I’ve been trying to get my hands on The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides at my local library since its release in 2019, and I’ve got to say, it was worth the wait!
We meet Theo Faber, our narrator, who is a psychotherapist intent on getting hired at the Grove, in order to try and treat a patient with a fairly infamous history. Alicia Berenson, a celebrated painter, several years earlier was found with a gun in her hands and her famous photographer husband’s head blown to bits. Naturally, everyone thought she was responsible and she didn’t help herself by going silent. In all the years since she hasn’t spoken one word, but Theo thinks he can be the one to get her to talk. He believes they have similarities, and as the novel goes on you begin to see some of those similarities.
With that being said there are several twists and turns along the way, and the last fifty pages really did jolt me with some shocks and surprises. Firstly, this facility where Theo gets hired in at and Alicia has been staying sounds a bit run down and rough around the edges. Not only that, but there are a few key members of the staff that seem unsavory. However, we are getting all of this information via Theo’s perspective, and the more he talks about his dedication to Alicia, the more I’d have to agree with his supervisor that he’s a little obsessed and maybe a little bit in love. If anything, he’s consumed by all the mysteries of her husband’s death. Perhaps he’s also finding as a nice distraction from his newly failing marriage.
Interspersed throughout Theo’s telling of events, we are also fed several journal entries written by Alicia. It reveals she’ likely struggling with some mental health issues, deeply loves her husband, is a bit stuck artistically, and her life also has its complications. Even though she seems put together at the present moment, it’s clear she had a rough past that she never really dealt with fully. It seems like maybe those unresolved issues are bubbling up back into her present. She also might be paranoid. That, or there really is a man that’s been watching her. These sparse journal entries that we are given to read are crucial to the climax of the story and are key to the reveal of the twists that follow towards the end of the novel.
As I said, getting my hands on this book was worth the wait! The lead up to the twists at the end were engaging and had me constantly trying to guess how everything was going to turn out. That makes a good book! Plus, there was a little mention of the art world, and that’s right up my alley. If you get the chance, definitely add this mystery/thriller to your read list.