Reviews with content warning for Rape - Before I Go to Sleep

So, so good. I can’t believe this is a debut novel. Legit had me anxious and my heart beat was up and down the entire time. I did not see that ending coming! It was pretty horrifying and scary, realistic to an extent too. The only reason i gave it 4 stars is because i hate open endings

like what the hell, just tell us if she remembers or not please! I like certainty and I desperately wanted her to be okay.

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missdoda's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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booksjessreads's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.75

This book is about a woman named Christine who had anteriograde amnesia. She is encouraged to write a diary to help her remember things but she starts finding out intriguing things about her past. The writing was good and kept me interested throughout. One thing I did find a little hard to get through in the beginning was reading the same beginnings to her diary entries. I know her memory loss couldn't be helped, but until the story picked up in the middle I certainly found it hard to keep my concentration there.

However, I did really like the book and particularly towards the end I was hooked to see what was going to happen. This has definitely sparked a curiosity within me to start reading the other S. J. Watson works!

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novi's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I read this in one sitting. It's so fast paced and I kept wanting to know what actually happened because right from the first page until the end, the suspense is always there. As we read more, we know that we can't trust any character in this book, not even the narrator (it uses first person pov from the main character). This book scared me a lot of the times and I didn't see the twist coming, even though it's not something very extra ordinary. But it's still good. I was scared that the ending of this book will haunt me, but thank god it didn't lol so this is not that disturbing. Even though if it did, it means it's really really good. But I still like it nevertheless.

Half of this book, we're reading the main character's journal, but it's not written in journal style, more in the novel style. Which is a bit weird since she has to write it in secret and she basically didn't have a lot of time to barely write before she sleeps and forget everything all over again, yet she wrote in novel style. I am used to writing journal entries for hours and I don't think I can do that lol. I understand why the author decides to do this, though, because if we readers read a journal version of it, we wouldn't grasp the entire situation

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mlebarrow's review against another edition

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mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.0

Not the best written book but interesting enough to keep me invested in what was going to happen. Decent pace until the ending, the peak was quick and the aftermath was too perfect. Disappointing ending really.

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josefinceh's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

Slow, redundant and kind of predictable.

The first 100 pages are extremely interesting, thrilling and you just get sucked in to the atmosphere of the book. The last 100 pages were ok but nothing neither brilliant nor mind-blowing about it. As for the middle of the book I feel as it would not loose anything from just throwing out 150 pages or so.

The concept of the story is interesting, I will give it that, but I had so many problems with the charters, plot and writing that towards the end I felt like I was reading it out of spite. I just wanted to find out if the ending I had predicted halfway through was right.

Let's talk about Christine. Now I can understand that writing from a perspective of a character who forgets everything by the next day is tricky, and balancing the style of writing a journal whilst still conveying a good amount of information equally so, but is it necessary for us to learn how confused she was every single time? Her entries were repetitive and with an unnecessary amount of detail about the smallest little thing. Even if she was a novelist the way the entries were written made no sense considering her mental state. It also bothers me how her writing never reflects what is going on in the house or in the place.

I expected that, especially after ben hits her or when it's the middle of the night, the the writing would be choppy, short sentences to give us a hint of what was going on, adding suspense by jumping back and forth.

Also:

would someone actually write an entire paragraph in their journal about how they nicked their leg wile shaving and then also tasting the soapy blood?

There were also times where it felt unnecessarily sensual, where she describes the matching bra and knickers, how she peals of her blouse. I have never found myself so aware of every single moment where she or Ben was naked, not to mention how she describes Ben and his "bobbing erection" because apparently we need to hear about his penis every time he is nude...

The transition of their relationship also makes little sense,

we learn in the beginning that we can't trust Ben. Towards the end we are supposed to trust him but we are given no other reason other than the fact that he is her husband. The repetition of that fact serves the purpose of trying to convince the reader that Ben is loving and to be trusted, but never actually shows us a reason why. The book also had a tendency to just drop things that maybe should be talked about, like Christine being raped?

In the end, after the final battle (that made little sense in my opinion), we have the moment where Dr. Nash is explaining everything, what happened to Mike/Ben, how they found her etc. Which just gives me the feeling that Watson couldn't bother writing an ending where everything actually connected so he resorted to telling us that this is what we missed from team Clair and Dr. Nash.

In summary: the story has a lot of potential but suffers from bad writing, plot holes and just lack of logic/beliveability.

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