Thank you to NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book.  

I definitely took a chance with The Queen of Hearts, it's adult fiction which tends to be 50/50 for me. But the synopsis just sounded really interesting, and I like reading books about friends.  

Unfortunately I ended up quitting this book about 20% into it. Right off the bat the writing style was just not for me, I didn't like the cadence or the way the author was describing things. I couldn't get enmeshed in the world because I wasn't sucked in, I felt like an observer instead of a part of the story. I didn't care for any of the characters, I didn't care about this guy Nick coming back into the women's lives, and it wasn't interesting enough to stick around till all was revealed. 

I also found the story confusing. It was switching from the past to the present, which I like sometimes but this just felt very choppy and was more confusing than anything else. I guess for me the book just felt like it wasn't put together very well and so I DNF it. 

I gave this book 1 star on Goodreads.

What a great story of friendship through trials and tribulations. I love to read about friendships amongst strong, career focused women who maintain their own lives as well (love, friendship, family). I’m impressed that this was Martin’s debut novel and I will certainly be on the lookout for what she does next! Highly recommend for fans of Grey's Anatomy - a bit of medical and a whole lot of drama!

I wouldn't say that Grey's Anatomy has ever been a "must-watch" for me, but I certainly find it entertaining. Seeing
that this novel was receiving such comparisons to the show definitely piqued my interest. I would imagine that it would be difficult for someone to write and describe such intense, fast-paced medical scenes without visuals to accompany. I think the author does a decent job describing things in such a way that someone whose only medical background is an episode of Grey's Anatomy can follow along. With that said, I didn't find any of that as exciting as I would while watching a show. I'm thinking medical fiction (?) is not really the genre for me.
As for the story itself, I found that rather dull as well. Too little is revealed about the characters early on in the novel, so by the time I was about halfway through and finally learning more about what makes them tick, I just didn't care. I was already disengaged and wasn't interested enough to figure out what the big secret was that was supposed to be driving the novel forward.

I loved this book! Perfect for fans of General Hospital, Grey's Anatomy, etc. Young doctors in love... Romantic soapy fun!

The Queen of Hearts by Kimmery Martin is a 2018 Berkley publication.

A suspenseful and emotional medical drama

Zadie and Emma have been best friends since their medical school days. They come from completely different backgrounds, but the friendship has endured countless trials, marriages, children, and demanding careers. Their lives are hectic, and filled with family and career related challenges, triumphs, and tragedies. They share all of it with one another, asking and giving advice, sympathizing with, and supporting one another. But, the one thing they never, ever, never talk about is their third year in Med school…

Imagine all the angst, medical intensity, the emotion, heartbreak, tragedy and high drama of Grey’s Anatomy, but with a darker, edgier, suspenseful tone running beneath the surface.

Queen of Hearts has this bipolar thing going on. On one hand, it’s a chick-lit novel about besties who stick with each other through all of life’s various valleys and peaks, but there’s a ‘dark side’, a sinister feeling of foreboding, of impending doom. It’s not just the emotional gut-punches, the graphic medical situations, or the appearance of Dr. X, who will most assuredly bring down all the carefully constructed walls built by Zadie and Emma when it comes to the past, and who also holds the power in the palm of his gifted hands, to once again, leave devastation in his wake.

It’s like watching a train wreck. You know it’s coming, but you are helpless to stop it, and you can’t tear your eyes away from the impending impact, or the carnage left behind.

I finished reading this book over two weeks ago. It has taken me this long to formulate my feelings. When I turned that last page I experienced a fuzzy feeling of disorientation. I really had to take some time to process it.

Finally, I think I can attempt to explain my thoughts. I admit I had quite a few conflicting feelings about how everything played out. Wow. I mean- wow. Once I had begun to form an opinion that would stick, I realized I couldn’t really explain how I had come to that point without giving too much away.

This review is long, and contains a lot of introspection and retrospection on my part, but it’s the mark of a good story when it prompts the reader to dig deeper and reflect on what they might do in a similar situation. It’s a gritty medical drama, but it’s also an ode to life, family, and above all friendship. So bear with me.

What a tangled web we weave….

Lies, betrayals, manipulations, and secrets- this book has them packed in so tight it can hardly contain them all. I still can’t wrap my head around some of it, and my feelings are still unsettled, even now. This story is part cautionary tale, partly a tale of borderline obsession, with a river of deception, envy, insecurities and competition. But, rest assured- your sins will always find you out. You can bury them, ignore them, hide them, and run from them, but eventually the truth bubbles to the surface. There are always consequences for our actions, some that take no prisoners, who hurt the very people we love and respect. Everyone has a secret, everyone has made questionable decisions, let our morals sink below our own standards. Atonement is a must, redemption hoped for. But, it is forgiveness that is the hardest thing to accomplish, but it is also the most powerful, effective ability humans are capable of.

Now, I can’t sit here and tell you my feelings are completely settled about this story, as I continue to struggle with ongoing conflicts. But, I think the story speaks to the powerful, but mysterious bonds of friendship. Friendship is a relationship like no other. It can be fraught with insecurities and jealousies, and is fragile in a way many other relationships are not, being devoid of familial bonds or the power of romantic love. Yet, it can create an unshakable bond, a special kind of love, a fierce loyalty and devotion, it brings out a certain kind of protectiveness and can often endure hardships that other relationships would never survive.

While there is a lot of emotional turmoil in this story, many heart rending situations and high drama, there is also the ‘light’ side of the story. The side where people rise to the occasion and do the right thing, where something good comes from something bad, and where the good side wins out in the end!

This story turned out to be much more than I had anticipated. I was on pins and needles from start to finish, swallowed a painful lump or two, cursed, fretted, and fumed. But, when all was said and done, I think this was a very well -constructed novel, filled with human foibles, realistic family challenges, and amazing depictions of human beings at their very worst, but also at their finest. Not only that, I love medical dramas- oh- and southern fiction- so there's that, too! 😊

This was a fiction books where you felt like you had everything figured out, but at the same time just couldn’t help but thinking, what the heck is going on between these characters. However, after a certain point you stop trying to guess what's going to happen next and just keep reading to let it unfold. It was the best decision because I loved seeing how everything unfolded at the end.

The Queen of Hearts by Kimmery Martin is a book with a storyline that really sucked me in.
Zadie and Emma are best friends and both are also wives, mothers and doctors. The book goes back and forth between current time and their third year of medical school where something happened which makes both of them very uncomfortable that their former chief resident, Dr. X , has returned. The story is told in the alternating perspectives of Zadie and Emma and I thought Martin did a great job of giving each woman a different voice.

While the storyline sucked me in these characters lives stressed me out! These women do not live a calm, peaceful life. The scenes depicting their experiences in medical school were so real and intense I felt like I was in the hospital with them and I came away with a deeper respect for anyone that has gone through medical school.

This is a fast moving book that reads quickly and a book you want to read quickly to find out what happened in that third year of school. But it is also a book about friendship and how the small choices we make change our lives and are the choices that shape who we are.

WHY DID I LISTEN TO THE QUEEN OF HEARTS BY KIMMERY MARTIN?
The Queen Of Hearts by Kimmery Martin was one of several holds I put in at once. And it so happens that apparently my library audiobook taste twin must have returned all of the books I had on hold at the same time. So, I began to marathon listen to this book. Friends, I was so EXCITED to get into this book. I love it when there is drama. I also love it when there are big secrets. Plus, that cover 100% is an April kind of cover. Also? I never read medical dramas and I LOVE LOVE LOVE experiencing new to me genres via audiobook.

WHAT’S THE STORY HERE?
Kimmery Martin’s debut book follows two main point of view characters – Zadie and Emma. Both women are doctors – one is a trauma surgeon and the other is a pediatric cardiologist. Both women became friends basically at this medical camp while in school. They then go on to do their residency together. Now they both live in Charlotte. The Queen Of Hearts goes back and forth between 1999 and present day.

Slowly, the story reveals a dramatic past between the two women and regarding this man called Nick or Dr. X. Nick basically caused some awful stuff to go down. Anyways, Nick is now in Charlotte, and this history is about to come back up. Both women must reckon with the past while also dealing with tragedy in the present. We get to see their home lives, their current careers, and get this well rounded picture of both women.

HOW DID I LIKE IT?
The Queen Of Hearts by Kimmery Martin is just a fantastic read — it is engaging and had me definitely on edge. I will admit there was one scene where I was kind of angry I was driving while listening. Mainly because I was overcome with all these emotions. Friends, I am so glad I stepped outside my normal genres to try something new. Granted, there’s some themes that are familiar. After all, this is story of friendship, forgiveness, life, death. The medical bits don’t comprise the entire story. Now I find myself ready to listen to whatever Martin comes out with next.

HOW’S THE NARRATION?
The audiobook has two narrators — Catherine Taber and Shannon McManus. One narrates the Zadie chapters. The other narrates the Emma chapters. I could not tell you which was which though. Honestly, they did such a good job with the narration. I found myself going back to the eARC to attempt to flip ahead to prepare myself for the more emotional parts (FYI that did not work out too well in the end). So, I did confuse Emma and Zadie a little bit when my attention wandered. However, that was a thing that was few and far between while listening. For real, this audiobook is one you should put on your MUST LISTEN list.

Kimmery Martin’s debut fiction loses the heart of the matter in hospital slog

Kimmery Martin, a physician in North Carolina who writes about books on her web site and has a family of three children, has written her first novel about physician moms in North Carolina. The Queen of Hearts’ main characters Zadie and Emma came up together through college, medical school and residency and this story that toggles between that exhausting time close to 20 years ago and present day when a mysterious Dr. X comes back into their lives and a year in their past that they’ve never talked about since threatens to unhinge their tight relationship and their happily married lives.

Southern charm (children say “honey dears” and “darling honey”) abounds while other moments definitely feel tone deaf: the word “sketch” is attributed to “gangsta speak” which the main character Zadie finds funny when her husband Drew uses it given “he had been born in some lily-white suburb of DC. (She) reflected that I lived in a world where suburban moms were trying to sound like bankers, bankers were trying to sound like rappers, and the privileged offspring of the moms and bankers were trying to look like gangsta-rapper-football players.” A patient in the ER is described as “a herpes-infested crack ho."

While Martin’s medical background may serve her character development and offer a lively backdrop of hospital action to an otherwise predictable romantic comedy, many moments in rooms with a bunch of medical staff and a patient bore with insider details. When a Dr. Markey "said sharply to the anesthesiologist, ‘What’s the last hemoglobin?’” I did not care. Hey, I get it, write what you know and there’s certainly a market for hospital dramas, but make sure to edit, darling.

Wendy Ward
http://wendyrward.tumblr.com/

Kimmery Martin's debut novel first came to my attention through the Instagram account of my friend, author Amy Poeppel. Amy and I used to work together at the school that inspired her first novel, "Small Admissions". As a published author, Amy has lots of connections with other up and coming authors and has great recommendations. I highly recommend following her on Instagram or Twitter.



Anyway, I grabbed "The Queen of Hearts" from Netgalley, although it took me a while to get to it. The book was published in February.



In Martin's acknowledgements, she wrote that people are drawn to medical dramas. After all, there's a reason why "Grey's Anatomy" has been on the air so long.



Martin herself is an emergency medical doctor. Like her main characters, she's from Kentucky. She's also a wife and mother.



"The Queen of Heart" is a big novel with a lot going on. It's part medical drama, part love triangle, with dashes of domestic drama (parenting toddlers, managing carpools, etc) as well.



But at the center of the story is the friendship of two women: Zadie and Emma. They met at a camp during high school and went on to be roommates in college and medical school. Now in their late 30s, they are both doctors who live in Charlotte, working and raising their children in happy marriages.



Still, they are haunted by the events that took place during their third year of medical school, until a sexy older doctor from their past moves to Charlotte and takes a job in Emma's hospital. His presence unleashes all the drama of their shares pasts and will change their present lives forever.



I loved this book. The cover was very girlie (especially if you only see a small version where it's hard to see the heart organ), which put me off initially. But really, this is a very smart, very realistic - and also very funny - story of friendship, love and the bad choices people make in their youth.



The tone can be a bit jarring at times. Like I got sucked into Zadie's parenting craziness, especially her adorable three year old who calls adults things like "dearest darling." That had me on the floor (having a 3 year old myself), but then the story switches quickly to a lot of medical jargon, which was a bit boring to read.



Like I said, there's a lot happening in this book. The story is told from both Emma and Zadie's perspectives, alternating from past (during their third year of medical school) to present. Eventually, the past and present collide with the return of the doctor from their past, propelling the characters forward into new and unfamiliar territory.



My one complaint was the loss of a character that came out of nowhere from my perspective. This was someone we were getting to know through the eyes of both women, someone I liked as a character and I did not expect what happened with their story. It came out of nowhere.



Besides that, I really loved this book. I was frantically reading the last couple pages in the carpool line while waiting to get my daughter from preschool, hoping I could finish before I had to get out of the car (I did!).



Don't miss this one!

I enjoyed this far more than I expected to. Would recommend.

Zadie and Emma's history goes back to when they were young med students. Their history includes loves and losses, good memories and bad. Now they are enjoying successful careers, loving marriages, and are raising children in the upper-class areas of Charlotte. Emma is a successful trauma surgeon and Zadie is a world-class pediatric cardiologist. Both of them are caught off guard when they learn that a doctor from their past is moving to Charlotte. Just the name of Nick drudges up memories that they both would rather leave in the past. What they don't know is that one of them has been keeping a pretty big secret about something that happened back in med school. Will the secret destroy the only real friendship that either of them has had in years?

For more than a decade the antics of med students at Seattle Grace have romanticized med school for millions of viewers. The Queen of Hearts is the kind of book that will bring back all of those reasons why we spent so much time at Seattle Grace. Romance, angst, heartache, and more. I think it is that sentimental connection to the beloved show that is the reason why I enjoyed this book so much. I really liked both Zadie and Emma. I even liked Nick in his own anti-McDreamy way. Zadie is a little more flighty, a bit overwhelmed with her four young children. But it is Emma who is most discombobulated by the thought that Nick will be moving to Charlotte. As the storyline goes back and forth between the present and the past you really get a strong "Greys Anatomy" vibe, especially when there is a tragedy that befalls the Zadie, Emma, and their friends. - CLICK HERE FOR SPOILERS

Bottom Line - I believe that The Queen of Hearts is a love story, but a love story between two friends. Neither Zadie nor Emma are perfect, but their friendship has stood the test of time and I believe the love between them was genuine, even when things get tough. We should all be so lucky to have a friend like that.

Details:
The Queen of Hearts by Kimmery Martin
On Facebook
Pages: 352
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Publication Date: 2/13/2018
Buy it Here!

Emma and Zadie are the best of friends; they've been through thick and thin with each other since they started medical school. However, Emma knows more about the tragedy that almost derailed both their lives than she lets on to Zadie. And when a man from their past shows up in their present, we find out just how strong their bond of friendship really is.
Told from alternating time periods from both Emma and Zadie's point of views, this amazing debut novel is a wonderful read. The pace is just right and the medical jargon is kept to a minimum so it doesn't slow you down. Fans of Grey's Anatomy will love this one! The character's voices are so distinct I had no trouble telling them apart in each section. The story line is so original and well thought out, and I loved finding out about Emma and Zadie and how their story would unfold.

Good novel about medicine, betrayal, and forgiveness. The characters are believable, and the story line is interesting.

I was looking forward to this novel of two friends, Zadie and Emma, experiencing medical school and life. I felt the book did drag a little at times, and the idea that friendship could survive betrayal and lies did not feel authentic to the characters. I did like Zadie’s relationship with her family, but it wasn’t enough.

First of all, I have to say, this was one of my most anticipated books for 2018 and it didn’t diasappoint. The book tells the story of two women who have been friends since Med school. The story is told by both Emma and Zadie and goes between the present and the past. We first really get to know Emma and Zadie during Med school. They were best friends and roommates. In the present both women are now busy wives, mothers, and very successful doctors. I really enjoyed that they both had wonderful home lives as well as balancing their busy professional careers. Some of the stories of Zadie and her children are really funny and down to earth. I’m a fan of medical stories so I loved all the details surrounding their work as physicians. Emma has run into some complications at work and more problems arise when Nick, a doctor they knew during their residency, joins her medical practice. As Emma’s career looks to be in jeopardy so does her friendship with Zadie as secrets long kept hidden come to light with the reappearance of Nick. Great story of friendship, motherhood, physicians, and secrets. This is the author’s first book and I can’t wait for more.

A nice read when you are looking for something to pass the time. If you are a fan of ER or other medical dramas, you will enjoy this book.

Okay. Let’s just get this one out there: I watched the first six or seven seasons of ER like I was eating candy (with abandon) and fulfilling a religious obligation (with intense purpose) at the same time. Although I have only a small idea what these things mean, I can bark “pulse ox” and “CBC” and “V-fib” and “stat” like it’s no one’s business. This is a language I share with my husband, also an ER fanatic from the mid- to late-90s era. No joke: he once passed a nursing practice test based on his knowledge of ER terminology alone.
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The best scenes in The Queen of Hearts, in my opinion, were the ones that brought me into the heart of the trauma, with the life or death decisions in the hands of medical students and their harried instructors. Absolutely gripping. This was also a friendship drama—two female doctors with established careers coming to terms with an event from their med school pasts. I liked the past drama and the present drama… although I wasn’t sure I bought the book’s conclusion. (Zadie as a character is a much more forgiving person than Paula as a human, TBH.)

My first thought when i read the synopsis was "Holy crap this is Gray's Anatomy type of shit I'm about to read". And you know what? I was right? I mean so much drama so many secrets, affairs and of course trauma patients!
Main characters, Emma and Zadie. Bffs for life right? they have been through a lot since they became friends. Reminds me or Meredith and Yang lol. I love that and also they have a personality where they seem to be funny and perfect. I couldn't find any reason to hate them.... Oh boy at the very end of the novel I was like what the f*ck. Can't say more but its crazy. Of course it's about a boy but more importantly their friendship is put to the test and the main concept of the book was forgiveness. Well, for me that's how I perceived it. The only reason it took me about a month to finish it was because I wasn't in the mood to read an e-book. The story for me was not boring at all. It was good. The pace was moderate so it was easy to keep a pace for it. The description was excellent and the characters were like straight from Gray's Anatomy lol. Only reason I am giving 4 out of 5 stars was mainly I thought this about Zadie and Nick. I wanted a different story and more of a plot between them but alas it was the opposite. I mean I give props for Zadie. She has a big heart. I definitely would recommend this book to any drama lovers and anyone who is into Gray's Anatomy would get a kick out of this novel.

I really loved this book. I was drawn in by the beautiful cover and the description. Once I started reading I did enjoy the elements of the book; friendship, secretes, and the medical drama that occurred. The only issue I have and the reason that I didn’t leave a 5 star review is because it’s a little difficult to get into. In the beginning I found myself struggling to connect with the book. I felt as though I was having to push myself to get through it. In the end I’m glad I did because it was a really great read.