Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of The Accidental Veterinarian. As the author is at pains to say "All Creatures Great and Small" by James Herriot is the master of tales from the vet's life and with this publication it remains so. I had hoped for more tales from behind the surgery door but there is a huge chunk in the middle explaining the pitfalls and trials of being in this profession. There are many chapters explaining diagnosis - the colour of this particular sample = this conclusion etc etc and Philipp goes on and on. I eventually skipped all the jargon including the varied diets and "why visiting a vet costs this much " chapters and found only a few at the beginning and end of the volume that fulfilled my quest for humorous tails (sorry tales). Sorry but I won't be re-reading this one again ! OK but not great.

This was a charming collection of essays by a practicing veterinarian, that tells a variety of stories from his own path to becoming a veterinarian to the experiences he has with the patients (and their owners) in his daily practice. He draws a comparison with James Herriot early on in his book, so I will acknowledge that Dr. Schott does not have the same ability to create the sense of character that Herriot brings so richly to life in his books. And yet, there is the same sense that you have when reading Herriot that the practice of veterinary medicine is as much about dealing with people as it is about treating their animals (as Schott himself asserts more than once). He also does a great job of helping the reader better understand the actual practice of veterinary medicine in the present day.

This was a quick and enjoyable book and I would love to read more of his stories.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for providing me with an advanced reading copy.

A fun and interesting book about one man's journey to become a veterinarian. I enjoyed reading this book and hope to hear more from this author.

Sadly I didn’t enjoy this book. . It lacked detail,depth and description. I found the stories a little boring.
Thank you to both NetGalley and ECW Publishing for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my honest unbiased review

The Accidental Veterinarian is a series of short blogs or vignettes with not much detail or description. It is arranged in a random order without any continuity or flow. To be honest, I was not expecting this format and I am not a fan, but if this is a style of writing that you enjoy, you may indeed like this book. The content was very informative and I learned a lot and some of the stories were amusing, though they could have been more fleshed out. For animal lovers who prefer a quick read, on-the-go, type of book, I would recommend this book; for those, as myself, who like to dive in and get lost in a book, I would not. Thanks to NetGalley for an advance copy to review.

The Accidental Veterinarian is a collection of essays all grouped around topics important to the daily life in a veterinary practice. I wondered, as I read, if the essays had been first published in a blog or as a weekly newspaper column. The essays deal with important and interesting topics in animal care, and I learned a lot from them. I would have liked to see more inclusion of actual animal stories, real patients. There was some of that, especially in the last part of the book, and I particularly enjoyed them.