It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet

By: James Herriot
Published by: Michael Joseph Ltd. (London)
Publication Date: 1972
Series: James Herriot's Veterinarian Memoirs and Stories
Series Number: 2

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Description

"There is a very fine deciding line between looking a real smart vet on the one hand and an immortal fool on the other."

These words of his boss became very real to young James Herriot as, after a year in veterinary practice, he still he ran into trouble despite his strivings to master his craft.

The unpredictable nature of his animal patients assured that he never knew just what was waiting for him around the corner, and though his predicaments make amusing reading, they weren't so funny to him at the time.

But though he had his problems his compensations were great.  He was aware always of the wild beauty of the Yorkshire Dales around him and as he laboured he breathed the clean air of the high moorland.  The sunlit fields were his operating table, his territory the winding Pennine roadsand the grey stone villages of the fells.  And, as readers of his first book If Only They Could Talk will remember, his home life was entwined by the society of his brilliant but erratic employer Siegfried Farnon MRCVS and Farnon's younger brother Tristan, a student who believed that veterinary surgery is only a sideline to the real business of living.

In this book the author takes us with him as he wrestles with the ailments of a variety of species from racehorses to kittens, introducing us to their owners, the rich Dales characters who charmed and easperated him in turn.  It is a book for those who find laughter and delight in the infinite diversity of animal ways, but it is also a picture of the countryside and readers who know the magic of the wild places will find a fellow spirit in James Herriot.

From the dust jacket

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