Before I Go To Sleep - S. J. Watson

When I first heard about this on the TV Book Club I was intrigued and immediately added it to my Amazon wish list. Fast-forward a few months and I was delighted to receive it as a birthday gift. This is S. J. Watson’s first novel and can best by described as a psychological thriller (as is hinted at by the staring eye on the cover). The premise When Christine goes to sleep, she forgets everything that has happened to her that day. Even more frighteningly, she has no memory of events before that day and wakes up every morning believing she is a young woman or even a child. Discovering her body ... more

I tend the stick to my chick lit books and rarely stray away from my comfort zone! This way I have a good idea of what I am getting and chances are I will enjoy it and find it a light and easy read. One Saturday a couple of months ago I turned on the TV and The TV Book Club was on. I rarely watch this but the presenters and guests were raving about some particular book so I decided to leave it on and see what all the excitement was about. The book was ‘Before I go to Sleep’ by S.J.Watson. After grasping what the plot was about I decided it was something I had to read so I downloaded it onto my ... more

Film fans were introduced to the idea of short term memory loss through 50 First Dates – a light-hearted romantic film about a woman who wakes up every morning with no memory of anything that has happened the day before, or in fact any of the preceding years. Before I Go to Sleep takes this a step further, turning memory loss into a disorientating and terrifying experience where nothing can be trusted, even your own family. This novel is a cleverly constructed and literary thriller which will keep the reader guessing all the way through. Christine is the main protagonist; a strong woman who ... more

I'm not sure why, but when I picked this up about a year ago in the charity shop, I was under the impression that this was a young adult book, but I can assure you, it is not. Before I Go To Sleep is a chilling thriller about a woman who suffers from a severe form of amnesia that means that everytime she falls asleep she loses most of her memories and wakes up thinking that she is still in her mid-twenties. She has absolutely no recollection of the accident that caused her amnesia or the fact that the man she wakes up next to everyday is her husband, Ben. Every morning Ben explains the ... more

~~Before I go to sleep~~ “'As I sleep, my mind will erase everything I did today. I will wake up tomorrow as I did this morning. Thinking I'm still a child. Thinking I have a whole lifetime of choice ahead of me ...' Welcome to Christine's life.” (Book description from Amazon.co.uk) I saw this book in my local library on the new addition shelf and it immediately caught my eye. The cover is very striking with a picture of an eye this takes up the majority of the cover, there is something unnerving about this particular eye and I instantly knew that this book was going to be a thriller before ... more