The silent patient
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Original publication date: February 2019
Book description: Alicia Berenson’s life is seemingly perfect. A famous painter married to an in-demand fashion photographer, she lives in a grand house with big windows overlooking a park in one of London’s most desirable areas. One evening her husband Gabriel returns home late from a fashion shoot, and Alicia shoots him five times in the face, and then never speaks another word.
Alicia’s refusal to talk, or give any kind of explanation, turns a domestic tragedy into something far grander, a mystery that captures the public imagination and casts Alicia into notoriety. The price of her art skyrockets, and she, the silent patient, is hidden away from the tabloids and spotlight at the Grove, a secure forensic unit in North London.
Theo Faber is a criminal psychotherapist who has waited a long time for the opportunity to work with Alicia. His determination to get her to talk and unravel the mystery of why she shot her husband takes him down a twisting path into his own motivations—a search for the truth that threatens to consume him.
Thoughts:
This started off slow. I was not sure where this was going, but then as Theo starts to investigate and seems to want to figure out the truth even when everyone else has given up in Alice and the truth she might have, I started to root for him. I wanted him to succeed, he even had issues with his own personal life, initially, I was annoyed with the fact that we got distracted from Alicia in order to continue to get to know Theo, but he was reflecting the issues he had in his own life so, it made sense to follow it as well.
Theo is not like the other psychotherapist, after this amount of time, a few years after Alicia's sentence, everyone gave up on her because she does not seem to react to their efforts. That I felt like reflects the lack of devotion to their profession on the Drs who work in this place. He seems a bit obsessed with Alicia, more than professional interest but still, that fact I did romanticize it.
The story is told in several timelines, the present where Theo is getting to Alice and starts to investigate her life, the case and not simply try to treat her and the past of Alicia, her life during the marriage, the friends and family. Each person has a story and an aspect of her life that they were able to see, yet Alicia's point of view of the same people are very different.
The family described here were flawed, the friendships let a lot to be desired, it was very realistic. She did not have the perfect life people said she had.
But then the ending was not expected at least I did not see it coming, but I was not very happy about it.
I was surprised but I did not like that final reveal and Theo went from being someone to be admired to not.
I felt that change jarring.
In the end, I gave this a lower rating than what I thought I was going to grant it, for the majority of the book.
This was read as part of the Good Reads Choice Awards challenge, this was the book that won on the mystery/thriller category. I guess I see why many people were captured. So this first round is halfway done. I will read the second place in the next month.
Comments
Post a Comment