The Doctor Who Writes 🩺

🎙️ New episode: Andrew Bomback on writing a book about his day job

Feb 14, 2025

Hey Bleeders,

Ever wondered what your doctor really thinks about you? (Gulp.) Our latest guest, Andrew Bomback—a real-life doctor—took that question and turned it into a book!

Andrew is the author of Doctor, part of the Object Lessons series, as well as Long Days, Short Years: A Cultural History of Modern Parenting. In our conversation, we dive into his experience writing about his day job, navigating the publishing world, and transforming a “weird,” inside-baseball book into something readers could actually find on a shelf.

Andrew originally envisioned Doctor as a no-holds-barred, behind-the-scenes look at the medical profession—structured as a lyric essay, one great paragraph at a time. But, as he soon learned, publishing is a beast with its own rules. His first agent didn’t know how to place the book, telling him, “If you're going to sell a book, the booksellers want your book to be in the medicine section.”

Another agent gave him this blunt but insightful advice: People won’t read you for style. They’ll read you for content and your ideas. So, Andrew reworked the book into a more traditional format—and it paid off.

I loved this conversation because it’s a candid look at the messy, frustrating, and sometimes surprising realities of publishing, and I think you will too.

🎧 Listen to the full episode here.

Happy bleeding,
Courtney

I’m teaching some upcoming workshops you might be interested in:

So… ROLL CALL! 🗣️

Do you want to read about life on the other side of the stethoscope?

The Bleeders

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