Book Review: Sometimes I Lie by Alice Feeney

My Rating:

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thirty-five-year-old Amber Reynolds wakes up in a coma in a hospital room with no recollection of the car accident that got her there. Though unconscious to the world outside and unable to react or respond to any stimulus and with gaps in her memory of events preceding her accident, she is aware and alert of what is transpiring in her hospital room and the people who are frequent visitors and those responsible for her care – her nurses, medical staff, husband Paul, her sister Claire and an unidentified man who rifles through her phone, taunts her and medicates her. Who is this person? Who is responsible for her present condition? Is her husband to be trusted? Is her sister keeping secrets from her? Was her accident truly an accident or does someone want her dead?

“My name is Amber Reynolds. There are three things you should know about me:

1. I’m in a coma.

2. My husband doesn’t love me anymore.

3. Sometimes I lie.”

The narrative is split between Now (Amber in real-time) and Then( the events from the week leading up to the present situation) with journal entries from 1991-92 in-between. We get to know more about Amber’s life- her strained relationship with her parents, her fragile bond with Claire who she feels is “younger than me but has always been one step ahead” and her troubled marriage with Paul, a writer with one successful book in his past but suffering from writer’s block ever since. We are also given a glimpse into her professional life, namely her complicated dynamic with Madeline, her colleague at the radio station where she works and with whom she doesn't quite get along. True to her style, the author drops hints and multiple red herrings throughout the narrative. Everyone seems to be lying and thus everyone is a suspect.

Well-paced, with fluid narrative and a cast of flawed characters, Alice Feeney’s Sometimes I Lie is a twisty, atmospheric and suspenseful thriller. The journal entry chapters are superbly written. I will admit that I felt a bit overwhelmed with how things pan out with multiple twists and revelation after revelation till the very last page (maybe a bit too much?), but towards the end, I could not put it down. Engaging and entertaining, this is a book that you would want to finish in one sitting.

“I’ve always delighted in the free fall between sleep and wakefulness. Those precious few semiconscious seconds before you open your eyes, when you catch yourself believing that your dreams might just be your reality.”