Trezza Azzopardi (apparently a novelist - no, I don't know either) is quoted on the front of this novel as claiming this book is 'The Bell Jar for the twenty-first century.' Now, nobody likes a novel about nymphomaniac mental patients more than I do, so this seemed a pretty perfect read, not least due to it being dirt cheap.
'Dirt' is probably a very good word to associate with this novel on reflection, and it makes me such a prude to say it. But this was just so tiresomely filthy, and I've read the entire Fifty Shades trilogy - surely the epitome of tiresome and tedious. The basic premise is, admittedly, pretty daft: ordinary girl has some wild sexual encounter in an underground car park and this bloke then takes over her life. It's unlikely, yes, but could have been quite interesting as a look into mental breakdowns and obsession. I'm not adverse to mental breakdowns and obsession; Wuthering Heights is one of my favourite books.
No, the main problem I had with this novel was that I just didn't believe in the main character. She was the narrator and yet she was so distanced and random that I didn't care what happened to her. The timeline of the plot was all over the place so I had no idea if we were talking days, weeks, months or years, and because of that, her relationship with the Big Bad Man was so difficult to get to grips with. It almost made Christian and Ana's relationship look plausible and believable. Strangely, it was her family and friends who I ended up liking and understanding more, which may have been Davies' purpose in presenting somebody in the middle of a breakdown. However, it was unclear whether she'd entered into this horrible relationship due to having a breakdown or her involvement with the Big Bad Man had led to her breakdown. Maybe, again, this was a deliberate act on the author's part to make it all more truthful to the experience of being mentally ill. Whatever, it made for a frustrating novel, not least because you never even find out the narrator's name, something which drove me insane in Rebecca.
All in all, not a huge success from my viewpoint.
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