What do I do with this book? On the one hand, A. J. Finn is a very talented writer and I was completely sucked into the world of this book. On the other hand, the plot absolutely sucked. I mean, for a thriller this was bad. Let me tell you, there is nothing more frustrating than when you're reading a thriller and you've figured out the 'twist' because it's insanely obvious and yet the main character remains painfully oblivious. The Woman in the Window is a particularly bad example of this because there are literally only two possibilities and the character completely glosses over one of them.
So, let me introduce you to the main plot. An agoraphobic drunk woman named Anna meets her neighbour's wife, sees her being murdered a few days later and then is told by the police and everyone else that she has never actually met his wife who is now a completely different woman. The main character insists the new woman can't be his wife, even when papers are produced showing she undeniably is. So the other possibility you immediately come to is that the first woman wasn't his wife and was in fact lying while this new woman is his wife.
Not if you're this main character!
Instead she continues on for hundreds of pages wondering who this new woman is instead of focusing on the identity of the victim. It is very frustrating to read and it means that the first intended 'twist' of her realising the first woman was lying and not the second comes off as anticlimatic and very poorly done. This is especially bad when the second major twist also turns out to be fairly guessable, though admittedly not to the extent of the first. Even so, the reveal that Ethan is the evil killer all along falls very flat and is unsatisfying. It is extremely easy to guess that the person Anna has been talking to online is a fake and is fishing for information, to the point where again you wonder why the supposedly smart Anna isn't making these simple connections.
The other major problem of this book can be defined as a distinct lack of originality. The main character reeks of the protagonist from The Girl on the Train, what with them both being alcoholics who witness a murder through a window and have their testimony doubted due to their substance abuse. This is even more obvious when you consider both protagonists jump to the wrong conclusions about the married couple they spy on. The other obvious influence is Rear Window. Anna is obsessed with old black and white movies and does mention Hitchcock several times, and yet she never draws direct parallels between Rear Window and her own situation. I actually enjoyed the constant use of movie quotes at first and thought it was quite a nice character quirk to include in a thriller, but said quotes quickly become overused near the end and the lack of the connection is honestly baffling. A throwaway line about it might have been cheap but at least it would have been something.
You may have noticed that neither of the things I have mentioned are what you could call small problems. By all rights I should hate this book for being a dumb, derivative, forgettable work.
AND YET.
By god this book is well-written. I didn't think much of it at the time beyond it being really compelling and hard to put down but honestly, this author deserves some kudos. They have an obvious plot with obvious twists and somehow I still enjoyed every minute of the characters and writing style. I guessed the first twist astonishingly early on but I still read eagerly, keen to find out what was going to happen. Then I guessed the second and third twists and yet I still read on. I minded a lot but it didn't make me rush through it or roll my eyes every other sentence like some thrillers I've read. Anna may be a bit of an idiot but she is likeable and has some decent depth to her. Also this book is much longer than the average thriller but it didn't feel like it for one second. I really, really hope this author writes more and writes something with a far better plot because he could go so far.
Overall, I am left with very conflicted feelings about this book. I cannot ignore its very painful and crucial flaws but I can't dismiss it as thriller trash either. Is it worth reading? Maybe. Do I regret reading it? Definitely not. This is the first book of 2018 I'm reading as part of my 'new releases, new reviews' schtick and it seems to be carrying on the noble tradition of not being that great. However, there are some really fantastic elements in here and I can't fault it too hard thanks to those. In terms of thrillers, you could do a whole lot worse.
Overall Rating:
.5
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