Gillian Hick’s biography/memoir, Vet Among the Pigeons, continues her story as a veterinary surgeon.
Although by now, at the time of this title, she is not such a green graduate, but animals and their owners “keep her challenged” in a way never described in textbooks.
While based in a mixed animal practice in Co. Wicklow, Gillian also regularly travels to inner city Dublin to work in the Bluecross animal welfare clinic but finds that sometimes the two lives are difficult to combine.
In the 256-page book, she tells the story of her “ever-varied, often harried, amusing but always interesting life” as a general-practice vet.
Chapter titles include leapfrog, Jed and his fluffy python, three little girls and their dog, a helping hand, out of the horse’s mouth, and the bald eagle.
Chapters mid-way through the publication include the pyjama party, special indulgences, twin lambs, beauty – or the beast?, a different consultation, the filly foal, a case of bumble foot, a nasty fracture and the white stuff.
Finally, the last four chapters explore a temperamental vehicle, the bewitching hour, new arrivals and one on not bad for a fiver.
A spokesperson for the publishing company, the O’Brien Press LTD, said:
“From dairy cattle to turkey cocks, from lofty equines to the not-so lofty, from six-foot snakes to snuffling hedgehogs, Gillian encounters it all as she struggles to improve her own skills and justify her place in the veterinary profession, along with the help of an ever-expanding young family of her own.”
One reviewer described this title as a “heartwarming and very honest portrayal of a demanding job”.
Another said that Hick “finds herself challenges in ways that the textbooks cannot prepare you for”.
About the vet/author:
Hick was born in Dublin and has practiced as a vet both in Dublin and in Wicklow.
She also works for the Irish Blue Cross. She lives in Co. Wicklow, where she has her own practice with her husband, three children, and a large assortment of four-legged companions.
Read about her other books, Vet on the Loose, and Vet on a Mission.
