Determined to help her amnesiac patients recover their lives, Boston psychiatrist Cristina Silva is achieving near-miraculous results by prescribing Recognate, a revolutionary new memory-recovery drug now in trials. She understands her patients’ suffering better than most, because she’s lost her memories, too. Desperate to become herself again, she pops the same experimental drug she prescribes … prescribes to her patients. And, like them, she remembers a little more each day.Until one of her patients, a successful accountant, jumps from an eight-story window to his death. And as Cristina’s memories return, with them come violent visions and an incessant voice in her head. Maybe the drug isn’t safe after all. But discontinuing it would mean forgetting everything she’s recalled and losing herself.Then an enigmatic, possibly dangerous man appears at Cristina’s bus stop. He seems to know more about her life than she does and says she holds a secret that puts her life in danger. Perilously balanced between an unknown past and a terrifying future, if she wants to survive, Cristina must stay on the medication and unlock those memories before it’s too late—even if the adverse effects of the drug could destroy her.
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First, a warning: the Prologue is a graphic murder scene, and that might put you off the rest of the book. But it shouldn’t. While Adverse Effects is a thriller and people die, the Prologue is easily the most graphic scene. And you can channel the modern teenager and skip the Prologue. It won’t affect your understanding of the overall plot.
So what is the story about?
Cristina Silva is a psychiatrist with amnesia. But there is a miracle drug, Recognate, currently going through medical trials, and Cristina has managed to get herself and several of her patients on the trial (okay, so she had to create a fake patient to get the drug for herself). She and her patients are all experiencing wonderful results, remembering a little more of their past each week.
Cristina is shocked when one of her Recognate patients commits suicide … and beyond shocked when another shoots several people in front of her. Nothing in her conversations or notes indicated any possible suicidal or murderous tendencies, so what happened?
At the same time, she is accosted by a strange man on the bus. He seems to know more about her than she knows about herself. Between her patients, the strange man, and the police, she seems to be pulled every which way in her search for answers.
It’s a great concept. The writing in the first half is a little jerky at times, but gets smoother in the second half (or maybe I was just more engaged in the story and didn’t notice any issues).
Cristina is an excellent heroine. She’s a competent professional—at least, we think she is. It’s hard to tell when she admits to having amnesia and faking records to get herself on a medical trial. But we want her to survive, but that raises the question of who can she trust? It seems everyone around her has an agenda, and some are less honourable than others.
Adverse Effects is a fast-paced thriller with a unique concept, and plenty of twists and turns to keep the reader guessing the identity of the evildoer … or even which characters are good and which are not.
Thanks to Blackstone Publishing and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.
Psychiatrist Cristina Silva is participating in a study for an experimental drug that helps amnesia patients regain their memories. The results have been miraculous, so she not only prescribes the new drug to her patients, but also to herself.
She’s adopted this as her specialty because she, herself, lost her memories. And like her patients, she remembers a little bit more each day.
All goes well … until one of her patients jumps from a high-rise to his death. As Cristina’s memories return, she develops violent visions and a voice in her head that just won’t quit. She’s afraid if she stops the medication, she will forget what she’s just recently remembered.
A stranger approaches her and says she holds a secret that puts her life in danger.
From who? From what? Does she continue the medication in order to learn what her secret is … even if it means she might turn psychotic? Or does she stop the medication, only to be killed by someone who knows her secret and wants her silenced forever?
As this author is a developmental pediatrician and a USAF veteran with a masters in public health, I expected some degree of credibility …. I was not disappointed. Well-written, the plot is intricate. There are many, varied characters that may be bit confusing to follow as some have aliases, some have memories that might not be their own. Plenty of twists and turns will keep the reader riveted to the pages.
Many thanks to the author / Blackstone Publishing / Netgalley for the digital copy of this medical thriller. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.
This book is about a psychiatrist participating in a study on an experimental drug to help amnesia patients regain their memories. Herself a survivor of a traumatic injury in a wreck that killed her parents, she begins taking the drug herself. When two of her patients kill themseles she begins to get worried. When a mysterious hobo begins following her she gets scared. Then she starts having violent nightmares. Are these all connected? Is the drug the cause? She must find out if she wants to survive.
I love medical mysteries and I hate Big Pharma so this book sounded perfect for me. I did enjoy it but it had some problems. First, the technical descriptions about how the drug works will bog some readers down. I am a pharmacist so I understood them but the average reader may not. Next, the characters. They were good, but there were a lot of them and they weren’t always what they seemed. This led to some confusion but maybe that is the whole point as the drug made the users confused. At times I felt like I was on a bad LSD trip. Lastly, the plots twists, and there were many, were hard to follow if you put the book down and came back to it later. It is best read in one or two sittings. In the end, I got it. I think.
On the whole I enjoyed the book. It is a good look at what greed and an unscrupulous drug company can do. It is obvious the author knows his subject. Though at times I was confused, looking back I realized that made the book more real. It misses the mark of being a truly great medical thriller (like Coma, the book that started my love of the genre) but it was still an enjoyable and worthwhile read. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an early copy.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. What if you had no memories of your marriage, your family, your children, your career, etc, etc? Would you participate in a drug trial to try to get those memories back? Now remember, drug trials occur before FDA approvals. What could possibly go wrong???
This was an interesting, easy to read, “change of pace” book. Well written with an excellent female protagonist. Enjoy!
I was really excited to read Adverse Effects! I love any book where the storyline involves anything medical. This one is about Christina Silva, a psychiatrist involved with a medical trial for a drug called Recognate which is supposed to help her patients with amnesia regain some of their memories. Christina is very confident in this new drug because she has seen positive results so far with in her patience taking it. Christina herself has suffered amnesia and decides to start taking this drug on her own to see if it will work for her. Unfortunately, the trial hasn’t gone on long enough, and the adverse effects are unknown, but as time goes on, people on the drug start acting strangely, even putting their own lives at risk, including Christina.
I loved the idea of a book about a medical trial of a miracle drug and Joel Shulkin, MD gave us a lot of facts about how those trials work. You could tell the author was very knowledgeable in the medical field and I enjoyed learning something new.
I truly loved the premise of the story, but the reason I am only giving it three stars is because I felt that there were too many characters in one book. It made it difficult for me to follow them and I oftentimes couldn’t remember who they were. Unfortunately, It was just annoying throughout. I wished the story would have been broken down into a series. I think it would have been much more enjoyable!
Thank you NetGalley, Edelweiss and Blackstone Publishing for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.
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