REVIEW: If You Knew Her by Emily Elgar @emily_elgar @harpercollins
If You Knew Herby Emily Elgar
HarperCollins
🔥 AVAILABLE 1/23/18 🔥
Thank you so much to HarperCollins for this copy in return for my honest review. A fantastic psychological suspense novel that is character driven and emotional.
The perfect life?
Or the perfect lie . . .
When Cassie Jensen arrives on the intensive care ward in St Catherine's hospital, Alice Marlowe the chief nurse, is fascinated by this young, beautiful woman who strikes her as familiar and yet she doesn't know why. But then Alice is astonished to discover something about Cassie that she has been keeping secret from everyone, including her devoted husband and family; a secret that changes everything.
Frank is a patient on the same ward who has locked-in-syndrome, so can hear and see everything around him but cannot communicate. Soon he comes to understand that Cassie's life is still in danger and as the police continue to investigate what really happened to Cassie, only Frank holds the truth, which no one can know and he cannot tell . . .
My Review:
Alice lives her days and/or nights as the ward nurse for 9B. She uses Frank, a patient with locked-in syndrome (he can hear and see things around him but cannot speak or move), as her therapist of sorts, talking to him daily about her life and hoping to see some life from him one day.. though they're convinced at the hospital that he's in a permanent vegetative state.
In comes Cassie, a victim of a hit and run, now in a coma. Finding out that Cassie is with child sends Alice reeling a bit as she has gone through several miscarriages and now she wants to make sure Cassie and child are properly taken care of. If this miracle can happen, surely one can happen for her as well.
Frank just wants to improve, show that he's in there somewhere and start over with his daughter. As he witnesses everything around him, he gets more knowledge than he's bargained for. Now he just needs a way to warn everyone.
Emily truly brings these characters to life. While the story is based on how Cassie ended up on the road that led to her accident, I was more engaged in the characters lives. At a certain point, I even forgot to think of any plot twist or where the book was eventually headed. I was just engaged in the thoughts of each of these three. The author brings them all together in a beautiful and heart wrenching way. While Alice's story hit home in some areas for me on a personal level, I was really mostly fascinated with Frank. Could you even imagine being locked inside your own body and no one knowing you were there??
Definitely an emotional roller coaster of a read. Those who like the character driven novels will surely find themselves immersed in this story. Highly recommend! Now excuse me while I pull myself together.
★★★★★
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