Devoured in less than 24 hours…
The Silent Patient stirred up quite the hype on booktok, and this is what encouraged me to buy a copy when I found myself wondering into Readers Warehouse' Tokai branch with no idea how I got there (okay, I had every intention of going because I was in the area and I just can’t help myself because I’m a relentless bibliophile 📚)
Let me just start off by saying that Crime Fiction isn’t a genre I particularly enjoy reading, because, somehow or another, it becomes just too predictable for me to truly enjoy the story. And after marking it as ‘currently reading' on my Goodreads account and only then seeing the onslaught of 1-Star reviews, my enthusiasm and excitement to give this one a go was trampled ruthlessly …
I'll admit; I made the hasty assumption I likely wouldn’t finish it because I doubted it would piqué AND retain my attention after the first several pages ...
I’m happy to say that even though it received FAR too many bad reviews, I thoroughly enjoyed it and was thrilled that The Silent Patient was my first ever Crime Fiction read!! I’m happy to say that I’m now open to exploring this genre even more 😌
It’s written terrifically - it’s easy to read and the chapters are short, making it easy to follow and keep one interested as to what happens next. This was a complete page-turner for me and kept me enthralled to the very end. The characters are compelling and intriguing and entirely suspicious and conspicuous
With morally grey compasses, they all grab your attention as you try to psychoanalyse each and every one of them from the pages
Definitely worth the hype!
The only reason I haven’t given it 5-Stars is because I predicted who the culprit was before the author revealed tidbits of who they really were. But, I must admit, the author had me doubting myself on several occasions, but alas, I was right and knew several chapters from the end who the real villain was… and that’s my fault alone, only because I have an overactive imagination and jump to my own conclusions way before I should…
That said, knowing who the real villain was made what I’d read even more chilling and left me entirely baffled… talk about hiding the villain in plain sight...
If you want to read a fast-paced suspense-filled psychological novel that will keep you drawing conclusions but then have you second guessing yourself (a million times over) and scratching your head while muttering “whaaat” or “fvcking hell” or “I bloody knew it!”, then definitely give this a go and ignore the 1-Star reviews because this is written BEAUTIFULLY and the storyline is compelling!