The Woman in the Window

by A. J. Finn
427 pgs

Last year, A. J. Finn (not his real name) made his presence on the literary scene known with the publication of his first book The Woman in the Window, a psychological thriller that shares a similar narrative style with books like Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train. Finn also probably owes a portion of his book royalties to the estate of Alfred Hitchcock, as he makes no effort to hide where he received the inspiration for his story.

Anna Fox is a child psychologist who has been confined to her townhouse in Harlem ever since the onset of a severe and near crippling case of agoraphobia. She spends much of her time chatting online with others who suffer with the same condition, and while she knows she shouldn't, she regularly mixes the drugs her doctor prescribed for her with alcohol.

It's in this condition that Anna witnesses--or believes she witnesses--a murder while spying on her neighbors through their window. She tries to report what she saw to the police, who investigate, but find no evidence of any crime. There doesn't even appear to be anyone missing. The woman she says she saw get stabbed doesn't seem to have ever existed.

The references to Rear Window are obvious and I found myself wanting to rewatch it while I read Finn's book, but eventually the story becomes completely Finn's. He does an admirable job of inserting a series of misdirections and keeping you guessing as to the reliability of Anna and what she believes she saw. Not all of Finn's twists come as surprises by the time they're revealed. I was pretty sure I'd figured out a couple of the big ones well before they were confirmed. But it was still a fun read and I'm excited to see what he writes next.

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

Since We Fell

by Dennis Lehane
418 pgs

Since We Fell is a great example of why I’m such a big fan of Dennis Lehane’s books. It’s got great characters and a plot that continually compels you to turn the page.

At the beginning of the story Lehane introduces us to Rachel Childs, a woman searching for the identity of her father. She was raised by her mother, an author who emotionally abused Rachel throughout her life and who kept the identity of Rachel’s father a mystery till she died.

Over time, Rachel establishes herself as a respected news reporter. But when she experiences a panic attack while on live tv covering a deadly earthquake in Haiti, she becomes famous as the “drunk reporter,” loses her job, and spends virtually all of the next 18 months secluded in her apartment.

When she finally starts venturing out into public again, she runs into Brian Delacroix, a private investigator she met briefly while she was trying to find her father. They fall in love and get married, and for me, this is when the story undergoes a paradigm shift and really takes off. Rachel, emotionally scarred from her mother’s influence and still feeling vulnerable from the panic attacks she suffers, begins to experience deep-seeded doubts about Brian’s honesty and fidelity.

It’s this sense of psychological uncertainty that Lehane is a master at and that sucked me in completely. When I started the it, I had no idea what direction the book was going to go. Had I known, it wouldn’t have sat on my shelf unread as long as it did.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Into the Water

by Paula Hawkins
388 pgs

Into the Water is an excellent example of a “sophomore slump.” Paula Hawkins’ first book, The Girl on the Train, while I thought was a little over-hyped, and definitely had its flaws, was still a pretty good book. For her follow-up book, Hawkins took all the flaws of her first one, and instead of fixing them, magnified them.

The story is difficult to follow. The prologue takes place in the 17^th century with a woman being drowned by a group of men, then the rest of the book switches back and forth between 2015 and sometime in the 1980s (I think 1983, but not worth going back to check). The chapters alternate between multiple first-person and third-person narratives and Hawkins throws the myriad of different characters at you without any context or background, which I found made them difficult to keep straight in my head.

The story takes place in the rural British town of Beckford. There’s a body of water near the town known as the drowning pool, which has a centuries-old history of women drowning in it, either by suicide or murder. It all began with Libby, who was accused of witchcraft and drowned there in the prologue. From that point, Hawkins leads you to believe that Beckford women have been dying there with regularity ever since, leading up to the two most recent women: Nel Abbott and Katie Whittaker.

Much like she did with her first book, Hawkins tries to keep her readers uncertain about why those women died for as long as she can. Every characters’ character is ambiguous throughout the book. You don’t know who to trust or believe, or if there’s anyone who even can be. The only thing you can count on is that there are no men in Beckford who possess any redeeming qualities. They’re all either adulterers, abusers, predators, or killers. Some man somewhere pissed Paula Hawkins off quite badly. Today, she’s making a lot of money writing books that seem to help her vent her rage against the whole gender. As a member of it, I’m not sure whether I should apologize or say, “You’re welcome.”

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

The Hollow City

by Dan Wells
333 pgs

The FBI are hunting a serial killer, a man known as the Redline Killer who, over the past two weeks has killed several people and removed their faces.

Michael Shipman is a twenty-year old paranoid schizophrenic who hears voices, sees faceless men, and who has a mortal fear of anything electronic. He believes that the faceless men are monitoring his thoughts and every movement through an implant in his brain that transmits his thoughts and his location through cell phones, and anything electronic.

When the story begins, Michael finds himself in a mental institution. He doesn't know how he got there nor can he remember the past two weeks of his life. He hadn't been taking his medications, and the FBI are interested in talking to him. It's a fantastic premise for a story.

Dan Wells has once again shown why he is one of the best at getting into your brain and messing around with it. He tells the story from the perspective of Michael and he masterfully uses Michael's schizophrenia to keep you guessing who and what in the book are real, and what are just the delusions of an unbalanced mind.

I loved his John Wayne Cleaver books and The Hollow City is another good one that I'll be recommending to many.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆