Practical, unassuming Jane Shoringfield has done the calculations, and decided that the most secure path forward is this: a husband, in a marriage of convenience, who will allow her to remain independent and occupied with meaningful work. Her first choice, the dashing but reclusive doctor Augustine Lawrence, agrees to her proposal with only one condition: that she must never visit Lindridge Hall, his crumbling family manor outside of town.
Yet on their wedding night, an accident strands her at his door in a pitch-black rainstorm, and she finds him changed. Gone is the bold, courageous surgeon, and in his place is a terrified, paranoid man―one who cannot tell reality from nightmare, and fears Jane is an apparition, come to haunt him. By morning, Augustine is himself again, but Jane knows something is deeply wrong at Lindridge Hall, and with the man she has so hastily bound her safety to.
CW: Blood, gore, medical content, drug use, child death, gaslighting, death of parent, war
Rating
Review
WHAT DID I JUST READ? This is the question I’ve been asking myself since I finished this book.
The beginning was good; I started to dive into the book immediately. It has kinda the same vibes as Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, a book that I love. The character was strange but likeable as she had her own mind, and I like how she decided to find her husband. The only problem I had was world-building. It was at the same time here and not here. You have some explanations of this world, for example, the name of the country/city or a war that happened, but the author doesn’t dive into that. The bare minimum of information, and that’s all.
As you continue the book, you don’t know where you are. At some point, my only question was whether it was the characters’s imagination or it was really happening. In the end, I don’t know if it’s well done as Jane, the character, kinda loses her mind. This mindset makes me lose interest in the story, and as you arrive at the end, the more this mind state takes an important place. Sadly, when I finished the book, I wondered if I didn’t miss the story’s purpose as the ending was too open for me.
There was so much frustration on my side as I didn’t understand the timeline. Sometimes, you feel that months happen between the different events, and you discover that it is only a few days and vice versa. Also, the change of mind of the main character was hard to understand. Like I know she is a human, but still, on one page, she says something, and on the next, she changes her mind.
The good thing was that even if some parts drag a little and some are a bit boring, it was a quick book to read.
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