As a rule, I don't tend to read WWII fiction, 9/11 stories, or books about the pandemic, with some exceptions. I'm not sure why I asked to read this book on NetGalley. I started this book three separate times and each time I just couldn't get through it. It was too real. I read for enjoyment and escapism, which is why I usually avoid such books.

But I borrowed it again from the library and tried again, skipping whole passages that were mostly about the virus. I focused on the friendship and the lives of these women who became friends in med school. How they relied on each other to get through this terrible ordeal, and supported each other. I am glad I stuck with the book and glad I finished it. There's a lovely surprise twist, given how the situation was written about, and it comes in two parts. If you're anything like me, you're going to need a box of tissues handy, when this is revealed. It makes sitting through the pandemic in this book all worth it.

I'm very glad I decided to finish the book. The women in this book are so strong, well-rounded characters. If the author decides to write more books, not pandemic-related, I'd read them. She does well with dialogue, writes good characters that can easily be imagined in one's mind's eye, and knows how to hold the reader's attention.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the chance to read and review this book, albeit a very late review. All opinions expressed are mine and given freely..

I won this copy on a giveaway and I so happy because I never win anything! I can’t believe this was written before COVID. This is about a pandemic (but not COVID) there are in my opinion similarities because I am no doctor or work in a medical field I think this book reads different. Is really good and I wish people won’t read this through the lens of the pandemic we just endured and try to go in blind. Triggers are there sure, there is a lot of emotional moments and sadness however it is not an apocalyptic story, is more about how world changes in front of your eyes, in a informative way through the eyes of these seven characters.

Opening Chapters
The book opens at a Christmas party held after the pandemic was under control. No, not Covid, a pandemic of the author's imagination, at least according to the preface of the book. Doctors and Friends was copyrighted/published in 2021 but the preface says it was written before Covid and the world in the book is fictional. Evidently Kira is that world's version of Dr. Fauchi--the person who would get on TV and talk about the pandemic in the name of the government. At that party we learn that "everyone" is wearing pins that broadcast their disease status and that the virus has a hidden long-term effect on the brains of some people. We also learn that the virus caused economic devastation. Shaking hands is no longer popular. I have to wonder what edits were done to the manuscript after Covid-19 hit.

The timeline then shifts to just before the pandemic. Kira and her medical school friends (all women) are gathering in Spain to see the sights and enjoy girl time, and Kira gets a call from work about this strange illness that starts with a cough and then kills people very quickly.

I love the relationships I see between these women. They truly know each other's faults and love each other anyway.

The Story Develops
The problem with blogging as I read, as opposed to reviewing after I read is trying to decide how much to say. Its hard to give an "on the ground" view on the book without giving away plot points. Since this book is neither new at this point nor famous, I guess its not that big a deal but in other stories it might be. So, be forewarned, there may be spoilers.

I'd really like to know what, if anything, was added to the book after Covid. I mean this is all bringing back memories--the hallway chatter about that stuff in China. The jokes in February during Mardi Gras about how all that Chinese junk that was being thrown from floats was going to get us all sick, and then the party St. Patrick's Day weekend when we bumped elbows instead of kissing--just in case.

In the book, the first signs are there, and the people are reacting pretty much the way we did. Its like I can see the avalanche coming. If the author truly wrote this pre-covid she did her homework is all I can say.

And Further Into the Story...
At the end, the author does admit she edited the book after Covid started and added some things--like Zoom calls, which I had wondered about because I hadn't heard of Zoom pre-Covid but now we all know that tic-tac-toe screen.

The virus in this story is much more lethal than Covid-19 and kills the young and the old so it sounds like people took it as much more of a threat than most considered Covid to be. The US president in the story is a woman and as non-Trump as it is possible to make a character and this is no comment on policy, but on personality. Love him or hate him, you have to admit that Trump's persona was "This is that I think and if you disagree you are an idiot", which is probably not the personality to be in charge of a situation that requires consensus from a variety of competing interests.
In the End
The beginning of the end of the story is back at the Christmas party and we learn how Kira and her friends made it through the pandemic and the losses they suffered.

As the pandemic kicked off we were Kira and her medical school friends on their yearly get-together and I thought something that was said was interesting. Basically these were women who were together for four very important years in their lives and who have since gone their separate ways, to different towns, different specialities and different relationships. Though they keep up by all the modern forms of communication, they are only together as a group on this yearly trip, and it was noted that they tended to revert to their 24 year old personalities when they got together. I wonder if my college friends and I do that without realizing it?

So, Was It Any Good?
Yes, it was a good read that was close enough to the reality we have lived for the past two and half years to make me uncomfortable and far enough away so that comfortable detachment was possible. Grade: B+

Thanks to NetGalley for making a review copy available. If you are a Kindle Unlimited subscriber, this is part of the subscription.

How timely is this book?!? The fact that it was written prior to the Covid-19 pandemic blows me away, and the fact we’re living through a pandemic ourselves right now made this book even more impactful. I also loved how Martin allowed readers to see how much sacrifice and hard work goes into the life of a first responder.

I’ll definitely be thinking about this one for a while!

I really enjoyed this one. It's way too close to the COVID world we live in today though, so if you are trying to escape that, this book isn't for you.
I loved the characters, the plots and how they were interwoven, and the overall feel of this book. There was some suspense and also some surprises in the story as well.
I would read more by this author.

My feelings on this one are super complicated. It was objectively an awesome book but also super traumatic to read. I can’t believe that she wrote this book before Covid, so much of it is prescient in an alarming way. I love how she writes, though, and I want to go back and read her other books. She fleshes out her characters absolutely beautifully. I wish I could be friends with the circle of strong and brave women.

This was such a great read. And how wild that it was written before COVID-19 as it's about a virus that takes over the world and changes the way people live. I really enjoyed reading about people's friendships and how they support each other through trying times. Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for an ARC.

𝟯-𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝗣𝗹𝗼𝘁
A group of women, friends since medical school, take a much-needed vacation to Spain just as word of a new, rapidly spreading virus is gaining attention.

After returning to their home cities and practices, each doctor experiences the impact of the global pandemic both professionally and personally.

Dr. Kira Marchand, an infectious disease specialist at the CDC becomes a vital member of the US response team.

𝗜 𝗧𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁
The author is a former ER physician and still, It is impressive that this book was written before the COVID pandemic. While the virus outbreak Martin imagined is fabricated and behaves differently than COVID, it's striking how eerily close the book parallels what we all experienced. Some readers may not be ready to read a book with a global pandemic as it’s background but I hope they mark this book as TBR.

At its heart, this book is about the friendship between a group of seven women friends and physicians, some of who have appeared in the author's earlier books. This story is told from the point-of-view of Compton, an ER physician based in New York, Hannah, an OB-GYN based in San Diego, and Kira, an Infectious Disease specialist, at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta.

The book opens with Kira, and it took me a little while to adapt to her no-nonsense personality. As other characters are introduced, the writing style shifts for each character and the book takes off as a thoroughly engaging page-turner.

If I could make one change, I would give it a different title because I don't think it adequately frames the story inside. Some passages of this intelligent, informative book brought me to tears but surprisingly, the book’s ending left me with a sense of thought-provoking calm.

Ver interesting topic considering it was started before Covid-19. I loved reading the similarities & differences from this fiction and real life. The medical jargon can be a bit much, but that is just my opinion. This is how the author writes. Over all I give a solid 4 stars and will recommend to others, including my book club.

Kimmery Martin’s new novel Doctors and Friends is gaining attention for being a story about a pandemic written before COVID-19 changed life as we knew it. Martin, a former emergency medical doctor, started her story about the fictional artiovirus in 2019, and I imagine she was just as surprised as the rest of us by what happened the following year. Her book Doctors and Friends details the relationships among a group of female doctors set against the backdrop of a global pandemic.

The similarities between Doctors and Friends and the real-life COVID-19 pandemic are staggering. It is almost hard to believe that Doctors and Friends was conceived before the COVID. From quarantine to vaccines, everything that we have been living through over the past few years is contained in this book. For some, it will hit too close to home and be “too much too soon,” but for someone like me who doesn’t mind stories that feel ripped from the headlines, Doctors and Friends was an informative journey into a pandemic told through the eyes of several prominent doctors.

While Doctors and Friends is verifiably eye-opening and affirming, I found that it majorly lacked one thing that I deem necessary for any novel written henceforth about a pandemic - heart. This book seriously lacked that emotional, heart-tugging connection that I believe readers who have now lived through their own pandemic will yearn for. Doctors and Friends is quite the dry, clinical take on a pandemic, and read more as a factual account of the virus’s effect on the world, as opposed to a resounding story of what we all have just lived through.

So depending on what you are looking for in a pandemic-themed novel, Doctors and Friends may or may not appeal to you. Want an educational narrative about what it is like to be a doctor in the midst of a pandemic void of emotion and drama? Then this is the book for you! Want something that will allow you to connect with a character living through a pandemic on a more personal, soul-searching level? Try Jodi Picoult’s Wish You Were Here instead.

BOOK REVIEW- ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

My Thoughts- Thank you to @netgalley, @berkleypub, and @kimmerymartin for an E-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review. This was such an interesting, yet trippy read. Think Covid 19 pandemic but written before the pandemic happened. Not everything mirrored our pandemic but so many things were so eerily similar. The author did a great job telling a scientific story while still allowing it not to be over the head of your average reader.

Synopsis: Hannah, Compton, and Kira have been close friends since medical school, reuniting once a year for a much-needed vacation. Just as they gather to travel in Spain, an outbreak of a fast-spreading virus throws the world into chaos.

When Compton Winfield returns to her job as an ER doctor in New York City, she finds a city changed beyond recognition—and a personal loss so gutting it reshapes every aspect of her life.

Hannah Geier’s career as an ob-gyn in San Diego is fulfilling but she’s always longed for a child of her own. After years of trying, Hannah discovers she's expecting a baby just as the disease engulfs her city.

Kira Marchand, an infectious disease doctor at the CDC in Atlanta, finds herself at the center of the American response to the terrifying new illness. Her professional battle turns personal when she must decide whether her children will receive an experimental but potentially life-saving treatment.

Written prior to Covid-19 by a former emergency medicine physician, Doctors and Friends incorporates unexpected wit, razor-edged poignancy, and a deeply relatable cast of characters who provoke both laughter and tears. Martin provides a unique insider’s perspective into the world of medical professionals working to save lives during the most difficult situations of their careers.

I absolutely love Kimmery Martin with her medical take on her novels and this one certainly didn't disappoint. I must admit I did pick up and put down this book a few times, but once I sat down and gave it the time it deserved I devoured the whole book in one seating. It was interesting to read a book set in a pandemic era, knowing that this novel was written pre march 2020.

Love this author! I appreciate that the author did write this before our current pandemic. I liked a lot about this- especially the realistic descriptions of the medical side of things and how the pandemic all went down. I really liked the tie in with The Queen of Hearts! It made me grateful to have been able to stay at home during the pandemic- couldn't imagine being abroad and the fear that would bring!

I've never read a book quite like this one before. It was so raw and gripping, it gave a perspective I've never read prior and it was incredible. This will be something I will probably reread at least once. It was emotional and difficult to read at times because of how it grips you but it was so worth it because of that. Loved it.

This was written before the COVID-19 pandemic, but wow did this hit close to home.

I loved the doctor's closeknit friendship. I had to put this book down a few times because it was so eerie.

Doctors and Friends by Kimmery Martin is an eerily prophetic, beautifully written, fascinating, and suspenseful tale about a viral pandemic, written by a former emergency room physician. The most astounding thing about this book is that the author wrote it prior to our current Covid 19 pandemic. Some of the parallels between the fictionally depicted ”artiovirus” and Covid 19 are uncanny. Many parts of the book reflect the reality of what our world has been going through over the past two years. The book is told in three timelines: Before – During – and After the artiovirus. It is told from the point of view of three of the main characters: Kira, Hannah, and Compton. If you have read either of Martin’s previous two books (“The Queen of Hearts”, “The Antidote for Everything”) you’ll be pleased to be reunited with several of the characters in those books. The characters are all so strongly drawn, that it isn’t necessary to have read the previous two books.

Martin does an amazing job of portraying life in the middle of a deadly pandemic from the perspectives of a group of friends who met while in medical school. All of the primary and secondary characters are so real, likeable, and relatable. I loved and admired all of the strong women that were depicted. This story is much more than a story about a global pandemic. It is a novel about these unique women and the bonds of enduring friendship and love that they have shared and currently share, and how the virus impacts the world, and their personal and work lives. Themes of love and friendship are woven into each chapter so that there is a nice blend of both the medical and interpersonal aspects of the story. The character development was amazing… I felt like I was a member of this close knit group of friends. Their dialogue was smart, witty, deeply emotional, and had depth. The striking parallels between the events unfolding in Martin’s fictional world and our current world were gripping, and I was totally engrossed from start to finish. The story was compelling, and the plot lines were perfectly executed. The author also vividly writes about details of the cultures of Morocco and Spain. The way the government was prepared and reacted to the pandemic in this book was idealized and hopeful (I wish that some of our leaders handled the pandemic the way it was depicted in this book!) Martin’s unique perspective as a medical professional enables her to highlight the struggle and sacrifice along with the strain on the first responders and healthcare workers in a personal way. Don’t miss the author’s note at the end of the book where she talks about her inspiration and the edits she made as the real pandemic struck. The book was impeccably researched.

Some readers might think it is too soon to read a story about a fictional pandemic when we are in the middle of a real one, but there are many things that are very different from what we are going through, and the focus was equally on the characters and many other themes, with many elements of hope and inspiration. I appreciated the book more, because of the current crisis we are going through. This is Kimmery Martin’s best work to date, and it shouldn’t be missed. It is wonderful contemporary fiction and medical drama.

I have adored all of Kimmery Martin's previous books. I got about halfway through this one and just couldn't finish. It's just a matter of wrong topic/wrong time. The pandemic is still just weighing on me. I thought I could read it because I like her so much, but I was struggling through it, so I decided to abandon it for now. I may get back to it another time.

Med school buddies Hannah, Kira, and Compton revel in their annual trips—this year, Spain. But after Compton, an ER doc, aids a sick child, Kira, an infectious disease expert, hears of a deadly new virus. When the women arrive home, everything has changed as Kira and Compton work the pandemic's frontlines, and Hannah learns she's finally pregnant. A prescient and hopeful drama.

This was a do not finish for me at 25% Although written before the Covid pandemic it is a pretty close facsimile to what is and has been happening for the past 2 years.

I thought I would be able to separate my feelings on this one but it's just a case of too much, too similar, too soon.

Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this title.

The book is about 3 doctors Kira, Compton and Hannah who take their families and go on a vacation together to Spain. When they arrive a pandemic breaks out in Africa and Spain that spreads quickly to every corner of the world. We see how it affects the doctors and their families. The doctor's families become ill and it is heartbreaking to watch them know the meaning of the numbers and try to cope with their grief while performing their jobs. It is well written and delves into the human side of doctors, which I think many of us tend to forget. I had to put the book down a few times as with Covid - it was too much. But would highly recommend it to anyone.