Alex Michaelides: The Silent Patient, Orion Publishing, 9781409181620, paperback
German Edition: Alex Michaelides:  Die stumme Patientin, paperback, Droemer Knaur

“The Silent Patient” by Alex Michaelides was a record selling thriller in 2019, a New York and Sunday Times bestseller  with  rights sold into 39 countries world- wide as well as film rights. This means I started reading my first book of 2020 with very high expectations indeed.

The story of this psychological mystery sounded very promising and compelling: a successful painter, Alicia Berenson, is convicted of having shot her beloved husband five times and has refused to speak ever since concealing what led to her actions.  All efforts by psychologists at the clinic where she is kept have been in vain; she remains silent and even became violent at times. Enter Theo Faber, a psychotherapist who has become obsessed with the case, convinced he can treat Alicia and bring her back to the real world. He is even prepared to give up a promising position in another clinic just to be able to treat her as his patient.  Being a happily married man himself he is totally puzzled why Alicia should have killed the man that had given her all the love and stability she had graved for….. 

This is where I will stop talking about the plot which is a very engaging,a slowly building one with a clever twist towards the end. But despite staying interested and wanting  this book to grab me, it never really did for whatever reason, be it that I have read zillion thrillers and mysteries over the years working in publishing which is perhaps why I am a little demanding or that the development felt  a bit too constructed towards the end for my taste.  It is a very clever plot now doubt and I can see why the story appealed  to so many readers as it clearly did; I was just not one of them. ….