Listening to the Animals: Becoming The Supervet

Product Information

Fortunately I was much more interested in Noel's scientific advances than his friends and lovers, and enjoyed his enthusiasm for his life's work and his compassion and warmth towards the animals he treats and their families. I found the technical detail of how he creates his innovative prostheses fascinating, and he also offers a compelling vision of a potential future where scientific and technological advances can come to replace the requirement for medical experiments on live animals. Read with my daughter who is a fan of Supervet and very much enjoyed the author’s previous book which I think was more conventionally biographical. I think Noel has made great waves in the veterinary community and did find interest his discussions on one medicine, ethical implications of surgery and treatment and the process of said treatments. He also touches on the mental and emotional toll that being an animal caregiver has, something that I truly connect with as I work with exotic animals myself and have had my own battles with self-worth and worrying each day about doing enough.

Listening to the Animals: Becoming The Supervet, Fitzpatrick Listening to the Animals: Becoming The Supervet, Fitzpatrick

I don't believe in 'ownership' of a sentient life - I think we undertake volitional guardianship and that this bringing forth can be one of the most rewarding and reciprocally loving relationships that a human being can ever experience.” At the time of writing the book, it appeared that Noel was single, I’ve always had a bit of a ‘thing’ for him, so if you’re reading this Noel and fancy meeting up then do get in touch!Some kind of cute parts, a good news story as far as where he came from and how he got there. As far as he never really thought himself too brilliant, but he's done brilliant things. He somehow just kept going and going and working and he came good. What can I say, Noel has always been my hero, now he is even more so. He had such a bad start in education, being taught to be a good Catholic and little else at primary school and then being horrendously bullied at secondary school. He still had a dream, from a very young age, to be a vet and despite all the hurdles he achieved his ambition. I know of Noel’s skill but have only seen glimpses of his tv programs as I hate to see animals suffer.

Animals Saved My Life, Listening to the Animals: Becoming How Animals Saved My Life, Listening to the Animals: Becoming

The book feels like just a continuous ramble of thoughts with no clear direction. I found it so difficult to read, compared to his first book which I absolutely loved. At worst points the narrative was condescending and exuded privilege. The narrative of "if you work for it you will get it" was so pervasive I found myself despairing and shaking my head numerous times. R.F. Kuang, Sue Lynn Tan, Rebecca Ross, Kate Heartfield, N.E. Davenport, Saara El-Arifi, Juno Dawson and Sunyi DeanI have so much respect of Noel. He has a wonderful work, and life, ethic - believing that you can achieve anything if you work hard enough for it. And he has shown that himself from the large amount of time and effort he’s put into his profession, advancing veterinary medicine to the benefit of thousands of animals.

Listening to the Animals: Becoming The Supervet by Noel Listening to the Animals: Becoming The Supervet by Noel

I really wanted to read and enjoy this book, having been given it as a Christmas present. However I found it rather disappointing, and strangely it read almost like three different books, each third (roughly) is written completely differently and each has its good and bad points. The middle section covers vet school and his early days as a vet, and was for me the most enjoyable part of the book, with some amusing anecdotes to leaven the continuing negativity. Noel is a born story teller where people are concerned but he failed to engage me on the finer points of his profession. There is no doubt, however, that he deserves more recognition for his innovative work on surgical implants for both animals and humans.As heart-warming and life-affirming as the TV show with which he made his name, Listening to the Animals is a story of love, hope and compassion, and about rejoicing in the bond between humans and animals that makes us the very best we can be. I enjoyed reading about some of his hobbies that he loved and learnt from, although all fell to the wayside as work took over his life. And we also heard about relationships, here he was very honest with us, I’m not sure that I really needed to know how old he was when he lost his virginity, but it was an interesting chapter. Sixthly in how up to date it is – the book’s themes drawing together in a very tangible and incredibly up to date way with a severe accident to his own dog in September 2020 (one month before publication). Thirdly, with the author’s frequent discussion of his One Medicine approach ( https://www.humanimaltrust.org.uk/who...) seeking to bridge the Veterinary Science/Human Medicine gap – which as he points out has taken an additional resonance with COVID.