SOCIAL MEDIA

Friday, December 27, 2019

Oxygen by Carol Cassella - Post Exam Read

Assalammualaikum.

My missions post-exam include KDramas binge-ing (Her Private Life, Hotel Del Luna which I finished, Chief Of Staff, etc), and finishing my unread novels.

I bought Oxygen in 2014 for RM5, perhaps during the BBW Fair in Mines that time (I write the date and the price of the books I bought) but I read it only halfway - can't seem to finish it.
I finished it this time and can't help but wonder why couldn't I finish it before.


Cassella is an Anaesthetist (or Anaesthesiologist, as they call it in the US) and hence her writing felt very close to me.
She accurately and brilliantly described her work routine, her worries and concerns in anaesthetising patients and her interactions with the OR staff.

The story started with it introducing the protagonist, Dr. Marie Heaton as a senior and renowned Anaesthetist in the hospital, and how the HOD is closer to becoming a businessman than an Anaesthetist. She then anaesthetised a little girl which ended up wrong, and the poor girl died on table.
It was a spine operation and the girl was lying prone; she portrayed the dismay the surgeon had when he had to stop his operation and turn the girl flat to be resuscitated, the adrenaline rush during the resuscitation as well as the agony she had to go through in breaking the bad news to the girl's mother - a single parent.

Then the real story unfolded.
The lawyers somehow got hold of the deceased patient's mother and started to instigate her to sue the hospital.
The hospital which initially backed Marie up then decided to split the defense and left Marie on her own to defend herself.
It talked about how close Marie is to her younger sister, Lori who is married and has kids on her own and is very satisfied with her life but also realistically struggles financially.

Her relationship with Joe, another anaesthetist colleague who is very smart, sturdy, reliable and charming - but perhaps not ready for a relationship was explored in great detail. In the end, it turned out that Joe actually keeps a dark secret unbeknownst to Marie. The secret that led to the death of the little girl with an undiagnosed cardiac disease.

I love how Cassella talks about the art of anaesthetising people, putting them to sleep, oblivious to their surroundings and waking up safe and perhaps cured.

I have also just finished another Mitch Albom's work - The First Phone Call From Heaven. This is one of his books that I find very hard to finish. It has so many characters that I got them jumbled up and confused. I will talk about this book later.

I still have a shelf full of unread books - one of the many reasons I stop myself from buying new books nowadays.

-Because life is a test-

-AkMaR-
http://nur-akmar.blogspot.com

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