Killing Me Softly: The gripping new novel from the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author

by Christie Watson

'Thrilling . . . I adored every single second' YOMI ADEGOKE

'Incredibly funny, brilliantly disturbing, filled with humanity' JOANNA CANNON

'A nifty, twisty crime story of surgical precision' SEBASTIAN FAULKS

Unexpected deaths and untoward incidents are becoming alarmingly frequent at City Hospital's Emergency Department. A&E Senior Sister, Aoife, begins to question whether her new nurses are incompetent - or worse.

Earnest recruit Eden cares deeply for her patients and carries the Code of Conduct around in her pocket, reporting everyone whose views don't align with hers. But despite her self-righteousness, Eden keeps making mistakes. Is she dangerous?

It is Sophie who worries Aoife the most. Acerbic, over-confident and seemingly lacking in empathy, how Sophie ever became a nurse is beyond her. When Sophie begins an affair with Aoife's best friend, Michael, a man twenty-five years her senior, tensions escalate further, threatening to eclipse the fact that lives are at stake.

Aoife is the nurse we'd all want. Compassionate to the core. She's the nicest, kindest nurse in the world. Until she is tested to the limit . . .

Fearless, fast-paced and darkly funny, Killing Me Softly is a jaw-dropping novel about the hidden extremes of nursing and three complex women who hold the lives of their patients - and each other - in their hands.

Genres: Thriller

247 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 12, 2026

About the author

Christie Watson is a professor of medical humanities at UEA, and worked as an NHS nurse for over twenty years. She has written six books, including her first novel, Tiny Sunbirds Far Away, which won the Costa First Novel Award, and the memoir, The Language of Kindness, which was a number one Sunday Times bestseller. Christie is a contributor to the Times, the Sunday Times, the Guardian, the Telegraph, and TEDx, and her work has been translated into twenty-three languages and adapted for theatre. Moral Injuries, her latest novel, is publishing March 14th (UK) and June (US).

Reviews

[Rachel Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read all of Christie Watson’s books, so was really excited to pick up Killing Me Softly - and it absolutely lived up to expectations.
Her writing is as compassionate and insightful as ever, with a sense of quiet tension throughout the book.
Definitely a 5⭐️from me

[Paul Gormley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two new nurses arrive at a chaotic city hospital to work in the emergency department. Understaffed and under resourced, every day is a battle to stay afloat, with waiting times of 18 hours plus and patients on trolleys in corridors waiting for a bed on a ward.

Sounds all too familiar but told with great gusto and a generous dollop of dark humour. You’ll need a medical dictionary and it may make you reluctant to ever use an emergency department. A real page turner and an absolute delight to read. But …

I would have given this book 5 stars but I absolutely hated the prologue. It totally changed the mood of the story and didn’t make sense given what two of the characters had discussed only a few pages earlier.

Just stop reading at the end of chapter 31!

[Sharon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this author's last book which I really enjoyed, so I was looking forward to this one. You can tell that the author has a background in the NHS and a medical profession as the book really does go into the ins and outs of how an Emergency Department runs. The book was interesting, I loved all the patient interactions and the medical descriptions. However, I was confused with the characters. The three main nurses, Aoife, Sophie and Eden, all seemed to have different issues which evolved as the story went on, however I still didn't understand it all even by the end. I enjoyed parts of their stories, but other parts not so much. It didn't feel like the thriller of a read it made out it was, but was still a gripping fictional insight in an emergency department.

[Hana · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a LOT better than I'd expected! Not quite as "thriller" as I'd hoped but still really engaging. The last 70 pages or so were a little rushed and the characters (especially Eden) seemed to morph suddenly into different people without any real explanation as to why, BUT I was excited to read on and kept reaching for it and reaching for it and reaching for it. I'd say this was probably more of a 3.5⭐ than 4, as that seems a bit generous, but it was definitely more than a 3 so that's what I'm going for here. Really enjoyable and well researched read and, for someone who works in the NHS, it was especially interesting!

[Hala · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was billed as a crime/mystery novel, but actually reads more like a hospital soap opera with some ‘extreme nursing’ throw in. I really wouldn't be too much bothered with the supposed 'crime' elements in this novel, they were rendered almost inconsequential and the author has an alarmingly casual attitude to nurses attempting or committing actual murder. What is front and centre here are the results of the government's neglect of the NHS and more specifically the Emergency Department (of a large fictional hospital) where this novel is set. The ED is described as 'creaking like a boat about to sink, beyond capacity'; it is also often referred to as a 'war zone'. The consequences of working in such a high pressure, life and death environment is explored here as the mostly valiant nurses try to cope in an over stretched and under resourced work place. It's the patients that are suffering, sometimes begging for help as they experience extremely long wait times for treatment. I accept that Watson has accumulated many stories from her decades of real life nursing and they are fascinating, if only she didn't try and write a mystery where the perpetrators are the ones who are trying to help the most vulnerable. The message of well-funded NHS is a good one, but not when presented in such a disturbing manner.