This book took me a bunch of tries to get through. It started out on the train during the Australian Open (Jan) and didn’t end up being finished until 24th May. I attempted this everywhere I expected to be bored – in a Dr’s waiting room, on a plane – and struggled everywhere. But in the end, finished it was. And it was aggressively meh.
I’m spoiling this, to save you the trouble of reading it, ok?
Maya is a drunk, having replaced her Klonopin with gin. Nice, original idea here, drunken unreliable narrator. Didn’t we agree that after that Kristen Bell movie these were done? Maybe this book came out first. Sorry. Rude. “I” statements. I am a little bit over the drunken unreliable narrator in the year 2023.
Anyway. When Maya was a teen she witnessed her best friend dropping mysteriously dead in the presence of Maya’s NotBoyfriend, Frank (a NotBoyfriend is someone you are not exclusive with, nor have you DTR’d). Maya was determined that Frank had caused the death, but there was no evidence, and, well, her accusations went the way of most female-led, her word against his cases.
When Maya sees a viral video of a second woman dropping dead in Frank’s presence, she’s determined to track him down and prove he’s a killer.
Something is clearly off about Maya’s memory from the get go – she’s got blank spots all over the place – so there’s really no surprise when Frank and his disbarred shrink father turn out to be hypnotists. I had flashbacks to that disappointing Donna Tartt book where it turned out to all have been an epilepsy-induced dream. (Did I dream that?) I hated that book.
This novel stretched my credulity a little too far, and while it was good plane-fodder, it took too long and stuck too many purposeless obstacles in the way of the protagonist.
Possibly the first book I’ve read from the Reese Book Club that I’ve found so tedious. I suppose if it was adapted in the right way, it could make a sensible and compelling tv series.