What comes out at the end is truly overwhelming and far more than what you ever imagined. She is a blank canvas, you know nothing about and keep assuming, which step by step proves wrong. It is fascinating how the book circumferences a character who doesn’t speak a word until the end. The innermost working, the revelations of what the characters have gone through and their very natural features, have you immersed in this one-of-a-kind suspense.Īlicia’s presence, throughout this exquisite novel, is out of the reach and yet everywhere, all at once.

The comparison is drawn with the Greek myth, Alcestis, “a love story of the saddest kind”, makes the novel livelier and mysteriously enchanting. Each and every person has been delicately carved and presented, to make the readers known about them, yet stay sceptic about their being. The book has a hypnotic nature throughout, as you keep looking for the under bedded reasons and truth. Surprisingly, this is Alex Michaelides’ very first novel, and he has many readers swooning over his enthralling writing and avant-garde story-building, for which he has deservedly won accolades and praises worldwide, making his book, top-notch.The beauty of the book is its mystical way of bringing forth the different characters, and a profound focus on their psyches, rather than building a conventional, juicy drama. Just as Theo explores and unveils the mental state of his patient, so does the author reveals the psychologies of its layered characters.

What unfolds next is a sophisticated, methodical story that keeps the readers hooked and wondering throughout. Here Alicia is ‘the silent patient’, who has refused to utter even a single word after the harrowing incident and was deeply under depression, for which she was going for treatment to a mental hospital, where Theo, intensely intrigued by the story of Alicia, comes for her therapy. The story revolves around a woman, Alicia Berenson (an accomplished painter, held captive of a gruesome murder of her husband, Gabriel, a fashion photographer) and her therapist, Theo Faber.

With issues like ‘infidelity’ and ‘mental health’, finely engraved, the author never fails to keep you engaged and searching for the core truth.

The book is undoubtedly an experience that you venture into, and once it’s over, you crave for more. A gripping storyline, a thrilling plot that opens layer by layer and a mind-boggling ending! A real page-turner, ‘The Silent Patient’ satiates you to the heart.

Theo faber the silent patient