The Doctor Annie Payne

5 stars

Interesting Medical Story

Dr Alison Wilson has left London to take up a job as a Medical Director at a small seaside hospital. She has left her cheating husband behind whose behaviour made her leave a job she loved but is determined to make a success of her new position. St Margaret’s hospital is struggling in many ways but most importantly there seems to be an excess of unexplained deaths.

However right from the start all the staff seem to be against her in particular the man whose job Alison has taken over. Dr Richard Atkinson was forced to resign due to his drug addiction but blames Alison for everything including the fact that she is renting his previous home which he was forced to sell.

Everyone seems to be against Alison, not only the majority of the staff in the hospital but also the locals in the village. Everything that Alison tries to do goes wrong and it is soon obvious that someone is hacking into her computer, emails are not sent, meetings are cancelled and everywhere she turns the staff seem to be hindering her and blaming her..

I really enjoyed this book, my daughter is a doctor in a busy hospital and I know of the conditions that they have to deal with. It is obvious that the author has worked in the NHS as so many of the problems described are actually happening on a daily basis. This book was a really impressive story building up all the suspects and, something that always impresses me in this type of book, the real culprit was totally unexpected.

Medical thrillers like this are quite unusual and I really enjoyed this one and will look forward to any more books from this author.


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Karen Deborah
Reviewer for Net Galley

The Doctor is a medical thriller, it’s fast paced and quick to read.

Dr Alison Wilson has a new job as medical director at a new hospital, but after looking through the books she notices strange things going on. She’s not been received well as she took an older Dr’s job. Strange things started happening and she had an idea who it could be.

I enjoyed reading this book, the author has a great knowledge of the medical background after working in that work. The characters were good to read about, the descriptions were in depth.

A great thriller, an easy read and you wouldn’t want to put down.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for a copy.

This was a quick and easy read for me, but I found it a bit too predictable and that spoilt my enjoyment of it unfortunately.

I’d like to thank Avon Books UK and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read ‘The Doctor’ by Annie Payne in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

Dr Alison Wilson has left London and accepted a position as Medical Director at St Margaret’s, a hospital in the coastal town of Wayleigh, where she’s employed specifically to improve their CQC rating. Alison arrives a week before she’s due so she can make an early start but finds things worse than she’d expected with unexplained deaths and missing drugs, and it isn’t long before she senses that someone is getting into her computer, deleting appointments and falsifying reports.

‘The Doctor’ is an excellent medical drama that’s written by an author who knows her way around hospitals and is able to write a thriller that’s factually correct and authentic, making it an absolute joy to read. From page one I’ve been gripped by what was happening to Alison at both St Margaret’s and her home, not forgetting Paws, and all day I’ve been turning page after page unable to stop reading in case I missed anything. By the time I approached the last chapter I felt as if I’d actually been there in the hospital and was glad when the heart-stopping conclusion revealed who was trying to destroy Alison and her reputation. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reading this thriller, can wholeheartedly recommend it, and am sorry it’s come to an end.

I read this as a buddy read and the first days section felt like it was going to be really good. However. It rapidly went downhill from there for me personally. The storyline was jumping about all over the place, the main character made me mad at how she’d been written as a poor, ditzy, defenceless, silly woman. The plot wasn’t twisty out clever, just obvious from the word go and the never ending admin and hospital politics got really boring. I was expecting an exciting murder mystery set in a hospital. Wrong.

Set in small coastal town in England, Annie Payne's 'The Doctor' introduces us to Dr Alison Wilson. Newly divorced and hoping to make a fresh start that helps her forget about her life in London, she's hired as the new medical officer at St Margaret's. It's her job to shake things up and get the hospital's metrics back on track, but she'll have her work cut out for her.

Things are not as they seem and there's someone at the hospital who doesn't want Alison digging into things, and when attacks start getting personal, it becomes clear that they would kill to keep their secrets buried.

While I had high hopes for this one, I found 'The Doctor' very middle of the road. Alison's character is largely oblivious - which was massively frustrating - and even when she starts noticing that something's amiss, she keeps playing it down like it's not a big deal.

I enjoyed Mike's character, but he was used as a tool to help Alison along, instead of being a full, complex character on his own.

The ending was utterly unbelievable and gave the feeling that the author wanted to tie things off too neatly.

Overall, it was just OK 🤷🏻‍♀️

I wasn't bored, but I wasn't rushing to get back to it either, and not much about it will stay with me.

Doctor Alison Wilson has been drafted in as Medical Officer at the failing St Margaret's Hospital in Wayleigh, on the English coast, but feels she may have bitten off more than she can chew when she realises things are a lot worse than expected and someone is determined to make sure that she doesn't reveal what's really going on, but how far are they prepared to go?

The Doctor is a medical thriller which follows stroke specialist Alison as she takes up her new post to uncover why St Margaret's is failing and to make the necessary improvements needed to bring it back on track, but has she run from her problems in London right into something much worse here? This is a fast paced read with some quite unsavoury characters and Doctor Wilson appears to be clashing with everyone she comes up against in her fight to get to the truth. It's a great story, with just the right amount of drama and, even though I guessed the perpetrator quite early on, it didn't spoil my enjoyment of this debut novel and I look forward to reading more of her work.

I'd like to thank Avon Books and Netgalley for inviting me to read this, I will post my review on Goodreads now and Amazon on publication day.

Doctor Alison Wilson has moved to a new seaside town from a London hospital to take up the role of Medical Officer at failing hospital Saint Margaret’s.

Tasked with shaking things up, she quickly learns that things are worse than they initially seem: patient records are in disarray, staff morale is low, and there’s something afoot that she can’t quite put her finger on…

As Alison starts to dig into the hospital’s past, she gradually discovers a trail of lies that runs deeper and darker than she could have ever imagined.

I absolutely raced through this book and really enjoyed it until it got close to the end. There felt to me like a few things were put into the book but were never explained – exactly why Alison left London, it was hinted out that there was more to the story, and that we would find out later but we never did. Also Ed, the ex husband seemed to know a lot of what was going on, and I felt there was more to that story line, but again it was never explained. I wasn’t sure how the truth would all come out at the end, and that felt like quite a rush within the last chapter.

Saying all that, the pages appeared to turn by themselves when I was reading this as I wanted to know more and more and I was constantly thinking “is it you?” to almost every character. Very enjoyable with just a few flaws for me personally but don’t let that put you off!

Running away from a past she'd rather forget, Dr Alison Wilson has moved to a new town to take up the role of Medical Officerat failing hospital St. Margaret's. Tasked with shaking things up, she quickly learns that things are worse than they initially seem: patient access records are in disarray, staff morale is low, and there's something afoot that she can't quit put her finger on. As Alison starts to dig into the hospital's past, she gradually discovers a trail of lies and that run deeper and darker than she could ever have imagined.

Dr Alison Wilson is running form a past she'd rather forget and takes a new job as a Medical Officer in a new town. Her job is to get the hospital ratings up. But she never expected to be confronted by a series of attacks at her home, on her car and cat. Appointments have been cancelled, emails go missing, reports are changed. Even IT can't help her in resolving these problems. Alison soon realises that something bas is happening. Why is the mortality rate so high? Will Alison be able to uncover the truth?

This is a quick and easy book to read but it was a bit too predictable for my liking. I like a book more when you're kept guessing. There was no shock factor either. I did enjoy this story and I will read more from this author in future.

I would like to thank #NetGalley #AvonBooksUK and the author #AnniePayne for my ARC of #TheDoctor in exchange for an honest review.

Dr Alison Wilson moved from London to take up her new role as Medical Director in a hospital in a small seaside town. Right from the outset it is quite apparent that her challenge is greater than she anticipated. Some members of staff were openly against her appointment, standards were nowhere near good enough, drugs were going missing and the patient mortality rate was far higher than it should be. It was also quite clear that someone was interfering with her work in an attempt to have her removed from the post and away from the hospital.
It is quite clear that the author has a medical background with a fair amount of medical terminology used. It was still a good read as you wondered who was sabotaging Alison's work and trying to force her away from the cottage she stayed in.
Thanks to Netgalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

In spite of the seriousness of the subject matter this turned out to be quite a light read. It was enjoyable and even though I had worked out the ending quite early on I would recommend it as a good read for a summer's day in the park or a sunlounger.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC of this book

The story starts with Allison moving to a small town hospital to work as a medical director when everything starts going wrong. While she moved there to make a new start, she finds herself embroiled in a new mystery. It had a good premise. Definitely worth a one time read. Thanks.

I got an invitation to review this book. Judging by the book cover, I know this is going to be a medical thriller and I was excited to read this book. But honestly this book did not live up to my expectations.

The story starts with Allison moving to a small town hospital to work as a medical director. But ever since she got there, things are starting to go downhill. Patients seemed to be dying, someone hacked into her account and someone is determined to make her life as miserable as possible. Someone who do not want her to work at that hospital.

The plot was great, writing was ok in my opinion but overall, I didn’t find this book great. The book wasn’t fast paced, there were parts in the book that were utterly boring, not a complete page turner. I would say the character herself seems bit of naive in my opinion. With that being said, this was not a great thriller and was rather slow paced. Worth three stars.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Avon for ARC. Review is based on my honest opinion only.

Quick easy read, a little drawn out in places and predictable ending, but if you like hospital crime drama, it's worth a read!

Thanks netgallery for the opportunity.

This was such a fun thriller!! Definitely gonna check out more from Annie. Highly recommend for thriller lovers!!!

I really enjoyed this book. Alison has moved to a smaller hospital, but things are not right from the start. Someone doesn’t want her there.

I loved watching the storyline unfold and couldn't turn the pages faster enough. I did guess who was behind it early on, but it didn't spoil it. Looking forward to what the author writes next.

This was billed as a gripping physiological thriller however it missed the mark for me. It seemed to be bogged down with constant accidents and errors in office work tasks orchestrated by the killer to throw Doctor Alison Wilson off her game. Maybe it was supposed to imitate the water torture technique, each error adding onto the others before, but I found myself skimming pages to try to hurry the book along. I also found the main character difficult to like. She always seemed to relying on someone else to fix things instead of getting the deed done herself. DNF at 50%

At St Margaret’s Hospital too many patients are dying. The CQC flagged the problem, but there is no suspicion of foul play, just incompetence! However, the Medical Director resigned; or was he persuaded to jump before he was pushed? The latter is not uncommon in the NHS, where a Hospital’s reputation (and the career of its CEO) have to be protected from scandal. Dr Alison Wilson, a high-flying Consultant on the Stroke ward at a major London Hospital, has been hired as his replacement. She has taken the post partly with a view to getting experience which will get her an MD post in London, and partly because she is getting a divorce from her husband who works at the same hospital and is having an affair with a colleague. Rumours of conflicts surrounding this made it impossible for her to stay. Her plan is simple – find the source of the problems (there are financial failings as well as the death rate issue), sort them, get the CQC rating up to outstanding, and move on. Unfortunately, the death rate starts going up rather than down, the existing staff, especially Dr Carrick the Stroke Consultant, resent her plans and are being obstructive. The Management Team also seem to be negative about her ideas. More worryingly, she seems to have a problem with the IT system, which keeps losing her emails, deleting her appointments, and amending her spreadsheets. Her only allies appear to be Eliza, the Head Nurse, and Joyce, the Ward Sister. Is this all just coincidence, or is someone plotting against her and, if so, why? Even the locals where she lives appear to bear her some animosity – with the notable exception of Mike, motor mechanic and Jack of all trades.
This is billed as a suspenseful, psychological thriller, but it isn’t really any of these. There is some suspense, but not a lot – the interpolated “voice” of the killer just made me more certain of their identity; the killer is obviously unbalanced and Alison is obviously under stress but neither of these are psychological; the plot is nicely handled, but is really too obvious, too linear, too flat, to make it thrilling. Having said all that, the writing is good, the pace is brisk (which might help to sail over the issues above), the characterisation and background details are both sound. It’s about half way there, which gives me 2.5 as a score, rounding to 3 which is generous (2 would be overkill).
I would like to thank NetGalley, the publishers and the author for providing me with a draft proof copy for the purpose of this review.

I read The Doctor over a couple of days and whilst I liked it, I didn’t love it. Some of aspects of the book are good, strong female lead, pacy etc. but I found the plot to be quite predictable and leaving me without the ‘thrill’ aspect. I also felt the final scenes of the book were somewhat of a let down. Thank you to NetGalley, Avon Books UK and the author for the chance to review.

I received an E-ARC with a request for my honest review.

This medical crime thriller follows Alison Wilson as she starts a new job at Saint Margaret’s hospital as a medical officer.

With the hostility she faces from some the staff straight from the start, it takes her a while to settle into her new role. When her reports start to be tampered with, she starts to think that someone may not want her around at the hospital.

Soon the hostility towards her escalates, and when she uncovers some deadly secrets at the hospital, she must fight to save her job and maybe even her life.

Who wants Alison out of the hospital? What secrets are being hidden?

This medical crime thriller is a suspense filled read, especially as the threats and hostility towards Alison increases. It seems she doesn’t know who she can trust.

I liked that she finds some comfort in a new acquaintance she comes to meet in the storyline, it adds a little bit of hope that things will work out for Alison.

Alison is a strong female character which I always like to see when reading, as even with a past she is determined not to let others get the better of her.

Overall, a suspense filled medical crime thriller, where the secrets of a hospital are revealed.