My Five Word TL:DR Review : Still Thinking About This Book

This is one of the most unusual books I’ve ever read and I’m still thinking about it even now whilst writing my review.  Of necessity, I think this will be fairly short because I don’t want to give away any spoilers and there’s a lot of potential to spoil this for others.

So, this is a gothic horror story, a story of asylums at their worst, a story of having choices taken from you in the most insidious way.  It’s also a psychological thriller with a good dose of mystery that keeps you literally glued to the page.  On top of that it’s the most curious mix of possibly slightly futuristic setting offset by the oddest 50s style feel to the asylum.  I couldn’t help thinking of a curious mash up of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (a female only version) and The Stepford Wives.

This is a tale of two sisters.  Morgan, the surviving sister feels guilt over her sister’s death and is determined to get to the bottom of it, so much so that she dons a new persona in order to infiltrate (by which I mean she intends to have herself committed) to the asylum where her sister spent her last months.  Morgan has a troubled background of substance abuse and her sister Hadleigh usually rallied to the cause.  The two were close until Hadleigh became involved in a relationship and their easy going banter dried up leaving both feeling a little stranded.

The setting is predominantly Hollyhock Asylum, a privately run institution that uses an impressive and modern facade to showcase its work whilst behind the curtain lies a totally different and much more sinister story.  The place has a long history and ghosts and spirits of the dead definitely play a role. On top of this the director, Althea Edevane, is a very unusual character.  Sinister in her calmness and with her own ulterior motive.  The asylum has this weird (as I mentioned above) 50s feel.  There are home rooms and craft rooms where the women are encouraged to clean and knit and undertake other domestic duties while wearing headphones that provide a strange diatribe that runs on a constant loop.

In terms of the characters.  We pick up a picture of the relationship between the sisters through text messages and the odd flashback of events.  On top of this we have the character of Charlotte.  Charlotte is the fake persona that Morgan assumed in order to be admitted to the asylum.  This is a facade that she has been wearing for a good year and is about to become problematic.  Given Morgan’s past she is a somewhat unreliable character in some respects and her addictive nature perhaps leads this double identity she’s living to lead to a real crisis with Charlotte becoming the more dominant player.  This aspect of the story becomes a central focus with Morgan frequently being unaware of her own actions and learning of events in retrospect.

I loved the writing and the style of story telling using police reports, text messages and flashbacks.  This is a style that works really well for me although I would advise patience because it takes a little while for things to play out and I would say that for the first quarter of the book I felt as though I wasn’t grasping everything totally, but you need to press on in that respect.

I would also say that this book might not be for everyone.  There is a good dose of horror and also the underlying corruption of the asylum and what the director is trying to achieve could be triggering for some readers.

That being said this is a fascinating story but it’s not the type of book that you put down and say it was fantastic because it’s so mind bending and also a little worrying.  I found myself putting this down and having a long hard think about the underlying message here which for me revolves around women’s rights and the current trend that seems to be one of regression.  Here we seem to have flipped back to a more Victorian state where husbands could have their wives committed on a whim if they were becoming troublesome.  That’s why these inmates are force fed this banal domestic routine whilst being served up a dose of brain washing at the same time.  It makes you stop and really think.  The author isn’t trying to bash you over the head with this, you can simply read this for the story it delivers but for me it was so much more and I think I will probably continue to think about this for a good long while.

Gothic goodness, creepiness aplenty, mind bending psychosis, horror and gore and a strange story involving the mystery of two sisters.

I received a copy through Netgalley, courtesy of the publisher, for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.

My rating 4.5 of 5 stars