Before I Go To Sleep

This book has become one of the most notable psychological thrillers of recent years, joining an elite collection along with Gone Girl which has seen Hollywood producers scrambling for the rights to transform it into a movie. I though seemed to miss much of the hype for this when it was released and it has been languishing on my kindle for ages, however whilst looking on IMDB a week ago I found the trailer for the upcoming movie adaptation featuring Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth.

Regular readers of my reviews will know I hate to miss the opportunity to read the book before watching the movie so I catapulted this to the top of my reading list and dove in.

The story is an intriguing, if not original concept, whereby the key character Christine, an amnesiac, wakens each day with no memory of where she is or the last 25 years of her life. It is up to her husband Ben to tell her each day who she is, where she is and why she can remember nothing. Now amnesia is no laughing matter but I'm sure people will forgive me for having a giggle initially as it pulled to mind visions of the Adam Sandler movie 50 First Dates, where Drew Barrymore has to be wooed each day due to the very same condition. It took a few chapters to leave those images behind. For Watson, trying to create an intense atmosphere I'm sure he's cursed this movie silently more than once.

Once I'd left it behind I began to enjoy the book more, I liked the use of Christine's journal to move past the amnesia and to build the story by allowing her memories to be built gradually through writing things down and rereading the daily. what this did was identify the discrepancies in the information her husband Ben was giving her and allowed us to move into the questions around what happened to Christine, who was responsible and why she was being lied to by her husband. was he just protecting her to prevent distress or was it to hide his own indiscretions?

I've read reviews where people said they found this book predictable and had guessed the ending early on. I have to say I didn't find this fault, it took me until the point where Watson begins his reveal to catch on and it didn't leave me bored half way. I loved the way that Christine's memories had me questioning whether she could be creating fictitious memories and trying to piece together what was true.

I think this will translate beautifully as a film, utilising video diaries instead of Christine's journal, what I think will be more interesting is which upcoming film release will emerge the ratings victor, Before I Go To sleep or Gone Girl. Both have it hitting casts with strong stories. I suspect this may languish a little but if it does it should on book value be much more engaging. It, in my opinion, read as the more believable novel and was the most engaging and I'd be keen to review both movies against their book counterparts upon their release.

I only gave it 4 stars because of the never ending visions of Drew Barrymore belting out The Beach Boys “Wouldn't It Be Nice” whilst paining a wall day after day in the Sandler movie. It made it hard to focus and as I write this I can almost see Watson giving another silent curse to Mr Adam Sandler and that makes me smile.