Through the Wall by Caroline Corcoran
Genre: Psychological thriller
Read: 6th October 2019
Purchase: Amazon
(release date: 3rd October 2019)
★ 1 star
(will return to try reading again at a later date)
Honestly? I don't know what to say about this book because while it had the promise of a brilliantly creepy thriller I just couldn't get into it. And I must be in the minority because everyone else seems to love it and can't say enough about it!
I don't know, maybe I was in the wrong frame of mind, maybe I found the unformatted ARC difficult to follow or maybe I just found the monologuing endless. Whatever it is, THROUGH THE WALL was a sad fail for me. And it is so disappointing because I was really looking forward to it.
I might come back to it with a retail version and see if that has any bearing on my enjoyment of it.
The premise was exciting. The Prologue was enthralling. Locked in a psychiatric unit with the same mundane normality for both the patients and the staff. But who is it that is locked away? Who is the patient? And who is the mysterious visitor that comes every time with the boyfriend remaining in the visiting room? This alone promised compelling reading to come.
THROUGH THE WALL is basically just that. The lives in an apartment block where two residents yearn for the other more exciting life "through the wall" that they envision their neighbour living instead.
Lexie and Tom are together and trying for a baby. Their sex life is governed by the ovulation stick and punctuated with the promise of a child...that never comes. It is an putting enormous strain on their relationship and inevitably takes it toll.
Harriet lives "through the wall" next door. Her sex life is governed by her inert loneliness and the need to feel something, anything...even if it is through sex with faceless nameless strangers. Her lavish parties with people she has only just met to fill her flat with sound and laughter and happiness. Anything but loneliness. Anything but nothing.
Lexie and Tom have everything Harriet had before she lost it. She is miserable and begins to see their life as the one she should be enjoying. Knowing everything about her neighbours "through the wall", Harriet wants what Lexie has and will stop at nothing to get it...at any cost.
Harriet is "Single White Female" NEXT LEVEL. She is super creepy as she stalks Lexie and Tom in her bid to get what she believes she is owed.
THROUGH THE WALL is incredibly slow to start that I found almost glacial but covers a multitude of sins throughout such as obsession, lies, secrets, jealousy, fertility, stalking and mental health issues. The chapters are told in alternate narratives by Lexie and Harriet respectively and are relatively short and snappy.
Unfortunately, I found THROUGH THE WALL to have so much monologuing and not enough dialogue that it just seemed endless. It was almost depressing reading Harriet's self absorption into a life she believes should be hers as well as Lexie's endless attempts to fall pregnant. I couldn't connect to either character and in the end I just gave up.
But, as I said, it could have been my frame of mind or even the incredibly bad formatting of the ARC which I found incredibly difficult to follow. I will endeavour to pick up a retail copy of this book another time and hope I will better enjoy it then. I don't want to completely give up on it, as I really do want to find out what happens and discover just who it is locked behind those doors of the psychiatric unit.
This is not the end...this is just how it was for me just now. I look forward to giving THROUGH THE WALL another go at another time. I just feel bad that I didn't enjoy it.
I would like to thank #CarolineCorcoran, #NetGalley and #AvonUK for an ARC of #ThroughTheWall in exchange for an honest review.
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