Well this is quite the debut novel! Talk about making memory loss more terrifying then it already is! That’s right, in S.J. Watson’s novel, Before I Go to Sleep, Christine is suffering from memory loss after an accident almost twenty years ago. What she learns along the way is twisted and so very clever!
When Christine wakes up every morning, it’s as if her life has reset itself. She doesn’t recognize the middle aged woman looking back at her in the mirror, let alone the strange man sleeping next to her in bed. After the fear passes, she learns that strange man is her husband, Ben, and that she got in a horrible accident in her late twenties. It’s caused her to be unable to retain new memories and she’s also forgotten some long-term ones, as well. It’s a very unique condition, as her doctor said it’s strange that she’s able to retain the days’ memories until she goes to bed. That means Dr. Nash is hopeful that as time goes on and they work together that they may be able to restore some of her memory.
In order for her to do this, she’s keeping a journal of things she learns. What I learned almost straight away is that Ben is a liar. Sure, it’s reasonable to think that he’s like to spare Christine some pain and remorse, but there are other things he lies about that I found very strange from the start. Something that frustrated me was how much Christine’s attitude towards Ben flip-flopped. Not just day by day, because she would be starting fresh every day, but she would change her opinion of him in the middle of the day. I wasn’t crazy about that, and as interesting as it was to get new things revealed as the story went along, it took a painfully long time to do so. I think this novel could have benefited from a little bit of an accelerated timeline.
As I was finishing this book, I learned that it had been adapted into a movie back in 2014! It also has the likes of Nicole Kidman, Colin Firth, and Mark Strong in it! In looking at the poster, it did look a little familiar to me, so even though the film scored poorly with critics, I’m definitely interested in checking it out and seeing how it squares up against the novel. I would at least like to think that with a film they’d speed through things or omit some unnecessary details. Usually I’d like adaptations to include more details, but this time around I think I could do without. Overall, though, this book was a really original concept in my mind, and offered up some really thrilling twists in the end. It reminded me a bit of Memento. Both are work looking into.