The House of God

Just finished Samuel Shel's "The House of God," a sarcastic comedic portrayal of the medical field with a "Catch-22" like quality. It is a perfect blend of humor and tragedy.Shem’s storytelling is sharp, filled with wit and irony, yet he never shies away from the human cost of a system that can often seem dehumanizing to patients and caregivers alike. His novel exposes the emotional and psychological toll that medical training takes on doctors, especially interns.His characters are memorable, particularly the protagonist Dr. Roy Basch. They are richly drawn, and their experiences feel both harrowing and real. Here, too, Shem somehow blends a sense of camaraderie against the isolation that comes with working in the medical trenches.This novel was a recommendation from my fraternity book club, so I can not wait to discuss it with those in the medical field."The House of God" remains a classic for a reason—it’s both timeless and unforgettable. It’s sometimes shocking but always compelling.Check it out.

I came across this book by accident and am amazed I had never heard of it. It has been described as a "Catch 22" of hospital life and I think the comparison is somewhat fair... It's written in the style of a rollicking comedy but its humour is very bitter indeed. It frequently makes your hair stand on end but more frequently saddens the heart and embitters the mind. It turns all our classic traditional notions of wise compassionate healing medicine on their head to portray a medicine awry and distraught besotted with its own false beliefs aspirations and images, arrogant, presuming, mad and dangerous, "Doctor heal thyself..." might be the subtitle of this work depicting the horrid underside of the "American Medical Dream." It's not without its flaws. I found it overlong, and many of its characters and scenes are unevenly or erratically sketched it seemed to me. But it's full of a primal ribald truthful energy racy brash bold and colourful and sexy which is impossible to resist. It is a maelstrom of living and dying, of despair and the need for love. At its core is uncovered the raw pathetic pitiable feeble inept human condition... It is so entirely believable. In one scene the entire ward staff are beseiging a "cardiac arrest" patient they are trying to save... After half an hour they realise their efforts are useless, and like at a "dud party" lose interest and just wait for the opportunity to drift away... Despite any flaws it may have, this is obviously a novel written in a great white heat of revulsion disenchantment despair and vast vast pity. It is a racy heartfelt truthful novel like few others... It is an extraordinary and terrifying read... It really should not be missed... Not suitable for hospital patients!

To be honest, most of this book was absolutely horrid to me. I'm about to enter medical school myself and even acknowledging a lot of the problems in medical education and the healthcare system in the United States, I have a lot of hope for medicine and for my life as a physician. So, reading this very dismal, dark, sarcastic, catch-22-esque book was uncomfortable to say the least. I almost didn't make it through to the end, and if I hadn't I would have given it one star. But don't let the middle fill you. Part 3 is what makes this novel worth reading. The main character grows so much in the final chapters and is able to, finally, call out and critize all the terrible things he did and went through. This criticism forms the basis for the bigger the picture of the novel: the criticism of the brutality and lack of caring in medical education and medical practice (mainly during the 60s and 70s but to a certain extent today as well). I also highly recommend reading the authors note at the end of the book to get more perspective and insight into why the author wrote the book and what he hoped to accomplish. While part 3 gave me many of those reasons, it was fulfilling to hear from it from the author's own voice.