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A review by dovesfalling
The Night Before by Wendy Walker
3.0
First of all, what a gorgeous cover.
Second of all, I really did love [a:Wendy Walker|317193|Wendy Walker|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1267668906p2/317193.jpg]'s first thriller, [b:All Is Not Forgotten|26114146|All Is Not Forgotten|Wendy Walker|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1467209074s/26114146.jpg|45810965]. Although I found the narrator repulsive, the premise of the book was so compelling and original.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t a huge fan of The Night Before. To be fair, I read it while doped up on Nyquil, so I’m not sure if that affected my reading comprehension, but I found it to be a fairly shallow thriller, albeit with a crackerjack surprise at the end.
The novel centers around two sisters, Laura Lochner (the night before) and Rosie Ferro (the morning after). A bit of a twisted and aimless soul, Laura is back living with her sister’s family after a disastrous end to a relationship leaves her reeling. Although Laura wants nothing more than to find love, the past looms ever present in her blood-stained rear-view mirror, and informs every decision she makes, from omitting her infamous last name on her dating profile, to seeing a psychologist to try and work out her own fears.
Still hellbent on finding her happily-ever-after, Laura heads out on a blind date, and doesn’t come home. In the morning after, Rosie frantically searches for her, aided by her husband Joe, and their childhood best friend, Gabe. In tracing Laura’s footsteps, they find her abandoned car, and the tension ratchets up a notch. But who is Rosie actually worried about?
Laura?
Or the man she was meeting?
Told from different narratives and different timelines, the novel gives us snippets of Laura’s date (which is tedious and for the life of me, why did she stay on it?), Rosie’s search, and interspersed, Laura’s sessions with a psychologist who seeks the truth of why his patient feels so unlovable and broken.
Though the denouement surprised me (I had zero idea who the actual villain was, and it was a shocker), I didn’t find there was enough pull in the actual narrative to keep me invested. Laura’s voice was scattered and unappealing – with a ton of repetition and confusing backslides into the past. While Laura was at least complex, I found Rosie was a cardboard cutout – absolutely no character development at all – she existed solely to find her sister and/or worry about her.
While The Night Before wasn’t exactly my cup of tea, I won’t deny that it was entertaining and twisty, with enough “wtf” moments to keep it from sliding off the cliff. I think it was balancing on the edge of being truly good, and with some careful editing (Rosie’s flatness, Laura’s inner monologue, and the endless meandering date), it could have been a complicated and dark mountain of a novel.
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. I appreciate it!
Second of all, I really did love [a:Wendy Walker|317193|Wendy Walker|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1267668906p2/317193.jpg]'s first thriller, [b:All Is Not Forgotten|26114146|All Is Not Forgotten|Wendy Walker|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1467209074s/26114146.jpg|45810965]. Although I found the narrator repulsive, the premise of the book was so compelling and original.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t a huge fan of The Night Before. To be fair, I read it while doped up on Nyquil, so I’m not sure if that affected my reading comprehension, but I found it to be a fairly shallow thriller, albeit with a crackerjack surprise at the end.
The novel centers around two sisters, Laura Lochner (the night before) and Rosie Ferro (the morning after). A bit of a twisted and aimless soul, Laura is back living with her sister’s family after a disastrous end to a relationship leaves her reeling. Although Laura wants nothing more than to find love, the past looms ever present in her blood-stained rear-view mirror, and informs every decision she makes, from omitting her infamous last name on her dating profile, to seeing a psychologist to try and work out her own fears.
Still hellbent on finding her happily-ever-after, Laura heads out on a blind date, and doesn’t come home. In the morning after, Rosie frantically searches for her, aided by her husband Joe, and their childhood best friend, Gabe. In tracing Laura’s footsteps, they find her abandoned car, and the tension ratchets up a notch. But who is Rosie actually worried about?
Laura?
Or the man she was meeting?
Told from different narratives and different timelines, the novel gives us snippets of Laura’s date (which is tedious and for the life of me, why did she stay on it?), Rosie’s search, and interspersed, Laura’s sessions with a psychologist who seeks the truth of why his patient feels so unlovable and broken.
Though the denouement surprised me (I had zero idea who the actual villain was, and it was a shocker), I didn’t find there was enough pull in the actual narrative to keep me invested. Laura’s voice was scattered and unappealing – with a ton of repetition and confusing backslides into the past. While Laura was at least complex, I found Rosie was a cardboard cutout – absolutely no character development at all – she existed solely to find her sister and/or worry about her.
While The Night Before wasn’t exactly my cup of tea, I won’t deny that it was entertaining and twisty, with enough “wtf” moments to keep it from sliding off the cliff. I think it was balancing on the edge of being truly good, and with some careful editing (Rosie’s flatness, Laura’s inner monologue, and the endless meandering date), it could have been a complicated and dark mountain of a novel.
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. I appreciate it!