Book Nook Book Review: Gemini by Carol Casella

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Title: Gemini
Author: Carol Cassella
Copyright:  March 4, 2014
Genre: fiction
Format: book Pages: 352

Synopsis (from Goodreads):

A stranger’s life hangs in the balance. What if you had the power to decide if she lives or dies?

Dr. Charlotte Reese works in the intensive care unit of Seattle’s Beacon Hospital, tending to patients with the most life-threatening illnesses and injuries. Her job is to battle death — to monitor erratic heartbeats, worry over low oxygen levels, defend against infection and demise.

One night a Jane Doe is transferred to her care from a rural hospital on the Olympic Peninsula. This unidentified patient remains unconscious, the victim of a hit and run. As Charlotte and her team struggle to stabilize her, the police search for the driver who fled the scene.

….Filled with intricate medical detail and set in the breathtaking Pacific Northwest, Gemini is a riveting and heartbreaking novel of moral complexity and emotional depth.

My Thoughts:

I saw this author interviewed on Well Read, a television program I highly recommend that comes on public broadcasting. Do click on the link to check them out and look at the incredible list of book recommendations they have on their site. The author of this book is an actual anesthesiologist and knows her facts so the medical detail is spot on.

This was an easy book to get into. I was very interested in Charlotte’s character as the doctor in this book. She brought out many things to think about when someone is unconsious in the hospital. I remember an interview Oprah had with Jile Bolte Taylor, a Harvard brain scientist that exprienced a stroke. She eventually wrote a book about her experience called, My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey

Many things stuck with me from that interview many years ago, one being that after she had the stroke and was in the hospital, she couldn’t communicate but she talked a lot about the energy the different nurses and doctor’s brought into the room when they entered. This is something I am continually revisiting for myself in my general day to day with my family and friends! Do I come to them as a Debbie Downer, or do I bring joy to the room. I want to bring joy. So it’s good to be mindful of our energy because as Ms. Taylor stated, it affects others. Sometimes we get in the habit of only complaining when we talk with friends and family and the word and energy definitely bring others down. So I try to catch myself when I do that and pull back.

Now to my point….In this book the patient is in a coma and I couldn’t help but think about the energy different characters brought to her room. I also had to put the book down a couple of times, because even though it is now 7 years since my mother passed on, my heart continues to ache and I remember her in the hospital. It plays in my head like it happened yesterday and I think this book brought it to the surface for me in a different way. So I had to put it down from time to time to work through my own thoughts and then back to the story.

It was one of those books that jumps back and forth to the past and present in each chapter. I felt it was a clever way to keep the suspense while building the back story.

I enjoyed this book and don’t want to spoil it for you with details. I would definitely read another of her this authors’ books in the future.

I gave this book 4 butterflies.

Happy reading!

Belinda

4rating

 

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