Reviews

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn

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layemi's review against another edition

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4.0

A good story, I was engrossed till the end, but the ending seemed a tiny bit of a let down.

emmabeckman's review against another edition

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4.0

**3.5 stars**

Right off the bat, I have to say that I don't have a lot of patience for the surprisingly prevalent murder-mystery trope of the Alcoholic Narrator; psychopaths, murder, and tragedy can all be compelling without anyone being drunk all the damn time. (I had this problem with Girl on the Train and Sharp Objects, and I had it again here.)

That being said, I did enjoy this book otherwise. I thought the pace was exceptional, both the writing and the format (larger dated sections with internal chapters, general short chapter length in a generally long book, etc.). I also thought the PTSD agoraphobia was an interesting trait to give the narrator and one that I haven't seen too often in books. I liked the realness of many of the relationships.

I will say that I did predict a couple of the "big twists" before they happened. Like, hundreds of pages before they happened.

Spoiler

I think this one in particular may have been purposely easy to spot, but it felt fishy from very early on that Ed and Livvy were still alive. There were too many comments about "rarely hearing the phone ring" and what not that made me very suspicious from early in the book. Please let me know if you think that was one that people were supposed to catch so that the overall finale was supposed to be an even bigger shock.

Honestly, I think that's my main problem with the "drunk narrator" trope: even though everyone is denying that the drunk narrator saw anything, clearly she must have because otherwise there would be no story. "Hey I think I saw something happen." "No that couldn't have possibly happened." "Oh ok I must have been hallucinating." ~reevaluates medication dosages and joins alcoholics anonymous~ "Great! I was just mixing up too strong of a medical cocktail, but I'm fine now!"

Anyway. Overall, I liked it. I think it would be a good book to read in a book club to discuss what people thought of the big reveal.

vs9001's review against another edition

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mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

Content Warnings

ver_phd21's review against another edition

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dark sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

lisa_reads_a_lot's review against another edition

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5.0

I loved it!

mariathebookish's review against another edition

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2.0

At most a mediocre novel. It wasn’t a thriller. It took forever until the story got interesting and if something interesting happened, it was quickly checked off. The end didn’t interest me after half of the book and I found it pretty weak. All this was too far-fetched and the dissolution could have gone faster.
Even the writing style of A.J. Finn was a disaster. I couldn‘t handle the short and choppy thoughts of Anna and had thus problems to get into the story. I would have found the story from many perspectives much more interesting and exciting. „Thrill“ was only partially available. I can‘t understand the hype, especially if that wasn’t the first "thriller" in life. I also saw many parallels to other thrillers and only a little originality. 1.5 - 2 stars ..