A review by cmoo053
A Mistake by Carl Shuker

4.0

A Mistake seems to be a novel that is either loved or loathed and in a lot of ways I can see why. I personally, found this story about medical mishap immensely affecting. Although almost every character was flawed in a way that grated, shocked, or appalled me at various moments I finished this novel with an immense amount of empathy for them. I don’t have the experience to comment on the accuracy of the portrayal of the NZ hospital system here, or the medical community at large, but this story seemed to me to capture the unrelenting pressure, and deep personal sacrifice that a career in this field demands. Shuker has a lot of interesting things to say about what we do to survive this kind of pressure and how these demands colour our relationships both within and beyond the world of work. There were scenes in this novel that made me feel physically ill, but I suspect this is exactly how Shuker wanted his reader to feel in these moments. It’s a novel that draws heavily on traditions of NZ gothic, and although I found it confronting I was both mesmerised and moved by it.