Author: Joanne Macgregor
When a patient describes an experience of mental torture and sexual mutilation by a gynaecologist at the private hospital where she works, psychologist Megan Wright decides to investigate. Determined to find out the truth and stop the abuse, but bound to silence by the ethics of confidentiality, Megan must enter the dark mind of a dangerously disturbed man.
Between the anaesthesia and the awakening, are the dark whispers.-Goodreads
Review: Megan Wright is a successful psychologist at a private hospital. When one of her patients is still struggling months after a gynecology surgery (that did not go as planned), Megan does a session of hypnosis to see if they can figure out what happened. She is shocked when it seems the surgical gynecologist was psychologically abusive and possibly mutilated the patient's genitals for no medical reason. Megan begins to investigate and is horrified to find a pattern of abused women. She is equally horrified when she suspects one of her male patients is the gynecologist. How can Megan bring this matter to justice when she is bound by ethics and confidentiality as a psychologist?
This is my first book by Macgregor and while I read a lot of thrillers, this was definitely unlike anything I've read before. A doctor who is psychologically abusive (by what he whispers to them before surgery) and sexually mutilating women is downright creepy and horrifying on every level. I think I read somewhere that this book was inspired by a doctor who did similar things in real life and it's is disgusting on every level.
I really enjoyed the therapy session Megan had with her patients and the sections written from the point of the view of the depraved gynecologist. I wish there were more sections written from his point of view (especially more flashback scenes, we had a few and it explained why he did what he did, I was wanting...more). I also wanted to know more about Megan's past and relationship with her family.
Overall, I enjoyed this however I think this book would have been stronger if it had been set in the pre-Internet era. After learning the gynecologist's name and knowing he worked in the same hospital as her, Megan made no attempt to see what he looked like. She did look up his licensing to see if anyone had lodged any complaints against him, but I would have immediately looked him up on social media platforms (FaceBook, Twitter, LinedIn) and Healthgrades. The hospital itself should have had a website with physician profiles and at the very least, she could have asked her patient, who was his victim, what he looked like. Too much of the book was spent on if one of her patients was him or not. This was just not believable in this day and age. And the fact that her office manager didn't get insurance information or documentation from patients (I always have to provide an insurance card and at the very least a copy of my drivers license for any doctors visit) was not believable. Maybe (a big maybe) this would fly the first visit but subsequent visits?
Overall, I enjoyed it and I will read more from this author.
Grade: 3/5
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