Thank you Bookoutre and Netgalley.
This was a very slow burn, but I love a medical thriller so I kept going.
Once I got into the book it was full of twists and turns - as it was a bit slow to start I can only give it 3 stars. Had it been quicker it would have been 4.

This was not for me. The story was kinda slow and I couldn't connect with the characters at all. I was hoping for somethig different

"The Good Doctor" by Jessica Payne is a captivating exploration of empathy and resilience in the face of adversity, with rich character development and a compelling narrative that keeps you engaged until the very end.

#TheGoodDoctor #NetGalley
When Nurse Practitioner, Chloe Woods and her fiancé Elton, finally decide to leave the world of travel nursing and settle in Portland, Oregon they feel so lucky that they both get a job at the same hospital. That is, until Chloe ends up working with her ex-husband,Jameson who she ran from on the last night of their marriage 3 years ago after she saw him perform an unspeakable act. She hasn’t seen him since that night. When she is asked to investigate the influx of suspicious deaths at the hospital she hears rumors that Dr. James Smith’s nickname is “Dr. Death”. Knowing how he feels about, let’s say, helping people to the other side, she begins to think he is up to his old practices.
Nothing feels right to Chloe. Someone is following her. Elton is acting very jealous of the time she has to spend with Jameson. And Jameson’s twin sister, Laura, who also works at the hospital, is getting just a bit too chummy.
Thanks to NetGalley and Bookouture for giving me an advance copy.

I seriously couldn't put this book down & kept on reading it into the early hours of the morning! So many twists to keep you entertained!

I love a medical thriller and this one certainly ticks all the boxes. I was so gripped in the story that I forgot where I was. It has twists and turns so hold on tight. It's a bumpy ride.

The perfect thriller for my thriller heart. Payne gave the drama, the plot twists and the character development. i LOVED reading this book to see how it ended and it did not dissapoint.

The audiobook narrators were fantastic!

Sadly this book was extremely predictable, and I found the FMC to be SO stupid, and irritatingly slow, when I thought things were so incredibly obvious. (Another irritating thing: The FMC always uses the word "provider" instead of "staff". UGH!!!) The FMC also did a LOT of assuming and jumping to conclusions, which annoyed me greatly also because she just assumed she knew things. I actually almost laughed near the end when she was shocked that she had "jumped to conclusions".

The plot itself was really good, I just would have enjoyed it more if it wasn't so obvious what was going on.

Despite all this I just got the e-ARC for Jessica Payne's newest release "Never Trust the Husband". Her plot descriptions always sound so good! I hope the next one won't be as predictable though.

oh my God! this book is well paced and written well. Jessica has woven a story that grips you right from the start and keep you hooked till almost the end. I guess it was because I guessed who the really "good doctor" is, but... maybe that is just me. a good book that every thriller reader will enjoy. will recommend!

Thank you to NetGalley for and the publisher for providing me with an advance copy of The Good Doctor by Jessica Payne in exchange for my honest review and opinion. I love anything that Jessica Payne writes so I was thrilled to be approved to read this! This is absolutely mind blowing and will keep you guessing what is going to happen next all the way to the last page. So many crazy twists and turns. Absolutely brilliant writing style. READ THIS ASAP!

Loved this medical Thriller!! A wonderful page turner full of twists. There was a sense of dread throughout the story that kept me on the edge of my seat. I recommend it to anyone who loves to read thrillers.

“There’s nothing between us but secrets and threats.”

I really liked Payne’s book The Lucky One so I was excited to read another one by her. I didn’t like this one as much as that one, however it had a lot less swearing in it which is a plus.

What took this one down a few notches for me was a lack of mystery, a pretty one-dimensional plot, too much coffee, and the whole oft-used scenario where someone discovers something alarming and gets mad and hurt and even though the other person is like ‘Let me explain…’ the mad/hurt/scared person says ‘No. I will not listen to potential answers. I shall flee the scene and live in confusion and misunderstandings because I just can’t even. And don’t ever touch the same ground as me.’ And if they would have just listened for five whole seconds, everything could have been avoided.


As to the lack of mystery: there is a disclaimer at the beginning which warns readers of physician-assisted suicide in the book. I suppose that’s important in case that’s a trigger for some but for a thriller it felt like the author was giving away information that lessens the suspense.

Thus, I went into it thinking the book was going to be about deaths happening in a hospital and then them realizing it was a doctor assisting patients to die. This is partially right, except we find out pretty soon that the main character, Chloe’s ex-husband (Jameson), is a doctor who does physician-assisted suicides so the ‘mystery’ becomes more about whether or not the higher death rate at the hospital is actually because of him or someone else.

And that part I figured out at like 20%. To be fair, there were a few times where I thought maybe I was wrong after all, but overall, the book didn’t feel like the twisty psychological thriller it promised to be.



Another Annoyance #1:

It’s repeated and hinted at multiple times that Chloe and Jameson have some sort of shared secret that they’re guilty of.

“I never thought I’d get a second chance at happily ever after. Not after what I did, and to someone I loved, no less.”

“After what we did, he isn’t allowed to be the love of my life.”

I got annoyed with all the cloak and dagger stuff surrounding her past because when we find out what they did, we really aren’t surprised at all.


Another Annoyance #2:

The coffee and the wine. I get that it’s the Pacific Northwest and they are coffee fanatics out there and that doctors and nurses require much coffee, but I feel like every time the author needed to move the plot forward she used coffee or wine to do that- Hey let’s get drinks! Hey, can I grab you a coffee? Can you grab me a coffee? Should we go drink coffee? Can you reinsert my coffee IV line?

If you don’t believe me, here are the facts: the word coffee is used 85 times and wine is used 87 times. Folks, that’s much times. I cross-referenced these numbers with a few other digital books I have just to see and those books used these words less than 20.

Perhaps a reader who actually likes coffee will love this, but for me it felt like coffee was it’s own character. And a bitter one at that.


Another Annoyance #3:

I feel like there were a lot of plot holes required for this story to be a thing. I just think it would be pretty hard to hide all of this at a hospital. Especially when they have had a task force created to research the high death rate and determine a cause and then results go missing and people on the task force start dying.

And the hospital has cameras. Sure the camera was off during some of the deaths, but wouldn’t that also be a red flag?

At the end when a character goes missing from their room, even though Chloe had been looking at the cameras previous times, she doesn’t check them at that point. Probably would have helped.

I’m not familiar with how hospitals work and typically I can suspend reality for the case of a book in a lot of scenarios, but considering the whole high death-rate in a hospital where people might be killing patients is the entire premise and setting for the book, I wish it would have been a more plausible situation.


Another Annoyance #4:

They have a soap dish in their bathroom at home. What kind of psychos prefer bar soap to wash their hands??


Another Annoyance #5:

Chloe finds herself in a bit of a love triangle with her ex-husband and her current fiance. She suspects her ex-husband of murdering patients, but to her fiance it just looks like she’s obsessed with her ex-husband and he’s not super thrilled they’re working so closely together.

It creates some tension between her and her fiance. But no matter how bad it gets, she is just not ‘ready’ to tell him the truth. I get how this is important to the story as Payne wrote it, but I don’t like when a story requires a character to withhold information from a person they wouldn’t. Maybe at first, but there comes a point when withholding the information makes no sense anymore.



Physician-Assisted Suicide

Because this is a major part of the book, let’s talk about this controversial subject. (Also sometimes called ‘death with dignity’ or ‘right to die’ or ‘aid in dying’- AID.)

Whether or not physician-assisted suicide is ethical or moral is not really discussed in the book, it’s kinda just a given:

“he was doing it because he believed people had the right to choose when they died when they were terminally ill. When they were actively in pain and suffering and there was no light at the end of the tunnel.”

“I also knew how much he cared about people. How much he hated to see them in pain, and I knew this came from a place of caring.”

“Jameson was offering a great kindness. A great, horrible kindness.”

“he was so honest that he told me he was doing something that while ethical, was illegal.”

PAS or AID is different than euthanasia because the patient is administering the drugs, not the physician. The physician merely prepares the drugs and is present.

PAS should also not be confused with palliative care which is care given to patients by trying to alleviate symptoms and pain as best as they can as they are dying, which with modern medicine is usually pretty effective.


This is a controversial issue that has a lot of gray areas. Like the character in the book who had ALS, an incurable disease and a painful way to die, it’s hard to think about ‘forcing’ someone to endure that in the last days of their life.

I don’t know if I land on a concrete black-and-white stance in regards to this issue as I think there are so many factors to consider in each case and medical things that I don’t know about.

But here are some thoughts and information about it. It’s worth pondering and thinking through the implications of PAS.

The main argument for PAS is patient autonomy. People want to be in control of when and how they die. It is often driven by severe pain and discomfort that they want to be free of. They believe they should have the right to choose when they die.

However, a Canadian physician interviewed in this article reveals that research studies show that the driving force for patient autonomy is less about their pain and more about their desire to control their death.

He also says, “When death itself can be considered as a medical benefit, the sky seems to be the unfortunate limit for patient autonomy, and it introduces a level of subjectivity into medicine that we wouldn’t otherwise tolerate.”

Oregon, where this book takes place, is one of the eleven states that currently allows PAS. There’s some information coming out of there that gives pause.

After a high profile PAS death in 2014 in Oregon, numbers showed that others who ended their lives this way more than doubled. PAS can actually lead to more PAS just like how the show 13 Reasons Why led to an increase in suicides in teenagers.

Research also shows that doctors weren’t present for one-fourth of the cases. It’s unknown how frequent there are complications with this method of death.

Additionally, another factor often not considered when patients are electing to die is that their judgment may be clouded by clinical depression which can be treated, but this is rarely taken into consideration.

This article listing the arguments for both sides of the issue states, “Opponents of AID are concerned that in Oregon, greater than 70 percent of patients who elect AID are elderly and have cancer, but fewer than five percent are referred to a psychiatrist or psychologist to rule out clinical depression.”

While patient autonomy is important, I am a firm believer in the sanctity of human life. And that life should not be taken. While there are some gray areas as it stands, I think the ‘slippery slope’ opposing argument of PAS is a really important one to think about.

If we start legalizing PAS when patients want to alleviate their pain- where are the lines drawn for that? At what point is it too much pain? Which diseases qualify a patient? It would easily start applying to a broader and broader patient base than it should.

As Wayne Grudem fleshes out in his book Christian Ethics, the ‘right to die’ can also easily become ‘obligated to die.’

“If euthanasia is allowed for some patients, who are suffering, then how can we prevent it from being applied to more and more patients who are suffering?… a society can quickly move from merely allowing the ‘right to die’ to the belief that there is ‘an obligation to die’ on the part of the elderly and the very ill people who are ‘draining resources’ from the society.”

He then goes on to reveal alarming statistics coming out of the Netherlands where euthanasia is legal. It is estimated that “in 1990 nearly 6000 of approximately 130,000 people who died in the Netherlands that year were involuntarily euthanized.”

While there are some examples of people who used PAS that seem right, it’s hard to deny that the legalization of PAS and euthanasia can lead to more and more death. Death of patients that could still recover, death of patients involuntarily, death of infants of children who can’t make those choices for themselves, and an overall subjective scale on what quantifies a life worth living.

Just some thoughts to ponder!


Recommendation

I won’t write Jessica Payne off because I liked her other book and this one shows me she can write without using a lot of swearing. However, there were a few things, as listed above, that made this book a hard one to recommend.

I think if you’re easy to please when it comes to thrillers, you’ll probably enjoy this.

If you’ve read a lot of thrillers and have become a bit picky, my annoyances with this one may be yours as well.

I also would not recommend if physician-assisted suicide is a trigger for you.


[Content Advisory: 17 f-words, 14 s-words, a couple sex scenes are implied but only a few sentences of content]

**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

4.5 rounded to 5.

"It turns out sometimes you have to do the wrong thing. Sometimes you have to make a big mistake to figure out how to make things right. Mistakes are painful but they're the only way to find out who we really are."
- Denny Duquette, Grey's Anatomy

Jessican Payne does it again. This book was described as Grey's Anatomy but with murder so of course I knew I needed to read it.

This book was told from Chloe's POV, with alternating timelines. I love this layout especially when the past catches up with the present... you get a little more explanation. I really also LOVE medical thrillers. What makes it even more believable (and terrifying) is to think that stuff like this actually happens in real life. I had no idea what was going to happen which is always the best when reading a thriller. I also loved the chemistry between Chloe and Jameson. The only reason this didn't get 5 stars from me is because I was left with a couple questions, that went unanswered. Overall, another amazing thriller from Jessica Payne. Can't wait to read more.

I do love a @jessicapayne.writer book. This is a stand alone medical thriller which I have devoured in just one afternoon sitting.

This is fast paced and unpredictable. I loved the dual timeline and perspective of this one. It really let me get a feel for the characters and events.

I found myself transported by the writing. I felt as though I was watching the events play out in front of me.

I found myself continually changing my mind about the guilty as I read. I loved how unpredictable this has been. Payne has quite possibly written her best book yet with this one. It’s definitely my favourite.

I’ve read all of this author’s books and each one gets better and better. The Good Doctor is unpredictable, gripping and unputdownable. This is a book unlike anything I’ve read previously and I’ve loved it.

I cannot wait to see what’s coming next from this author.

A must read.

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Chloe thought her life was finally back on track. After she divorced her husband Dr Jameson Smith she decided to travel using her nursing qualifications. She meets Elton, who is also a nurse and quickly becomes engaged to him. They realise that they both have had enough of travelling and it is time to come home and buy their own house and get permanent jobs. Chloe is very excited when she starts her new job at the local hospital but is totally devastated when she discovers that her ex husband Jameson is a doctor there and that she will be working under him. When the mortality rate begins to increase at the hospital she is asked to look into it and then realises that Jameson could be involved as events and a dark secret that happened when they were married make her suspicious. The book is told from Chloe and Jameson’s perspectives, across now and then timelines and is full of unexpected twists and turns. A gripping read.
Thanks to Netgalley and Bookouture for giving me the opportunity to read and review this book.

I love love any sort of medical thriller and this one didn’t disappoint. Fast paced and twisty, this book was perfect

Such a good read. The twists where very well executed and shocking. It left me on the edge of my seat, and I couldn't put this book down. It was my first read by Jessica Payne, and certainly will not be my last!

I've enjoyed Payne's other books but this one just wasn't doing it for me. I didn't like the main character and I think that just set the wrong tone for me. It was a really interesting premise and that kept me reading but I was never fully invested in this one.

Wow !!! What a book. I couldnt put it down. Loved the medical setting. I love the show Greys Anatomy so I got a very similiar vibe.

Actioned pacted physiological thriller. This deal with a highly complex topic a medical serial killer. Told from the pov of chloe and her ex husband Jameison. She had escaped and found a new life with elton her fiancee but now she is determined to get the killer.
There is a lot of twists and tuns on this. The backstory is filtered through their iterqcyions and i was hoked from abot 505 but i wrongly picked the tre killer. There were on reflection a lot of red herrings i felt with the final reveal i was blown away. This is what make it a some what unbelievable 5 atar read for me. I never saw the ending and alrhough parts seemed ott it showed thevqualiry of the writing. I was so wrapped ip.in the relationship s of the 2 pov and their past i didnt look beyond. Sadly this happens a lot in real life.
Well done to tge autho for touching on such a sensitive issye and telling a fab stoey. Thank yoy netgallery abd publisher.