The Therapist
The Therapist
By: B.A. Paris
[Fulfilled ‘Book with a journalist or therapist’ for Shelf Reflection’s 2023 Reading Challenge]
This book is a bit of a slow burn but definitely worth it in the end. As with a lot of psychological thrillers, there are a lot of ‘normal’ (read repetitive) days we have to read through until the next ‘thing’ happens.
I’ve read a few other B.A. Paris books and that is her MO as well. Quite a bit of build up until things come together at the end. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
While a few times I felt the drag and just wanted to get on with it already, I mostly wasn’t bothered by the pacing. It’s not a very long book anyway which helped.
The basic premise is this: Alice, the main character, has moved into a house with her new-ish partner only to find out after the fact that her partner kept something from her: someone was murdered in their home.
The previous owner Nina— a therapist— was supposedly murdered by her husband. After he was accused he committed suicide and the investigation died down.
Alice is trying to fit into the tight-knit gated community of twelve homes— The Circle, but something is off and she starts to become convinced that the murderer is still out there and may be sneaking into her house. And everyone in The Circle seems more than content to forget anything ever happened.
I think the setting of this one definitely added to the psychological uncertainty. It’s twelve houses set in a circle around a central green space. It’s a gated community and has cultish vibes.
With so few houses, everyone knows everyone’s business and their comings and goings. It’s the perfect setting for neighbors to lie or deceive each other or for new neighbors to feel ‘out of the loop’ and suspicious of something the community might hide from newcomers.
The format of the book is mostly in the present with a few flashbacks to a therapist’s office sprinkled throughout the book. We aren’t sure who the therapist is in these flashbacks until the end.
There was an emphasis on the ‘relaxation therapy’ that seemed like it was going to be a thing but then ended up not and that was a bit strange. Usually when things are repeated and said at the end of a chapter they’re significant. I guess not?
I didn’t have this one figured out. I had some suspicions but Alice accused pretty much everyone at some point so it was hard not to follow along with her every whim.
I was very satisfied with the reveal and thought the suspense was good.
There were a couple indications throughout the book about something in Alice’s past. When Paris revealed what it was, it didn’t seem very influential to me. It didn’t seem worth including in the story unless it was going to be more consequential to Alice figuring out what happened.
I suppose it was important in terms of relationship to Leo, but when it was revealed in the story it was almost an afterthought and not really something the reader was too invested in anyway.
I have mixed feelings about Alice. She obsesses over the murder and starts to annoy her neighbors with all her questions and nosiness. She also shows paranoia about someone being in her house at night— which may or may not have happened.
No, she’s not the smartest protagonist we could have had and some of her choices are questionable.
But at the same time, I’ve read worse. B.A. Paris does seem to like this trope, and I can say that her use of it in The Breakdown was more frustrating than in this book. There weren’t constant remarks about her forgetfulness or being over-emotional or flighty.
She was mostly a normal person who is just trying to process something shocking that happened in her home and the distrust with her boyfriend who never told her about it. So in some ways the behavior can be explained by that.
To me, it didn’t seem like just another insecure and unstable female character who can’t be trusted.
One thing I was pondering as I read the book was how big a deal everyone was making about living in the house after a murder happened.
So I had to ask myself- would I ever live in a house where someone was murdered? Or at least murdered in a similar context as Nina?
I think I’ve been so far removed from murder, only really ‘encountering’ it in fictional stories that part of me says it wouldn’t bother me. But then I think that I would feel different in real life when it was so close to me.
I don’t know though. The housing market is crazy right now so if you could get a bigger, nicer house for a lot less money, it would be seem like enough to not let the house’s past bother you.
[Sidenote: If you like the concept of someone being in a house with a secret past, you may enjoy the book The Villa by Rachel Hawkins.]
I’ve read a lot of books by British authors so I’m coming across fewer words or phrases that I don’t know, but there were still a few in this book that I’ll mention, since I do that kind of thing.
People carrier= as far as I can tell, this is… a van. But with a lot of extra syllables. It also sounds like what my kids would call a van if they didn’t know the word van. And do smaller cars not carry people? What an odd word.
Gate-crasher= I’ve heard of wedding crashers, or party crashers, but gate-crasher is new. Probably because people in England have gardens instead of yards and those probably have fences with gates.
Peaked cap= based on Google images, this is a like a newsboy hat, however there were also pictures of police or military hats.
This isn’t a term, but apparently Brits have a special compartment in their wallets for stamps?! Am I missing something in American wallets?! Honestly, I don’t even have stamps in my house so I don’t know why I would put them in my wallet. That’s for my million retail store rewards cards.
Anywho.
I think this is an awesome book that is worth the slowish somewhat repetitive parts because the ending was so good. Plus it’s a pretty clean book with minimal swearing and no sexual content.
A lot of reviewers that have given this book a low rating have mentioned the ‘stupidity’ of Alice as the main reason for it, so if that’s something that can really get on your nerves, maybe you won’t like this book.
I didn’t think her behavior was so far-fetched that it was ridiculous to read, but I’m usually able to give some grace on ‘unrealistic’ behavior for the most part when I’m reading a psychological thriller.
So I’d say, definitely give this one a try!
[Content Advisory: minimal swearing; no sexual content.]
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