Meg is a professional poker player with a celebrity sister Haley, who commits suicide in rehab. She then goes “undercover” as a rehab patient to try to figure out what actually happened, because she doesn’t believe for a second that Haley killed herself.

This story was so far fetched. The fact that the beginning is spent talking about how similar they look, and then when she enters the rehab she doesn’t even change her name or appearance was the first red flag to me. There’s a therapist on staff. Did Haley never mention her sister Meg? Not only that, but no one even noticed the resemblance? Or how about when Meg immediately started asking about Haley upon walking into the place?

That was just some of the discrepancies that really irked me, and then as we got further into the plot it went off the rails. I understand that I need to be able to suspend my belief, but this was too much. The twists got excessive and overwhelming unbelievable. This just did not work for me, which is disappointing since the writing was so atmospheric and I was loving the short chapters and the pacing early on. It ended up getting too detailed, with too many twists, and it would have benefitted from being shorter.

I enjoyed it, but it just isn’t a new favorite for me to say the least.

Thank you NetGalley & Sourcebooks Landmark for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion!

Wow is the first word that comes to mind when thinking about The Clinic. Riveting character development with twists and turns to keep me guessing as I turned each page. I couldn't decide if I liked Meg or wanted to just shake her and say "what are you thinking!" The dynamic between the guests was incredible. Each twist makes you feel like you are in the book.

A capitvating novel from start to finish! Meg finds herself plunged into a confusing mystery when her famous sister, Haley, is discovered dead at The Clinic, an exclusive rehab facility. Initially presumed a suicide, Meg harbors doubts about this and resolves to investigate, going undercover as a patient.

Once there, Meg struggles not only with uncovering the truth behind her sister's death but also with her own demons—addiction to alcohol and oxy pills, rooted in childhood and workplace trauma. As Meg struggles towards sobriety, she unveils a web of stories and secrets among fellow patients, psychologists, and staff. She quickly discovers the extent of her addiction and the blurred lines between reality and deception.

This engaging tale is a must-read for fans of suspenseful psychological thrillers.

Thank you to Cate Quinn, Sourcebooks Landmark Publishing, and NetGalley for an advanced eBook in exchange for my honest review.

First, the breakdown.
Plot: 5
Characters: 4
Pace: 4
Enjoyment: 4.5

Overall: 4

Meg goes to a rehab clinic to solve the mystery of who killed her sister, or figure out if it was a murder at all.

The plot of this book is fantastic. Cate did a great job at planning and executing this. The characters are well thought out and easy to distinguish between. There are multiple narrators and they are all unreliable. The way the plot plays out make sense and flows well. I will say the end was a little drawn out. After the climax there is more than I thought necessary. I think the climax could've been the ending and that would've been good. There was an additional twist at the end. I don't think it was needed but it could lead into another book. There was also a part at the end that I didn't understand. I might need to go back and reread but I don't know. *Spoiler* so if you didn't read, stop now. I don't understand how Meg was seeing Max as a therapist unless she was visiting him in prison?? Or was he her therapist after he was released from prison and Meyers and Hanson's visit to the 'new' Clinic was after that? Anywhere that was the only part that I didn't understand.

Overall I liked this and would recommend this to another ready of mystery books!

Meg doesn't believe that her sister committed suicide in rehab. So she's out to the Clinic to prove that Haley was murdered.
This mystery/thriller looked very promising, but addiction trigger me, so this was not a pleasant read for me. My bad for not doing my research prior to diving into this one. You also definitely have to suspend disbelief, as this is super far-fetched and all over the place. I don't really understand what was the point of Cara's POV... The book was about 100 pages too long, but I liked that the chapters were short. I've read many great reviews about this one, so it was just not for me.
I received an advance review copy of this book for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Ok I really enjoyed this one. I have read some mixed reviews, but I had a strong overall positive feeling about this book.
The dual POV helped for me as this book has 115 chapters. The dual POV makes the chapters short thankfully.
It also helped for me to see what was happening from both Meg and Cat’s perspective as Cat is a rule follower. She’s someone who had someone in her life touched by addiction and it molded her into what she is now. Then you have Meg, who basically doesn’t follow any of the rules. She’s there to find out what happened to her sister while dealing with her own addictions to alcohol and oxy.
As a medical professional I had some issues with the way the rehab had some design flaws for those at risk of self harm. But that’s just my brain always being extra.
I would say give this book a read if you like liked door mysteries, dual POV, and psychological twists.
I received an advance review copy for free from NetGalley and Sourcebooks. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Thank you @netgalley and @bookmarked for this ARC of The Clinic by @catequinnauthor. I made the mistake of looking at other reviews before reading this and can honestly say I don’t know how anyone didn’t like this book!

Trauma tends to get the best of people and manifest itself into various forms of addiction. Some people over eat, some people turn to sex or violence, and others turn to drugs and alcohol. When Meg’s famous sister ends up dead in rehab from what has been deemed a “suicide” she knows something is wrong. Haley loved herself too much to end her own life. Meg, like Haley, has her own demons and is on the verge of losing her job and the only man she’s ever maybe loved. Working as an undercover in a casino she too has turned to pills and alcohol to numb her days. Convinced there was foul play involved in Haley’s death she checks herself into rehab and goes undercover with no intentions of actually getting clean and only getting answers.

Meg is thrown into a glitzy Hollywood rehab with all the luxuries one can expect and all the drama associated with famous clientele. The longer she’s there she begins to believe Haley isn’t dead. Threatening messages start appearing, too many coincidences are happening, the eccentric owner and questionable staff seem to be hiding things, new age off the books treatment, and too many suspects put Meg into a tail spin. As her own trauma starts to surface and she makes the decision to actually get sober she begins questioning everything she thought she knew. Getting to the bottom of Haley’s death may just get Meg to save herself along the way. If you’re looking for a mystery that keeps you guessing this is it. #booksbooksbooks #bookworm #bookstagram #booknerd #arc #2024readingchallenge 📚📚📚

Pub Date: Jan. 23, 2024.

Thank you so much Netgalley for the ARC of this fantastic novel! The suspense and the plot twists were incredible and kept me guessing until the very end. Cate Quinn has crafted a seriously suspenseful story that involves a rehab center and a group of misfits trying to get their act together. I fell for all of these characters but especially Meg. After discovering her sister Haley has died in rehab, she risks everything to go undercover and find her murderer, as Meg refuses to believe her sister ended her own life while inside. Upon arriving at the Clinic, Meg meets the other addicts Haley was inside with and immediately decides one of them is her killer. Working through her own addictions and past childhood trauma, she tries to also solve her sister’s murder. What happens in between is a roller coaster ride that leaves the reader convinced that everyone is lying and no one can be trusted.

I really wanted to like this. The premise sounds so great (and the cover is stunning) but it fell so short. The dual POV didn’t work for me, and I just couldn’t get into the characters. I started this and set it down months ago and it was such a struggle to pick back up. Completely forgettable.

This psychological thriller will have you guessing to the very end while touching on important issues like addiction and the corrupt healthcare system. The story follows the POV of Meg and Cara. Meg is first and foremost trying to solve her sisters murder in a rehab center called "The Clinic" while also attending to her personal alcohol and opioid addiction. Cara is a worker who little by little finds out more about why Dr. Lutz and his unorthodox practice.
This eerie tale takes you through a journey and an addict with drawling and a quest to find out what truly happened to Meg's sister.

S U M M A RY:
Meg works for a casino in LA, catching cheaters and popping a few too many pain pills to cope, following a far different path than her sister Haley, a famous actress. But suddenly reports surface of Haley dying at the remote rehab facility where she had been forced to go to get her addictions under control.

There are whispers of suicide, but Meg can't believe it. She decides that the best way to find out what happened to her sister is to check in herself – to investigate what really happened from the inside.

Battling her own addictions and figuring out the truth will be much more difficult than she imagined, far away from friends, family – and anyone who could help her.

R E V I E W:

I really, really enjoyed this one. I have been out of the thriller game for awhile and this kept my attention. I saw someone on Instagram saying they thought it could’ve been 100 pages less but I thought it was pretty perfect. I enjoyed the ending, I loved hearing the ‘truthful’ parts about rehab, and I enjoyed that the author did so much research as well has having gone through the process herself. It added authenticity to the book. I also thought that keeping the ‘hero’ of the story with some major flaws was wonderful. To find out that the ‘hero’ is a sociopath was wild, but I really like that she’s working on it through therapy.

Read if you like:
🚪 Locked Room Thrillers
2️⃣ Dual POV
🔍 Murder Mysteries
🧠 Psychology Thrillers

This one has a slower pace for the beginning of the book, but it definitely increases in pace once the reveals and twists start coming through as Meg continues to dig for answers about the death of her sister at the same facility. We also get the POV of Cara the manager of the facility to give extra twists and turns by bouncing between the two pov.

This one does have some pretty outlandish twists and turns and ending so be prepared to suspend reality and be fine with answers that don’t make a lot of sense all the time, if you can do that, you’ll really enjoy this one!

Additionally, neither of the narrators is very likable so if you like me love thrillers with unlikable characters, you will enjoy that aspect of this story too!

Thank you so much sourcebooks landmark for my ARC of this one in exchange for my review!

The synopsis of this book immediately caught my eye. I was incredibly intrigued by a murder that happens inside of a celebrity rehab and the sister who goes to solve it. But I think overall this book just fell a little flat for me.

The first thing I’ll say is that the authors note did make the story a little better for me. With Quinn’s own experience in rehab being the background, I understood the relationship between the patients a little better and why everyone was so codependent on everyone else. It made the characters feel a little more real to me.

The actual plot wasn’t for me though. It was twisty, yes. But it also did not feel fleshed out at all. The two different POVs made it feel disjointed and weird. I would’ve preferred not to have Cara’s POV because it literally brought nothing to the table. There is a major twist at the end that I did not see coming at all but it was barely expanded on and with another plot line twist being added on right in the middle of it, it just didn’t work.

I’m thankful to NetGalley and Sourcebooks for this galley in exchange for my honest review

I received this title from NetGalley for an honest review. It was fantastic. This is my kind of book. Who done it with a twist. The story was fast paced and kept me interested. I finished it quickly.
The main character was likeable and a bit annoying. Under the circumstances I think that she is allowed. I would like a prequel with Meg and Sol how she got the job etc.
I liked have the pov from the Cara and Meg. I thought that was a great touch. Getting more detail from a different perspective is always nice. Especially when you’re trying to find out who the bad guy is.
Meyers was a great add to the story. Her character was fun and made the small town feel more believable. Her description by Cara was so funny to me.

****UNPOPULAR OPINION TIME****

I wanted to love this book but could not get there. This author struggles to grasp gothic fiction like Sylvia Moreno-Garica, whose books are all the same (and predictable). I understand the author probably was going through addiction and rehab herself, glad you are safe and happy now. But this book was heavy on that content and the rest of the plot was an after thought.

The one star was for the cover. I honestly skim-read most of this to get to the good parts. IMO, a forgettable book. I do not feel good leaving a bad review because I enjoyed previous books but this one is a miss. Cannot recommend.

Thanks to Cate Quinn, Netgalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for an honest review in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 1/23/2024

I really wanted to like this one more, but there was no connection to any of the characters for me and the premise a bit over-the-top.

Remote, ultra-expensive addiction facility in Pacific Northwest where the death of a celebrity leads to an undercover stay by her sister (also with her own issues).

Writing was fine, just not what I had hoped for.

My thanks to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for providing the free early arc of The Clinic for review. The opinions are strictly my own.

DNF @ 35%.

I really try not to DNF ARCs and rate books that I've DNF'd, but since it is an NG ARC, I'm kind of forced to give it a rating. And I'm devastated that this turned out to be a DNF, because I was really looking forward to reading it. I was hoping for the gothic vibes of The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearse on American soil with more of a thriller to it, and with all the drama and secret-keeping that comes along with people being in rehab. I know about the drama and secrets from having worked in a substance use rehab facility, and it seems like the author didn't even do the bare minimum of research for this book, or it wouldn't have been a DNF, and might have just been a poorly rated book instead.

To start with, it's tough to connect to the characters. Cara is extremely type-A, standoffish, and a stick to the rules kind of woman. It makes no sense why she would consistently bend the rules for the clinicians at the practice if she's as much of a stickler for the rules as she is everywhere else. Meg isn't easy to like either. So much of what comes out of her mouth isn't truthful, and she's combative and unfriendly to basically everyone unless they can help her in some way, which isn't really a pleasant personality type. This makes it kind of hard to care about what happens to either of the characters.

By far, the biggest issue for me was the glaring inconsistencies in the clinical information that is presented that makes it seem like the author didn't bother to do any research at all, and took me out of the story. I was fuming when I saw these things, and it gives the wrong impression about people with substance use disorders and mental health, as well as treatment, potentially keeping people who need help away from life-saving care. Maybe I only noticed these things because I worked in the field, but I'd like to think that some are just common sense.

For example, early in the book, Meg is gambling at a casino in Vegas, and notes:

"The Viking takes naxolone spray out of his shirt pocket and sniffs."

I can only assume they're talking about naloxone, which is the same as Narcan. You know, the drug that reverses an opioid overdose, and has no other effect on the body. Which means that either "the Viking" is in imminent danger of an overdose (which he isn't because he isn't displaying any signs of it) or the author is trying to make it look like he's taking a drug that's going to have an effect, which it isn't.

Next up, we have the central issue in the story that starts off everything, Haley's death, which is attributed to a heroin overdose. But not just any heroin.

"'Medical grade. For extreme pain relief...'
Hanson is shaking his head. 'Still can't get my head around why a rehab would keep heroin.'
'It is perfectly standard for a medical facility,' says Dr. Lutz, his accent thickening. 'We keep a federally approved pharmaceutical supply of licensed drugs. as do all professional rehab facilities.'"

Um, I don't know where Cate Quinn is from, but this book is set in the Pacific Northwest, and there is absolutely no circumstance in any situation in America where heroin is approved for medical use. There is no medical grade heroin in the US. So there's no federally approved pharmaceutical heroin. If you've ever been in a situation where you've had extreme pain, chances are hospital staff will give you morphine, dilaudid, or fentanyl. But never heroin, because it's illegal in America. Two seconds on Google could have informed the author of this.

But it doesn't end there - we also learn that this facility doesn't have to provide informed consent before performing any kind of procedures (unlike every other medical and psychiatric provider in the country), are able to outright lie to clients about drugging them, and utilize experimental treatments (despite accepting insurance) without telling their clients. Not only is this unethical, it's SUPER ILLEGAL! The psychologist outright tells a client that withdrawal is mostly psychological (just ignore the well-studied and known physiological withdrawal syndromes that occur as brain chemistry works to restabilize). The doctor wants to promote a completely untrained staff member to clinician (also illegal). And apparently thinks that opioids are neurotoxins (they aren't).

I couldn't figure out for the life of me why a character who is there going through alcohol withdrawal (which can be fatal if untreated), and is being heavily dosed with benzodiazepines (without their knowledge, of course), which is the standard treatment for alcohol withdrawal, is still having alcohol withdrawal symptoms. Ultimately, this became too ridiculous to sustain, and I just couldn't manage to focus on the story itself. I can't imagine that the story would be much more believable than the rehab itself, which wasn't atmospheric enough to be quite gothic, but wound up just being a foggy mess.

The premise of this book proved strong, but it didn't grip me the way I love a good thriller/murder mystery to do. The multiple POVs brought dimension to the story, but the characters felt flat. I wanted to have the opportunity to dive deep into what made each of them tick, and how that connected to the overall point of the book. My favorite part of the book was the afterward-- and I do not say this in jest! I appreciated the author sharing that this is the first book she wrote sober (congrats to her!). I only wish she wove more of her first person experiences into the characters and their struggles. I am looking forward to future books by Cate Quinn. This one just felt off.

The Clinic by Cate Quinn……. Where to begin. It had lots of things I liked, dreary atmosphere, unreliable characters, two POV’s, flashbacks. But it had many things I didn’t like, the main one being it was just too long and a fair bit of repetition. It also started out fast and kind of went off the rails at the end or maybe I was just bored by that point. It wasn’t bad but it could have benefited from some editing in my opinion.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for a advanced copy in exchange for an honest opinion.3⭐️

Over time I’ve learned I’m not really a fan of the slow-burn thriller, and lucky for me this one was the complete opposite. I was excited by the time I finished the prologue!

I really enjoyed the pacing, short chapters, and overall vibe of this book. It kept me entertained and guessing, and I feel like it depicts heavier themes of trauma and addiction in a respectful manner.

There were however some issues for me in regard to some of the medical aspects of the book, which required me to suspend belief a little bit in order to move on with and enjoy the story. I don’t usually mind doing this, but because this story felt more realistic in a lot of ways, these discrepancies stood out more than they typically would for me.

Overall this was a good thriller with twists I didn’t see coming!

Thank you so much to the author and Netgalley for my e-copy to read and honestly review.