This book attempts to deal with both the complexities of morality AND the complexities of female friendship. While it does the latter really well, I feel that it disappoints on the former. It’s an extremely ambitious endeavour so it’s no wonder that it falls a bit flat.

However, as I say, the depiction of a complex friendship is very well done and the book is worth a read just for that aspect.

Moral Injuries

Olivia, Laura, and Anjali became friends during their medical training and stayed close for twenty-five years. They keep each other secrets, even those involving someone's death. But when their teenage children get in trouble and are at risk of being arrested, friendship and the Hippocratic Oath become less important than the mother instinct to protect them at all costs.


I absolutely loved this book. I was hooked from the first chapter and just couldn't put it down. It's a very well written medical/ family thriller. It's clear that the author has a background in medicine, as all medical facts were accurate and easily blended with fiction.
I'm really looking forward to reading more books by Christie Watson!

This is a story about 3 friends - Laura, Olivia and Anjali - who have stuck together through thick and thin, not least in surviving several years at medical school. This latter point is particularly important, because there was an incident at that time which all of them were aware of, which they have never really faced up to or resolved.

Over a friendship of two and a half decades, the differences in their personalities - Anjali being relatively more laidback than either the ambitious Olivia or highly strung Laura - have taken a back seat to other priorities. But now it is crunch time.

When their children become involved in a situation that has echoes of the dilemma the three friends faced so long ago, the fault lines start becoming evident.

The question is, what choices will the women now make, with the benefit of hindsight and the imperatives of motherhood directly influencing the outcome?

The characters in this novel are well drawn, and in many ways, relatable. I was not entirely happy with the ending, but perhaps it was the most realistic outcome, given how people tend to behave in real life situations. The dual timelines of 1999 and the present day did work quite well in my view. An engaging story that raises some ethical quandaries, it gets 3.5 stars.

If you didn't already know that Christie Watson was a non-fiction writer, and has personal experience of working in hospitals, you will after you've read Moral Injuries. I should actually have started by saying I love a medical thriller, and this is definitely in that genre, but I found it a bit of a slog. Partly, I think this is because of the structure of the novel, which contains several (compelling, by the way) characters whose backstory is told every now and then in flashback: 1999 then 2024, then another character's backstory, then back to the now. And so on. If you like that kind of glitch - and, to me, it is a glitch - then you'll get along with the narrative fine. The medical terminology offers a kind of realism to the situation, but the actual main issue felt as if it was being withheld for a bit too long. I'm being picky, I know, but to be fair, this novel has a good plot, compelling characters, and there were times as I was reading it that I thought it would make a great TV drama. I'd watch that. My thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for the ARC.

Thanks to Christie and NetGalley for allowing me to read Moral Injuries before the publication date.

The characters are well developed and believable and the instinct to protect their children at any cost will resonate with many parents.

The story certainly poses many moral and ethical questions ( including some very current issues) both in relation to the personal lives of the characters and their professional lives.

As it alternates between the current day and 1999, information is gradually revealed about each of the women and the events of 1999. Each chapter is told from the perspective of one of the women and memories or perceptions may differ.

An interesting book which can either be treated as an easy read or potentially a book club read.

What an amazing book! The author is a doctor and so the details are accurate and authentic which adds to the story beautifully. The 3 main characters are all highly relatable, flawed women- mothers, lovers, doctors and friends. What an impressive fiction debut

As medical students, Laura, Olivia and Anjali are party to a miscarriage of justice. Now, 20+ years later, Olivia and Laura are forced to face what they did when they discover their children are involved with another moral dilemma.

I found this to be a compelling read. The medical detail throughout is fascinating. The three main characters are well drawn and Laura especially shows development over the course of the novel. I wasn't sure about the ending. which is yet another instance of middle class parents doing everything they can to protect their offspring. I've noticed this in a number of recent novels. It's as if the author(s) think privileged children are entitled to make a mistake and get off with doing something they really ought to face the consequences for.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

I did find this book hard to get into at first but as the novel progressed I felt more drawn in, I would read more by the author in the future to see if I feel the same way about her other novels.

A story about a friendship of three young medical students, that started together. Olivia, Laura and Anjali who all came from different backgrounds with common ideals of serving medicine .

During their long and arduous study they shared a dark, dark secret that bound them even tighter. The secret much later, threatened to tear the friendship apart .

Once qualified , and after much further years of hard training Olivia became the cardiothoracic surgeon she always wanted to become. Laura an emergency trauma doctor and Anjali a GP. Laura and Olivia has children and its these very children which they became so protective of , started the cracks in their friendship . This potential break up of the three friends could be disastrous to them all in both personal terms and in careers .

An interesting novel based on medical principals in which decisions can become dangerous , not just to patients to the doctors making them as well.

The story moves along at a good pace with constant flash backs to an earlier age when the thought of finally finishing med school is the overriding drive for the three. This drive clouds their thinking , ones that has repercussions later.

Loved the book , so pleased to have read it and many thanks to the publisher for the opportunity.

I wasn't sure about Christie Watson's non-fiction account of her twenty years as a nurse, The Language of Kindness. The narrative voice felt complacent rather than thoughtful; it struck me that her depiction of the profession was a bit sugar-coated, whereas other medical professionals and hospital workers were either ignored or criticised. Happily, Watson is a much better fiction-writer: Moral Injuries is really, really good. Interestingly, this is actually Watson's second novel, but it's the first to draw closely on her experiences as a nurse, where she worked across a range of specialisms that included resuscitation, paediatrics and mental health. This breath of knowledge is vital, making this story of three female doctors working, respectively, as a heart surgeon, an air ambulance doctor, and a GP, totally authentic and convincing. Watson doesn't overload us with unnecessary detail, but she brings to life these different medical environments with precision: 'Majors was always busy. Patients spilled out into the corridor and there was constant noise, alarms and shouting, the smell of urine or bleach or NHS egg sandwiches. The central station was like a hive for medics, all on the phone, permanently harassed, their dark blue scrubs as crumpled as their faces, lanyards swung over their shoulders, pens stuck into ponytails.'

Moral Injuries is pitched as a kind of thriller: these three friends, Olivia, Anjali and Laura, who met at medical school, are forced to confront a secret they are keeping after two of their teenage children witness a tragedy at a party. I suspect those who want a breathlessly fast-paced psychological thriller won't necessarily click with this. Despite a series of medical emergencies, it's much more character-driven, and doesn't rely on a shocking 'twist'. All the better, I say. This allows Watson to make her characters much more realistic, sympathetic and complex. I was especially drawn to Laura, who starts off as the stereotypical 'anxious perfectionist from a tough background' but become so much more than that. She's the most effortlessly competent of the three as an older adult, has plenty of casual sex, and is dealing with family trauma, not just growing up working-class on a council estate. Bisexual Anjali is also much more than a flaky risk-taker, and Olivia is hard to pigeonhole at all - she's ambitious, sure, as the blurb says, but she's also shaped by her privileged background and her relationship with husband Dele.

The title, if at first a little baffling, ends up being perfect for this novel, which is ultimately about moral choices, and the damage we cause to ourselves, and other people who witness our choices, when we make the wrong ones. All three of the characters are culpable to different degrees. Again, it's a dilemma Laura faces in the second half of the novel that I found most compelling, as medical ethics run up against old loyalties. Watson effectively creates a situation which is not ethically clear-cut, and yet we appreciate the enormity of what Laura chooses to do. My only criticism of this novel would be that the chapters rely too much on flash-forwards and flashbacks: a character often recalls a situation rather than it happening in real time, which was a bit confusing and unnecessary. But otherwise, a top-notch literary thriller. 4.5 stars.

I read over a third and kept wondering 'when is the actual story going to start?' Because up to then, all we had was long, rather dull descriptive background. Didn't engage with any of the main three women. And I could not tell the difference between the 1999 and the 2024 chapters, so, in other words, no sense of place or time. No tension, no curiosity, no engagement, nothing really.

Maybe, if I carried on but after 110 pages or so, I couldn't face it. A pity.