The Silent Patient

Alicia Berenson is an artist, a wife and someone who has suffered quite a bit of tragedy in her lifetime. She is happily married to her beautiful and doting husband, Gabriel, - or so she thinks. Gabriel has been murdered and Alicia has taken the blame and fallen silent. Completely silent. Instead of going to prison, Alicia is admitted to an inpatient psychiatric facility, the Grove.

Enter Theo Faber. Dr. Faber is a psychotherapist newly hired at the Grove and he has an obsession with Alicia - even prior to his employment. He specially took this job to get access to her. He knows her art and her story. As Theo begins working with Alicia, he interviews her family and friends for more background information. Theo eventually earns Alicia’s trust and she begins communicating with him in different ways…

The Silent Patient had me drawn in from the beginning. I found myself unable to put it down on every occasion that I picked it up. This book takes an unexpected twist at the end. (If you don’t read a lot of thrillers you may not see it coming!)

⚠️ Trigger warning: murder/suicide, adultery, drug use.

he needs his licensed revoked, bad therapist one star on Yelp

This book surprised me. I was eager to get to the end, but it did not end as expected. The character's description was so vivid that I could visualize the face. It was such a great read.

I think this is the book that has now gotten me into reading more mysteries and suspense driven novels. I liked the way it guided you in a direction that was completely overlooked in the end, but when the end came, the book started to all fall into place and completely shock the reader. I wasn't expecting the turn it took, but certainly picked up on it the more I read.

HOLY COW, WHAT DID I JUST READ?!?!?! It honestly took me a bit to get into this book, but I am so glad I followed the advice of some fellow book worms and kept at it!
Just when I thought I had it ALL figured out Michaelides threw a wrench in my thought process and totally messed with my mind (in the best possible way). Just when you thing the story will zig, it zags, and you truly go back forth about the characters and their intent.

Just when you think Alicia is innocent, you are led to believe she's guilty, and then innocent again, and this goes back and forth throughout the whole novel. You also begin to wonder whether she is stable/unstable or just plain likes playing games with Theo's mind as time goes along. Michaelides has you second guessing all that you know about the story left and right during the second half of the book, and until the last several chapters of the book you you have no clue just how messed up everything is... ESPECIALLY Theo...

And speaking of Theo... He is one DARK and TWISTED dude by the end. If you think his thoughts towards his wife cheating on him and his actions towards this are twisted, just wait until that last bit of the book...