A compelling, candid and darkly funny novel that explores the modern realities of our dysfunctional public health system, and the fragile human beings fighting to make it work.

Night shift. Just keep them all alive until the morning they said.

No higher brain function required they said.

They were wrong.

For Amy, being a doctor was supposed to mean winning at life.

Helping people. Saving lives. Having a secure job. Earning good money. Tick, tick, tick, tick.

But now, in her second year in a city hospital the reality is a world away from Amy's med school dreams. She is finding out that people don't always want to be 'helped', the pay barely covers rent, her hours are ridiculous, her favourite patients are getting sicker, and her surgical trainee boyfriend has recently gone shy on proposing.

What Amy does have are the friendships forged by dealing with recalcitrant patients, endless nightshifts, and crying in the emergency department bathrooms. And a belief that maybe, underneath it all, it's a job that's still worth doing.

And when things begin to go wrong - horribly wrong - they're all that Amy has. Will it be enough?

A Little Unwell is a darkly funny and emotionally powerful medical drama about the life of a female junior doctor - dealing with recalcitrant patients, long hours and crying in the emergency department bathrooms - informed by the real-life experiences of the author.

'Jewell writes with surgical precision . . . Fans of Samuel Shem's The House of God, Shirlene Obuobi's On Rotation and the hit television show The Pitt will find much to digest in this empathetic debut' BOOKS+PUBLISHING

Details

ISBN13: 9780733653957
Format: Paperback / softback
Number of Pages: 352
Edition:
Publication Date: 28 Apr 2026
Publisher: Hachette Australia
Publication City, Country: Sydney, Australia
Dimensions (cm): 23.4(H)x15.4(L)x2.8(W)440
Weight (gm): 440

Author Biography

Dr Kerry Jewell is a writer and nuclear medicine physician. Kerry is an accomplished public speaker and regularly presents at local and international conferences, along with fulfilling session chair and emcee duties. Outside of medicine, her short fiction has appeared in local and international literary journals and anthologies, including Island, The Saturday Paper, May Magazine (NZ) and the Bath Short Story Award Anthology (UK). In 2020 she was shortlisted for the Richell Prize for emerging writers for this novel, then titled Meddies.

Reviews