Review: Before She Knew Him

Before She Knew Him by Peter Swanson
My rating: 0 of 5 stars

Many thanks to NetGalley, Faber and Faber and Peter Swanson for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. My opinions are 100% my own and independent of receiving an advance copy.

What we have here is a good old fashioned psychological thriller that finally lives up to the hype. I’m late in the game for Peter Swanson books but now that I have read this one, I’m checking out all his other books. Wow, can he write. Great characters, clear storyline with lots of surprises and a build up of suspense that propels you forward until the end. You almost want to slow it down, draw it out because even though you want to know what happens, you don’t want it to be over.

There are lots of places you can read a recap of the story, and they do a much better job than I would be able to do so please go and check those out. I’m just going to lay it out a bit differently. You have the main character Hen. She is an artist who makes really creepy art, which ties in with her fascination with death and all things morbid. She also happens to be bi-polar and has, in the past, experienced manic episodes. Once she ended up hospitalized after she became obsessed with a neighbourhood boy’s murder. With her meds corrected and a move to a new area, she and her husband, Lloyd, are looking for a fresh start. I didn’t much care for Lloyd’s character, his personality didn’t seem to stand out one way or the other. He seems to be this perennial nice guy, that does everything right, supportive, loves his wife and has stood by her through her mental health issues. Then you have their neighbours, Mira and Matthew. Mira seems a little desperate to make friends, a little uncomfortable with her husband, and a lot insecure. Matthew is the other main character and Hen suspects him to be a murderer. We get to learn a lot about Matthew and what makes him tick.

So, there were at least a couple of times that I though I had this story figured out. At first I almost didn’t finish it because I thought “Uch - here is one of those books where Hen will slowly descend into crazyville, no one will believe her because of her past, the murderer will play mind games with her and it will take the whole book to figure out that either Matthew or Mira is the murderer. But just when you think you have this book figured out, zup, left turn. Swanson takes us in a new direction. I so appreciated being kept on my toes. I figured out the last twist but it didn’t detract from the experience. It was dark, scary and thrilling. I found the main characters fully realized and complex and you get a sense of them as a whole person.

As any good psychological thriller should, there was lots of suspense and fast paced action to keep you interested right to the end. Do yourself a favour and pick this one up. It is a really great read and something a little different than the normal fare, which is so refreshing. I really enjoyed it.


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