Jennifer Palmer has read crime fiction since her teenage years & enjoys reviewing within the many sub-genres that now exist; as a historian who lectures on real life historical mysteries she particularly appreciates historical cime fiction.
Anna is slowly revealed as an agoraphobic who has been trapped for 10 months in her New York home. She witnesses through her camera lens, a neighbour being attacked in her home, but nobody believes her because of her phobia, heavy drinking, pill taking and isolation.
Anna is imprisoned in her New York house by her own volition. She suffers from agoraphobia and has been inside the house for 10 months. Any attempt to leave causes her to collapse. She has devised various strategies to get her medicines and food, and has a handyman who rents her basement at a reduced rate to do other jobs. She functions effectively via the Internet, giving advice to fellow sufferers since she is a psychologist who previously worked with teen and pre-teen children. Besides the handyman, she has visits from her doctor and a woman therapist. She watches her neighbours and takes photos of them so her knowledge of some parts of their lives is extensive. Her main external interest is in old black and white films of the Rear Window variety - heavy on suspense and women in danger. References to these films enliven the story. She drinks very heavily and mixes her drinks with desultory, but equally heavy pill taking. Not surprisingly she has strange thoughts. As the layers of Anna’s personality are revealed the raw bones of a complex story appear. Though, even when she behaves in the most self-destructive way she is an engaging personality.
After an effective (but slow) beginning, events develop interestingly as Anna sees her a neighbour being killed in her home, and from her window.
The police and others do not believe her story, especially as other bizarre events happen around her; so much so, that even Anna starts to doubt her own sanity.
It is a cleverly written tale which ratchets up the narrative tension to a screaming point.
All the loose ends are tied up at the dénouement, and fit the carefully concealed clues; and in retrospect, I cannot find any holes in the plot.
Like the motif of observation, this novel is a truly visual story which could make an interesting film.
Editor’s Note: Jennifer guessed right, there is a film currently in development at FOX; and A.J. Finn is in fact a pseudonym of an American Publishing Executive named Daniel Mallory
