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Oxygen: A Novel, by Carol Cassella
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With the compassion of Jodi Picoult and the medical realism of Atul Gawande, real-life anesthesiologist Carol Cassella’s riveting national bestseller seamlessly melds compelling women’s fiction and medical drama to create an “involving debut that’s just what the doctor ordered” (People).
Dr. Marie Heaton is an anesthesiologist at the height of her profession. She has worked, lived, and breathed her career since medical school, and she now practices at a top Seattle hospital. Marie has carefully constructed and constricted her life according to empirical truths, to the science and art of medicine. But when her tried-and-true formula suddenly deserts her during a routine surgery, she must explain the nightmarish operating room disaster and face the resulting malpractice suit. Marie’s best friend, colleague, and former lover, Dr. Joe Hillary, becomes her closest confidante as she twists through depositions, accusations and a remorseful preoccupation with the mother of the patient in question. As she struggles to salvage her career and reputation, Marie must face hard truths about the path she’s chosen, the bridges she’s burned, and the colleagues and superiors she’s mistaken for friends.
A quieter crisis is simultaneously unfolding within Marie’s family. Her aging father is losing his sight and approaching an awkward dependency on Marie and her sister, Lori. But Lori has taken a more traditional path than Marie and is busy raising a family. Although Marie has been estranged from her Texas roots for decades, the ultimate responsibility for their father’s care is falling on her.
As her carefully structured life begins to collapse, Marie confronts questions of love and betrayal, family bonds and the price of her own choices. Set against the natural splendor of Seattle, and inside the closed vaults of hospital operating rooms, Oxygen climaxes in a final twist that is as heartrending as it is redeeming.
- Sales Rank: #263567 in Books
- Brand: Simon & Schuster
- Published on: 2009-06-09
- Released on: 2009-06-09
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.44" h x .80" w x 5.50" l, .61 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 320 pages
Features
Review
"In Oxygen, Carol Cassella's taut novel, Dr. Marie Heaton, an assured anesthesiologist at the top of her game, is forced to face the personal and professional fallout from an operating room disaster. Marie finds herself on the losing end of dollars-and-cents medicine in a malpractice suit, questioning herself, her skills, her colleagues, and her life choices. I couldn't wait to race to the end to see how her story played out, and I wasn't disappointed." -- Lalita Tademy, author of Cane River
"A subtle, compelling plot that twists and twists again. This quickly becomes a book you cannot put down." -- The Dallas Morning News
"A finely crafted mystery, as well as a sparkling literary work." -- THE DENVER POST
"Like her protagonist, Carol Cassella has the heart of a poet and the mind of a physician; the result is a striking meditation on the complexities of love, the fragile miracle that is the human body and the burdens and blessings of being a healer." -- Stephanie Kallos, author of Broken for You
"More than just an assured debut novel, this book is a tour de force, as emotionally involving as it is intelligent. Carol Cassella writes with the clarity and precision that are the hallmarks of her other profession....The fine, sharp details of her portrait of a gifted doctor facing a devastating crisis will stay with you long after the book is closed." -- Susan Wiggs, author of Fireside and Just Breathe
" A startling plot twist, combined with Cassella's first-hand understanding of our ailing healthcare system, makes this involving debut just what the doctor ordered." -- PEOPLE
Review
"In Oxygen, Carol Cassella's taut novel, Dr. Marie Heaton, an assured anesthesiologist at the top of her game, is forced to face the personal and professional fallout from an operating room disaster. Marie finds herself on the losing end of dollars-and-cents medicine in a malpractice suit, questioning herself, her skills, her colleagues, and her life choices. I couldn't wait to race to the end to see how her story played out, and I wasn't disappointed."-- Lalita Tademy, author of Cane River
"A subtle, compelling plot that twists and twists again. This quickly becomes a book you cannot put down." -- The Dallas Morning News
"A finely crafted mystery, as well as a sparkling literary work." -- THE DENVER POST
"Like her protagonist, Carol Cassella has the heart of a poet and the mind of a physician; the result is a striking meditation on the complexities of love, the fragile miracle that is the human body and the burdens and blessings of being a healer." -- Stephanie Kallos, author of Broken for You
"More than just an assured debut novel, this book is a tour de force, as emotionally involving as it is intelligent. Carol Cassella writes with the clarity and precision that are the hallmarks of her other profession....The fine, sharp details of her portrait of a gifted doctor facing a devastating crisis will stay with you long after the book is closed." -- Susan Wiggs, author of Fireside and Just Breathe
" A startling plot twist, combined with Cassella's first-hand understanding of our ailing healthcare system, makes this involving debut just what the doctor ordered." -- PEOPLE
About the Author
Carol Cassella, MD, is a practicing anesthesiologist, novelist, and speaker. She majored in English literature at Duke University and attended Baylor College of Medicine. She is the bestselling author of the novels Gemini, Oxygen, and Healer, published by Simon & Schuster. Carol lives on Bainbridge Island, Washington, with her husband and two sets of twins. Visit the author at CarolCassella.com.
Most helpful customer reviews
116 of 122 people found the following review helpful.
A medical/legal drama reviewed by a doctor and a lawyer
By Anne Masterson
I am a lawyer and my father is a retired surgeon. We both read this book, so we can give views from both sides of the aisle.
I found this book painful to read for its woeful lack of any substantive knowledge of how the legal system actually works. Lawyers are portrayed very badly; essentially we are all Brooks Brother wearing, BMW driving, yacht owning sharks out to get the poor innocent doctors. As I spend more than fifty percent of my practice representing abused kids, I was offended by the caricature. It is difficult to list all the legal inaccuracies without major spoilers, but I shall divulge a few. In the book it takes an extraordinary long time for the autopsy on the girl to be completed (this was something my father also noted as unrealistic). Before the autopsy is concluded, a case has been brought, experts have been hired and deposed (which would be very expensive) and the doctors have all been deposed. It would be impossible to adequately prepare a case without knowing what the cause of death actually was.
Once it is revealed, Dr. Heaton is told that she may be facing potential criminal charges. Again, this would never happen! The only time a doctor would be charged is in the event of gross negligence, e.g., performing surgery while under the influence of drugs or alcohol. That was not the case here.
Dr. Heaton has a huge "woe is me" attitude about why this is happening to her when all she wants to do is help others. There are many references in the book of other characters (particularly her sister) telling her that her work is so much more important than anyone else's as she saves people. At one point the character refers to herself as God helping people.
My father liked the book better than I did and would probably give it three stars. He liked the use of correct medical terminology, but thought it would be a bit dense for the average person to understand. I concur with him on this point. He also liked the twist at the end which I won't reveal. However, he could not buy that an anesthesiologist was left holding the bag for a potential missed underlying medical problem. It was his position that the responsibility for a medical history lay with the surgeon and not the anesthesiologist and if there were an error, it would be on all of them.
In summary, if you are employed in either of professions, I do not believe you will be able to suspend your disbelief enough to buy this story. If you are a "layman" take everything with a grain of salt. However, ultimately the character of Marie was just not that likeable. All she did was mope about why this was happening to her. There is a subplot that involves her estranged father, but never explains the estrangement nor is the plot resolved. This was not an enjoyable book to read
101 of 107 people found the following review helpful.
"There has been a complication."
By E. Bukowsky
The protagonist of Carol Cassella's "Oxygen" is thirty-seven year old anesthesiologist Dr. Marie Heaton, a dedicated and conscientious physician. After introducing herself to her patients and reassuring them that they are in good hands, she administers drugs that bring about "a temporary loss of sensation, an absence of pain during ... otherwise painful procedure[s]." Marie loves her job, "its precision and focus, its balance of technical skill and judgment." For the past seven years, her excellent performance has earned her the respect of her colleagues at First Lutheran Hospital in Seattle, Washington. Although she is single and childless, Marie is too busy to dwell on her ticking biological clock and her anemic social life. She once had a fling with a fellow anesthesiologist, Joe Hillary. However, they decided to settle for a platonic friendship and are now best buddies rather than lovers.
Marie's life comes to a screeching halt when she administers anesthesia to an eight-year old girl named Jolene Jansen. For some inexplicable reason, Jolene's heart rate plummets and her blood loses its oxygen supply. Although Dr. Heaton tries every technique at her disposal to bring the child back, she fails. This devastating tragedy leads to sleepless nights during which Marie second-guesses herself, wondering what she could have done differently. She is also on tenterhooks waiting for the inevitable malpractice suit to be filed. Marie is raked over the coals by lawyers and members of the hospital board, but she is more concerned with Jolene's mother, Bobbie, who is disconsolate over her daughter's death.
This is a touching book about a courageous and compassionate woman who is nearly brought to her knees by a series of calamities. Cassella's descriptive writing is beautifully crafted and she thoughtfully explores the ways in which people either support or undermine one another. The events in this novel demonstrate how selfish and callous individuals bring untold misery to their friends, family, and coworkers. The author, who is an anesthesiologist, provides an insider's look into the political, legal, and human sides of modern hospital care. She also imbues the story with an added dimension by shedding light on Marie's personal life. Although she has deep affection for her younger sister, Lori, and her adolescent niece, Elsa, Marie has no idea how to cope with her seventy-nine year old father. He is a former history professor who is steadily losing his eyesight and his ability to function independently.
"Oxygen" is suspenseful and engrossing; it builds in intensity until it reaches its electrifying conclusion. Marie, the first person narrator, tells her account in the present tense with an intimacy that draws us in and keeps us invested in the outcome. The title is an elegant metaphor: Just as oxygen makes physical existence possible, so do productive work and love provide the psychological and spiritual sustenance that bring meaning and fulfillment to our lives.
28 of 30 people found the following review helpful.
OXYGEN is a great read with some juicy surprises.
By Bookreporter
Dr. Marie Heaton takes great pride and pleasure in guiding her patients into the land of Nod so they can have their gallbladder out, their knee replaced or their baby delivered without pain and often even without awareness. She loves her job until the unbearable happens --- an eight-year-old girl under her care dies in surgery, despite all her best efforts. The crisis leads her to question not only her professional competence but also her personal relationships. And yet, even as she carefully documents each methodical step she took and each drug she administered, she is haunted by inconsistencies.
This first-person narrative works on many levels --- as a mystery, as an expos� of the sometimes brutal juncture of the medical and legal professions, as a family drama, and as a romance of sorts. Marie has never found time for a husband. "I never meant to dam myself off from those. I just knew they would require careful scheduling." In the aftermath of the child's death she feels more alone than ever. Taking a painful leave of absence from her duties while the investigation proceeds, Marie faces a different sort of challenge --- her aging father's demise, and the realization that if she is ever going to mend her relationship with him, now is the time. Meanwhile, new knowledge comes to light through the child's autopsy that seems to implicate Marie even further. The hospital begins to back away from her, and there is the specter of criminal charges being filed against her, on top of the malpractice suit.
Through this difficult time, Marie takes some comfort in the rejuvenation of a former love affair with Joe, another anesthesiologist on the hospital staff. As their relationship heats up, more clues trickle in about the real cause of the child's death. Marie must uncover and face some unpleasant truths to clear her name.
This novel is written with a clear, even hand, and the reader feels like a part of the heady world of high-stakes surgery. Carol Cassella, a practicing anesthesiologist herself, shows skill in giving us enough medical detail to understand the nuances of the case without overwhelming us. Marie's guilt and her desire for the mother's forgiveness are well-drawn without being overdone. It would have been easy to get maudlin here, and I applaud the author for not doing so. (I think she's a much better writer than Jodi Picoult, with whom she is compared on the cover flap.) There are some great lines here, such as "It is our job to rage against the dying of the light."
Marie is an appealing character --- smart but compassionate, needy but not blinded by her needs. In the end she saves herself with some timely medical sleuthing, although the answers come at a high personal price. All in all, OXYGEN is a great read with some juicy surprises.
--- Reviewed by Eileen Zimmerman Nicol
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