The Citadel

A. J. Cronin drew on his 1920s work as a medical inspector in the South Wales coal valleys and on later years practising on Harley Street. Andrew Manson, a newly qualified Scottish doctor, arrives in a mining town, confronts the miners’ unsanitary conditions and later enters the world of high-paid London physicians. It was a global bestseller, and some have credited it with helping inspire the NHS. Abraham Verghese read it again in 2022 and credits it with sending him into medicine.