The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

I’ll start by saying, I really enjoyed this book. It’s an easy read and well written by Alex Michaelides. Not bad for his debut novel!

Back story here. There was a bit of a debate between two of my reader friends (a fearsome mother/daughter duo) who both read this novel. The mother had read the premise of the story and made assumptions as to what the book would be about, prior to reading the book.

The daughter read the book blind, simply based on her mother’s recommendation, but otherwise not having any idea what it was about, beyond the title.

When the two sat down afterwards to discuss, they both had differing opinions as to what they thought would happen, and what should have happened etc.

At this point, I hadn’t read the book yet, so when explaining the debate to me, they left out a lot of the details. I’ll have to follow up with them.

What I gathered, though, was the little blurb on the back (or rather, inside, in this case) of the book misled the reader. Because of this, I decided to read the book blind as well.

My very brief summary (not based on the back of the book):

An artist one day shoots her husband five times in the face, and then never speaks another word (titular character obviously). A criminal psychotherapist sits with the woman regularly, waiting for her to speak.

That’s my nutshell. It’s the bones of the book. The story is told from the point of view of Theo, the criminal psychotherapist.

The reader is taken on a journey as Theo investigates Alicia (the artist). He meets with her regularly enticing her to speak, but through most of their sittings, she won’t even look at him.

He then reaches out to friends, family, and neighbours, trying to learn about her past leading up to the murder, and in doing so, you learn a little about him and his wife.

I won’t give anymore about the book away, but after reading it, I went back and read the premise written on the cover. It is kind of deceiving, I’ll give you that. It lures you in under false pretenses.

However, the book delivers. It might not deliver what you want, or even what you expect, but it’ll get you to the end of the novel in the blink of an eye.

I enjoyed the journey, but I didn’t really care for the end. I needed more vindication.
If you’ve read the book, I’d love to hear your thoughts! Bring opinions to the Facebook Group.