One of my most recent reads has been Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson. It is basically the psychological thriller version of 50 First Dates. Except instead of a young woman going to the same diner every morning, Christine is waking up in a house that she doesn’t recognize next to a man that she has never seen before.
I’m going to steal the Good Reads description to make his a little easier:
“Christine wakes up every morning in an unfamiliar bed with an unfamiliar man. She looks in the mirror and sees an unfamiliar, middle-aged face. And every morning, the man she has woken up with must explain that he is Ben, he is her husband, she is forty-seven years old, and a terrible accident two decades earlier decimated her ability to form new memories.
Every day, Christine must begin again the reconstruction of her past. And the closer she gets to the truth, the more unbelievable it seems.”
What I really liked about story was the fast pace that kept me turning page after page. The protagonist Christine is one of those characters that you feel could be a close friend. You start liking her because you are curious but you develop a real relationship with her the more time you spend reading about her.
Crazy Yet Relatable Struggle
I think that one of the reasons why I connected with this character so deeply was because certain aspects of her situation are quite relatable. Looking in the mirror can be shocking for many of us. Our reflections show us the effects of aging, childhood scars and more recent bruises or scratches – the human version of every day wear and tear.
These things can be shocking to see even if you remember the details of what happened when. So the idea of not knowing why you look twenty years older or have a bruised eye is absolutely terrifying to me. I doubt I’m the only one who fears experiencing memory loss and forgetting the significant moments of my life.
Christine can’t remember marrying Ben, or moving to the house that they live in. She can’t remember what happened to her make her forget. Her journey to piecing her life back together is full of ups and downs. The hardest thing for Christine to figure out is who in her life to believe, when she can’t even trust herself to remember who she really is.
I definitely recommend this book to anyone who is into psychological thrillers! I liked it so much that I immediately ordered another book by S.J. Watson. I will let you know what I thought of Second Life once I finish it! You can read my other book reviews here.
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