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‘You’ by Caroline Kepnes is a psychological thriller that will have you looking at people around you a little differently and doubting their intentions and ways. It makes you hyper aware of how people aren’t what they seem to be and that trusting them at face value might not always be a good idea. Basically, it puts you ill at ease. Why read such a book then?

That’s what my husband kept asking me when I was shuddering, shaking my head, and saying ‘this makes my head spin’ over and over again while reading the book. But to say You is gripping and addictive is an understatement. It gets under your skin and you find yourself in the midst of the action. And you want to know what happens next, so much so that you find yourself reading it at every possible chance—while brushing your teeth and making tea, stuck in traffic, and before bed after a long day.

The protagonists, Joe Goldberg and Guinevere Beck, are both dark and twisted characters. Outwardly, they seem perfect—kind, gentle, not flawless but working on their issues—but both have hidden traits and secrets that can destroy them and those around them. In an interview, Kepnes said shiny, happy people give her the creeps and you can see why: She imagines them to be as sinister as Joe and Beck.

Also read: Before the Coffee Gets Cold book review: Feels like a warm hug

From the first time Joe meets Beck at the local bookstore he manages for Mr. Mooney, he becomes obsessed with her. Starting with googling her name and meticulously combing through her Facebook and Twitter accounts, he digs up a lot of information. Then he begins to stalk her, getting inside her home when she’s not there, following her around town, and reading her emails (he pockets her phone when she gets into an accident of sorts and he ‘rescues’ her). Not only is he in love with Beck but he is sure that she feels the same way and is only distancing herself to avoid hurting her feelings.

You get this eerie sense that much of what he feels and thinks is happening is in his head and are his warped interpretation of events instead of the real thing. And then there is Beck who isn’t entirely innocent and nice as Joe makes her out to be. She is needy, manipulative, and there are ulterior motives behind most of her actions. Joe, the stalker, is a smart guy whose actions are unpredictable and disturbing. He keeps you guessing and gasping. The cumulative effect of it all is a very unsettling feeling. There’s a Netflix series based on the book and, with some minor tweaks, it’s almost as good as the original story. But I’d recommend you read the book before you watch the series. It’s such a thrill to watch your eerie visions unfold on screen.

You

Fiction
Caroline Kepnes
Published: 2014
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Pages: 422, Paperback

We all have regrets, things we are embarrassed about and would like to undo if given a chance. But sadly, life doesn’t work like that. As much as we wish it were, time travel isn’t possible in real life. But we can indulge in a little vicarious living every now and then, thanks to good fiction where surreal things like time travel happen all the time. And books like these, though they won’t be able to change our past, can help us make our futures a little better.

Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s ‘Before the Coffee Gets Cold’ takes place in a café in Tokyo where, along with great coffee, customers are given a chance to travel back in time. There’s a woman who goes back in her past to confront the lover who left her, a wife who wants to get a letter her husband wrote to her before his memory started to fade, a pub owner who is estranged from her family but wants to see her sister one last time, and a mother who travels 10 years into her future to get a glimpse of the daughter she never got to meet.

But there are some conditions of time travel: They must sit in a particular seat and not get up—they will be forcibly brought back to the present if they do so. And they must also return to the present before the coffee gets cold, else they will forever be stuck in the past.

Also read: Take a Hint Dani Brown book review: Sweetly seductive

Originally written as a stage play before being adapted into a novel, there is a certain theatricality to it. Even the setting and characters are reminiscent of theater performances. The book consists of four individual stories and though you don’t have to read them in order, it helps if you do. The characters, at least the recurring ones, make better sense that way.

There are times when the narrative is a bit sappy but the lessons the stories impart and the bouts of introspection they lead to more than make up. Another issue I had with the writing style, or perhaps it’s the translation that is faulty, is that the same thing is said multiple times. But these are minor niggles. Before the Coffee Gets Cold might be a little rough but it feels like a comforting warm chocolate drink on breezy autumn evenings.

Before the Coffee Gets Cold

Three stars
Fiction
Toshikazu Kawaguchi
Translated from the Japanese by Geoffrey Trousselot
Published: 2019
Publisher: Picador
Pages: 213, Paperback

Romance isn’t my thing. In real life and in books. But I’m more than willing to make an exception for Talia Hibbert. She is a magician. She takes tried and tested tropes and comes up with absolutely stunning masterpieces. I read ‘Get a Life, Chloe Brown’ because so many of my friends were talking/posting about it. Despite my initial skepticism of the genre, I got sucked into the story and it was a happy time. I read the second book in the three-part series this Dashain and it really helped me cope with festival-induced stress.

I was in a good space mentally, constantly thinking about Danika or Dani and Zafir, the main characters of Hibbert’s ‘Take a Hint, Dani Brown’. This charming story about a young woman who agrees to fake date her friend after a video of him ‘rescuing’ her goes viral was named one of the best romances of 2020 by Buzzfeed, Amazon, Bustle, Washington Post, NPR, Kirkus, among many others. Indeed, it’s an exciting story, with some really steamy scenes and heartwarming instances that leave you with the happy kind of butterflies-in-your tummy feeling.

PhD student Danika Brown thinks romantic partners are distractions. She prefers friends-with-benefits. She prays for it too—a sign from the universe that a particular someone could be that person. When a security guard at Dani’s workplace, Zafir Ansari, rescues Dani from a fire drill gone wrong, Dani thinks there couldn’t be a bigger and clearer sign. Then the viral video has the two ‘pretending’ to be romantically involved but feelings run deep on both sides. However, neither is sure of the other’s feelings and doesn’t want to do anything to sabotage their ‘fake’ relationship. Dani fears being in an actual relationship will shift her focus from work. Zafir is a hopeless romantic but he has issues of his own that stop him from getting too close to anyone.

Also read: I’m Thinking of Ending Things book review: Feels like a fever dream

The ending is predictable (obviously, and you wouldn’t want it any other way) but it’s the journey that has your heart racing. Dani and Zafir’s shenanigans made me giggle, roll my eyes, and laugh out loud. The friends-to-lovers trope is so well executed that it doesn’t feel cliché at all. And Dani and Zafir are such loveable characters. You want them to be your friends. No other characters, of the romance genre at least, have had such an impact on me till now. (Wait, did I say that for Chloe and Redford from ‘Get a Life, Chloe Brown’ as well?).

And no, you don’t have to have read Get a Life, Chloe Brown to pick this one up (though I recommend you do) as it is a complete novel in itself. I’m super excited about ‘Act Your Age, Eve Brown’, the story of the youngest Brown sister, but I have a strong feeling that out of the three sisters, Dani will always be my favorite.

Take a Hint Dani Brown

Four stars
Fiction
Talia Hibbert
Publisher: Avon
Published: 2020
Pages: 400, Paperback

Would you laugh at me if I said I bought ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ by Iain Reid because I just loved the book’s cover and feel? The slim volume felt so nice in my hands. I was holding the book the entire time I was browsing at the Pilgrims Book House in Jhamsikhel, Lalitpur. When it was time to pay for the other three books I had selected, I couldn’t put I’m Thinking of Ending Things back on the shelf. So, I had the cashier ring it up as well. I had already watched the film adaptation by the Oscar winner Charlie Kaufman and it hadn’t made much sense to me. I hadn’t enjoyed the dark and dreary setting. But the book was a lot better than the movie, albeit as confusing.

The story is about an unnamed woman who has been dating a dullish man called Jake for about six weeks when the two decide to go visit Jake’s parents. Now, she doesn’t really know why she’s doing it considering she’s thinking of ending things. She feels like she has sleepwalked into it all and that the two of them, despite the initial attraction, aren’t meant to be together. But still, she finds herself in the car, on a road trip. Here we get to see what she likes about Jake and the two talk about things like memories, faith, the importance of relationships, and how everything is multifaceted. Their conversations give you a lot to think about.

Also read: The Silent Patient book review: Absolutely riveting

Throughout the trip, the woman keeps getting phone calls. But she doesn’t answer them. She keeps making excuses—it’s just her friend calling, she’ll talk to her later or the battery is about to die—and lets the call go to voicemail. You get the sense something is off long before the actual horror begins. There are no other cars on the road, and when they finally reach their destination, all the houses are burnt out or dilapidated.

Though Jake says his parents are expecting them for dinner, the house is in complete darkness. It all feels chillingly sinister. Jake displays awkward behavior time and again. There were times when I felt that had I been in the narrator’s place, I would have jumped out of the car and run screaming. Then, Reid also makes you question the narrator: Is she reliable? The novel takes a horrific turn when the couple stop for dessert (in the middle of a snowstorm) on their way back and then make a detour (to dump the empty containers).

I’m Thinking of Ending Things feels like a fever dream. The claustrophobic setting makes it frighteningly good. Reid’s sparse prose and a dialogue driven narrative keep you hooked. What you know gives you goosebumps yet you wish Reid had told you more. They say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover but just this once I’m glad I did.

I’m Thinking of Ending Things

3.5 stars 
Fiction
Iain Reid
Published: 2016
Publisher: Scout Press
Pages: 216

I had heard a lot about Alex Michaelides’ ‘The Silent Patient’. Authors like C.J Tudor and Lee Child whom I considered the masters of thrillers were raving about it, calling it smart, sophisticated and a very clever book. It’s also being adapted into a screenplay for Brad Pitt’s production company. I put off reading it because the blurb made it sound like a garden-variety thriller. I only picked it up when I wanted a light read. I felt I could read a few pages and then do something else and come back to it and so on and so forth. But I couldn’t have been more wrong. The blurb doesn’t do justice to the riveting story. The Silent Patient is a taut psychological thriller that you won’t be able to put down.

Alicia Berenson, a rising artist, has been convicted of murdering her fashion-photographer husband, Gabriel. But after shooting him in the head five times, she stops speaking. She is taken to the Grove, a secure psychiatric unit, but no medication or treatment can make her talk. Theo Faber, a London-based psychotherapist, is obsessed with Alicia as he has spent two decades in therapy himself, trying to overcome the trauma induced by a father who was cruel to him. As Alicia has had a similar upbringing, he feels she will be able to connect with him and that he is the only one who can make her talk.

Also read: The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo: Blown away

The narrative has Alicia’s journal entries that give us an insight into her life because by the time we meet her she has already stopped talking. We also get to know other people like her husband, Gabriel, her brother-in-law, Max, and some of her friends through these entries. And they are all intriguing, undecipherable characters. Theo, while conducting therapy sessions with Alicia, also speaks to some of her relatives and acquaintances.

The switch between the two voices is refreshing and keeps you hooked because you feel like you are on the verge of discovering something that could be crucial to the plot. Michaelides is primarily a writer of screenplays and that skill has come in handy while working on The Silent Patient—the scenes are so descriptive and thus easy to visualize.

I liked the writing style of The Silent Patient. Not everything is explicitly stated but you can draw a lot of conclusions by analyzing the information you are given. Michaelides keeps throwing things your way to flip the entire narrative around and you are left rethinking everything you have read and reevaluating all your thoughts. The book has several consecutive plot twists that leave you speechless and wondering if any author you have read and loved thus far can now live up to the high expectations you will have from them.

The Silent Patient

Four stars 
Fiction
Alex Michaelides
Published: 2019
Publisher: Orion Books
Pages: 341, Paperback

A historical fiction novel set in old Hollywood, ‘The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo’ opens with rookie reporter Monique Grant being asked to interview the Hollywood star who has had a glamorous and somewhat scandalous life. Monique goes to meet Evelyn to get her story for Vivant, the magazine Monique works for under Frankie, an ambitious and ruthless editor. But Evelyn tells her she isn’t interested in a magazine cover—that it was just a ruse to get to Monique. Rather, she wants to tell Monique her life story that Monique is free to publish as an authorized biography once Evelyn is no longer around.  

The book’s primary narrator is Evelyn, interspersed with Monique’s voice here and there. She takes us through her life—from her foray into Hollywood in the 50s to eventually winning the Oscars in the 80s. We get to know each of her seven husbands and her one true love, Celia St. James, while being enamored by the glitzy but often chaotic Hollywood life. But how does Monique fit into the picture? And why is Evelyn ready to bare her secrets to the world when she has done so much to protect those she loved and herself by putting up a façade for so long? It’s these two elements that don’t let you put the book down for long. You want to know what exactly drove Evelyn to keep remarrying despite being in love with Celia. You need to know what her plan is now that she is almost 80 and thus no longer guided by the same beliefs as during her younger days.

Reid is a master storyteller who knows what she is doing and is evidently in love with her craft. There are sentences that you want to keep rereading. It’s the smoothest prose I’ve read in a long, long time. I’m quite stingy with my five stars but this one was a winner through and through. There is never a dull moment in the story. Everything that happens feels important and gives you a complete sense of the characters and their emotions. You love and hate all the characters equally, just as you have a love-hate relationship with most of your closest ones. Even the ‘bad’ ones aren’t really bad. They are just human.

Reid shows us that everyone has flaws but nobody is really unredeemable—that a lot of times who you are depends on what your circumstances are at that moment, that you aren’t defined by any one thing but are rather a culmination of many different things, decisions, and emotions. She also addresses the issues of homophobia, racism, and sexism and does it with so much empathy that nothing feels forced or out of place. Bottom line: The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is a flawless book that will always have a special place in my heart.

Five stars 
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
Taylor Jenkins Reid
Published: 2017
Publisher: Washington Square Press
Pages: 389, Paperback

Some books are so hyped that when they let me down, I feel something must be wrong with me. Maybe I just didn’t get them? Perhaps my brain is the size of a shriveled raisin? Or was I distracted when reading, which I shouldn’t have been, and what does that say about me as a reader? These thoughts are discomfiting and, frankly, makes me feel a little stupid. I take a lot of time to bounce back and pick up another book when this happens. I don’t want the next one to disappoint as well and that’s a lot of pressure. I hate books that put me in this position and most recently it was ‘Where’d You Go, Bernadette’ by Maria Semple that got me all riled up.

I had high hopes, having heard so much about the book. Afterall, it had also been made into a movie starring Cate Blanchett. I searched for a physical copy despite having the e-book in my kindle. I was so sure it was going to be a great read and that I would want to see the spine on my bookshelf. From what I had heard and read, this was a fantastic story about a family trying to understand one another better and the power of a daughter’s undying love for her mother. I even thought I would enjoy the format in which it is written—a hodgepodge of emails, transcripts, invoices, school memos and even FBI reports.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette is the story of Bernadette Fox, a woman in her fifties who lives in Seattle with her husband, Elgin Branch, and their daughter, Bee, a high-school student. Once an acclaimed architect, Bernadette is now a recluse of sorts. She spends most of her time at home, coming out only to drop Bee off and pick her up from school. She’s not involved in any school activities like the other parents and is actually contemptuous of the ones who do. Then when Bee asks for a family trip to Antarctica for scoring perfect grades, Bernadette throws herself into the preparation only to disappear days before departure. Everyone thinks Bernadette broke under pressure but Bee is convinced there is more to it than meets the eye.

My problem with the story is that much of it is just about Bernadette being on the brink of a meltdown and how the town folks don’t like her much. It goes nowhere for more than half of the book—just pointlessly moving about in circles trying to establish a point that could have been made in a few chapters. It got a bit too much after a while. The emails and invoices felt gossipy. Semple was a television writer for 15 years and it’s evident that she still thinks like one. You had to piece together a story with the help of the various correspondences and, while that would have made for a fun read, Semple’s choppy narrative makes you lose interest pretty fast.

2 stars
Fiction
Where’d You Go, Bernadette
Maria Semple
Published: 2012
Publisher: Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Pages: 324, Paperback

We all have secrets, regrets, and other bottled-up emotions that we successfully hide, often from ourselves. The monsters resurface every now and then but are quickly buried deep in the crevices of our heads and hearts. Perhaps by doing so we are locking up an essential part of ourselves and thus we are never completely healed and whole. What if we confronted those dark feelings and we were honest about who we are? Maybe someone would judge us, like us a little less, but why should that matter when, by tackling our demons, we can finally be at peace? 

‘The Authenticity Project’ by Clare Pooley, with its myriad characters, one of which you are sure to relate to, makes you think of this and other conundrums of life. You realize no one is perfect and you aren’t either but not all flaws should be embraced. It’s human nature to change and evolve and working on our weaknesses and niggles can make us a better version of ourselves. 

The book begins with 37-year-old Monica, who runs a cafe in London, finding a green notebook, titled The Authenticity Project. Julian Jessop, 79-year-old artist, has written some truths about his life and left it at her cafe. In it, he asks the person who finds it to write his/her story and then leave the book for someone else to discover. Monica does as instructed and then lets it go. From then on, the journal falls into the hands of various people—an addict, a tourist and an Instagram influencer. As they all tell their own stories before leaving the book for others to come across, the characters end up forging a bond among themselves. By doing so, they realize the power of community, friendship, and the importance of staying true to oneself.  

 The language is easy albeit a bit clichéd here and there but that doesn’t take away from a story that brims with hope and positivity. There are moments of clarity when you feel like everything in life is manageable, every problem solvable, if you can just muster up the courage to be your authentic self. The Authenticity Project is fiction but, in a way, it is self-help too. It will make you re-evaluate your thinking and look into your actions to see what subtle changes you can make to significantly alter your life. The book also conveys a powerful message on the importance of fostering good relationships and being kind. All in all, it’s a cozy, feel-good book that reminds you to be a little easy on yourself as well as those around you.

3.5 stars
Fiction
The Authenticity Project
Clare Pooley
Published: 2020
Publisher: Penguin Random House 
Pages: 404, Paperback