arviso Alvord, MD

A memoir by the first Navajo woman surgeon that integrates Western surgery with Indigenous perspectives on healing. It reframes care as relational and contextual, expanding what it means to treat a patient beyond the procedure.

Women in Surgery: Navigating Challenges and Triumphs — edited by Maureen D. Moore, Asanthi Ratnasekera & Kahyun Yoon-Flannery

A multi-author overview of contemporary surgical careers. It connects mentorship, culture, and systems to who enters, stays, and advances.

Why We Need Women Surgeons — Outcomes, Accuracy & Care

Who is in the room shapes what is seen, what is believed, and what is treated.

Diagnosis Female — Emily Dwass

An examination of gender bias in diagnosis and treatment. It links dismissal of women’s symptoms to worse outcomes.

Sex Matters — Alyson McGregor, MD

A physician-led analysis of sex-based differences in medicine. It argues that ignoring these differences leads to inaccurate care.

Unwell Women — Elinor Cleghorn

A history of how medicine has misunderstood women’s bodies. It shows how outdated assumptions persist in modern care.

Racism, Bias & Systems in Medicine

Understanding where medicine has caused harm is essential to building care that patients can trust.

Black Surgeons & Physicians — In Their Own Words

Memoir and history from Black surgeons and physicians, many of whom were firsts. For context on why these voices remain so rare, see #BlackMenInMedicine.

Partners of the Heart — Vivien T. Thomas

The autobiography of the surgical technician who, without a medical degree, worked with Alfred Blalock to develop the operation for “blue baby” syndrome at Johns Hopkins — and trained a generation of surgeons.

No Boundaries: A Cancer Surgeon’s Odyssey — LaSalle D. Leffall Jr., MD

The memoir of the Howard University surgical oncologist who became the first African American president of both the American Cancer Society and the American College of Surgeons.

A Century of Black Surgeons: The U.S.A. Experience — Claude H. Organ Jr., MD & Margaret M. Kosiba

A landmark history of Black surgeons in the United States, edited by the surgeon who went on to lead the American Board of Surgery and the American College of Surgeons.

Brain Surgeon — Keith Black, MD

A neurosurgeon’s account of operating on brain tumors — and of the patients, mortality, and hope at the center of that work.

Seeing Patients — Augustus A. White III, MD

A reflection on equity and dignity in care from a pioneering orthopaedic surgeon. It argues for truly seeing patients beyond diagnosis.

Average Black Surgeon — Harry Benjamin-Laing

A serialized memoir published one chapter at a time — exploring discipline, doubt, and quiet defiance from inside surgical training and practice. Benjamin-Laing examines what happens between the milestones: between recognition and scrutiny, between effort and reward, and what it truly costs to be seen.

Black Man in a White Coat — Damon Tweedy, MD

A physician’s reflections on race in medicine — as a student, as a doctor, and as an advocate for his patients.

History, Harm & Systems

Legacy: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine — Uché Blackstock, MD

A NYT-bestselling memoir and call to action from the founder of Advancing Health Equity. Dr. Blackstock weaves together her family’s generational story in medicine with a searing account of how racism operates within healthcare systems — and what it costs patients and physicians alike.

Medical Apartheid — Harriet A. Washington

A comprehensive history of medical experimentation on Black Americans. It traces how past abuses shape present-day trust and outcomes.

Say Anarcha — J. C. Hallman

A reexamination of J. Marion Sims centered on the enslaved women he operated on. It challenges heroic myths and centers those erased.

Take Care of Them Like My Own — Ala Stanford, MD

A memoir of building community-based care during COVID-19. It shows how physicians can create systems when institutions fall short.

LGBTQ+ Health, History & Care

Books on LGBTQ+ lives and health, and the history of HIV/AIDS in medicine.

HIV/AIDS — Medicine, Activism & History

And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic — Randy Shilts

A San Francisco Chronicle reporter’s investigative account of the first five years of the AIDS epidemic in the U.S., examining the response of the federal government, public health authorities, and research scientists (St. Martin’s Press, 1987).

My Own Country: A Doctor’s Story — Abraham Verghese, MD

An infectious-disease physician’s memoir of caring for patients with AIDS in Johnson City, Tennessee, in the mid-1980s, when he became the town’s AIDS expert by necessity (1994).

Gender Identity

Narrative Medicine & Medical Humanities

Every history of present illness is a story, told by a patient, heard by a clinician, and shaped by both.

A History of the Present Illness — Louise Aronson

Sixteen linked stories about patients, physicians, and families. Aronson uses the clinical history as a frame for the stories people tell about illness, and for the strain of twenty-first-century healthcare.

Tools of the Trade: Poems for New Doctors — edited by John Gillies, Ali Newell, Noy Basu, Rachel Miller, Samuel Tongue & Lesley Morrison

A pocket-sized anthology of about fifty poems, including work by doctor-poets, given to newly qualified doctors in Scotland as they begin work (Polygon, new edition 2025).

Also on the shelf

Shelved under Healing Beyond the OR, and just as much about how illness is told and heard.

Healing Beyond the OR — Wholeness, Mortality & Shared Humanity

A life in surgery is shaped by everything beyond the operating room — mortality, identity, the cycle of life, and what it means to remain whole.

A Beginner’s Guide to the End — BJ Miller, MD & Shoshana Berger

A practical and humane guide to serious illness and end-of-life care. It centers patient values, decision-making, and how clinicians can better support what matters most.

In Shock — Rana Awdish, MD

A critical care physician’s account of becoming a patient after catastrophic illness. It reveals the lived experience of vulnerability in medicine and reframes what compassionate, human-centered care truly requires.

On Call — Ineke Meredith

A memoir balancing surgery with roles as daughter and mother. It explores competing responsibilities and personal cost.

Surgeon & Lover — Michael Meguid

A reflection on relationships, identity, and fulfillment in surgical life. It asks what a whole life in surgery looks like.

That Good Night — Sunita Puri, MD

A palliative care physician’s memoir of training and practice at the end of life. It explores language, meaning, and how presence and communication shape care when cure is no longer possible.

When Breath Becomes Air — Paul Kalanithi

A neurosurgeon’s memoir written after a diagnosis of metastatic lung cancer during residency. It explores identity, purpose, and meaning at the intersection of physician and patient, asking what makes life worth living when time becomes finite.

Moral Injury & Physician Well-being

What happens when the system asks more of clinicians than they can give without betraying what they came to medicine to do.

Other Inspiring Books in Surgery

These books examine judgment, uncertainty, and the moral weight of surgical decisions — how surgeons think, not just what they do.

Breathless — Tali Lando

A collection of pediatric airway cases at the edge of life. It highlights responsibility, uncertainty, and compassion.

Complications — Atul Gawande

Essays on uncertainty, error, and judgment in surgery. It argues that fallibility is inherent to practice and that transparency improves care.

Do No Harm — Henry Marsh

A neurosurgeon’s memoir focused on decision-making, failure, and responsibility. It confronts the moral weight of surgical choices and their consequences.

Admissions — Henry Marsh

The sequel to Do No Harm, written as he leaves the NHS: volunteer surgery in Ukraine and Nepal, and the hard judgment of when operating serves the patient and when it doesn’t.

And Finally — Henry Marsh

Written after his own diagnosis of advanced prostate cancer: the surgeon as patient, on uncertainty, regret, and what matters at the end of a life.

Little Miss Diagnosed — Erin Nance, MD

Essays on listening, bias, and advocacy in orthopaedics. It emphasizes patient-centered decision-making.

Career, Leadership & the Business of Medicine

Navigating contracts, building practices, and the structures that shape a sustainable career in medicine.

Become the BOSS MD: Success Beyond Residency — Amy Vertrees, MD

A practical guide to succeeding beyond residency that focuses on mindset, systems, and professional growth. It makes the hidden curriculum of training visible, offering strategies for efficiency, communication, and leadership in high-demand environments.

Parenting

Books I’ve actually used — not just owned.

Adventures in Veggieland — Melanie Potock

A practical guide to getting kids to actually eat vegetables — with 100 activities and recipes. Less about tricks, more about building genuine exposure and curiosity.

How to Raise a Healthy Gamer — Alok Kanojia, MD

A psychiatrist’s guide to kids and video games — why games pull so hard, how to end the power struggles, and how to build healthier screen habits together.

Oh Crap! Potty Training — Jamie Glowacki

The one that actually works. Direct, no-nonsense, and refreshingly honest about the process. Read it before you start, not during.

Peaceful Parent, Happy Siblings — Laura Markham

The sibling companion: fewer fights, and a foundation for brothers and sisters to become friends for life.

Children’s Books — Representation & Early Possibility

The stories we give children shape what they believe is possible — for themselves, and for who gets to belong in medicine.

Invisible Cages: The Alynthia Quest — M.D. Burton (Deborah M. Burton, MD)

A young adult sci-fi fantasy mystery by a retired pediatric ENT surgeon. Fourteen-year-old Jade and her friends join Kid Healthcare Heroes at the Alynthia Health Complex — an adventure written to open young readers to careers in healthcare, engineering, and computer science.

Black Pioneers in Medicine — Beautiful Voices

Profiles of Black medical innovators for young readers. It broadens representation and possibility.

The Doctor with an Eye for Eyes — Julia Finley Mosca

A picture-book biography of ophthalmologist Dr. Patricia Bath, who transformed blindness treatment. It highlights innovation alongside overcoming bias.

Dr. Jo — Monica Kulling

A biography of Sara Josephine Baker and her public health work. It shows how systems change can save lives.

This collection traces how surgery has been shaped — by those who opened doors, those who proved what was possible, and those who continue to redefine the field. It is not exhaustive, and it is meant to evolve.

If there is a book missing from this list that has shaped how you think about surgery, care, or belonging, I’d love to hear from you. If you are an author of any of the books listed here and would like your social media links included, just share them with me via the connect form.

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