#BookReview - Before I Go To Sleep by S. J. Watson

Title: Before I Go To Sleep
Author: S. J. Watson
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Psychological
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishing
Release Date: June 14, 2011

About the Book:

“The best debut novel I’ve ever read.”—Tess Gerritsen, bestselling author of the Rizzoli & Isles series

“An exceptional thriller. It left my nerves jangling for hours after I finished thelast page.” —Dennis Lehane, New York Times bestselling author of Moonlight Mile

S. J. Watson makes his powerful debut  with this  compelling, fast-paced  psychological thriller, reminiscent of Shutter Island and Memento, in which an amnesiac who, following a mysterious accident, cannot remember her past or form new memories, desperately tries to uncover the truth about who she is—and who she can trust.

Buy Links: Amazon 

My Review:

I stared at my computer screen for what seemed to be hours, although I'm sure it was just minutes, as I tried to think how I felt about this novel.  I wasn't sure what to expect when I first started reading it.  I knew that it was some kind of psychological thriller, but the premise of the main character having an amnesiatic condition whereby she awoke every morning with no memory of her past made me think of the sweet romantic comedy of Fifty First Dates.  But this was definitely NOT a romantic comedy.  So please don't associate this novel to that movie.

Christine awakes every morning in bed with a man.  She has no idea who this man is.  She goes to the bathroom and sees photographs all over the wall of her with said man.  Her husband?  Hmmm.  As we get into Christine's head we see her go from confusion to submission to paranoia.  What is the truth and what isn't?  A doctor who was seeing Christine without her husband's knowledge (what's with that?) suggests that she keep a journal and write in it every day, but she must hide the journal so that her husband doesn't find it.  Then he calls her each morning and tells her where she has hidden the journal.  What legitimate doctor would do that?

I guess I liked reading Before I Go To Sleep because I continued reading it, although halfway through it seemed to get repetitive and didn't make a lot of sense, but toward the end I had a difficult time putting it down.  Then it ended... and I kind of wished I HAD put it down.  

There were certainly some twists, but it was predictable.  I liked it, but I didn't.  It was definitely not a feel-good book.  But psychological thrillers generally aren't.

I'll finish writing this review and then I'm going back to bed.  Perhaps I'll awake in the morning and forget that I read it.

My Rating:

About the Author:

S. J. Watson lives in London and worked in the National Health Service for a number of years. In 2009 Watson was accepted into the first Faber Academy Writing a Novel course, a rigorous and selective program that covers all aspects of the novel-writing process. Before I Go to Sleep is the result.