CELTICLADY'S REVIEWS: #TheBreakdown @SheSpeaks The Breakdown by B.A.Paris Review

St. Martin's Press

07/18/2017

ISBN: 9781250122469

336 Pages

SUSPENSE THAT GETS INSIDE YOUR HEAD.

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES AND USA TODAY BESTSELLING BEHIND CLOSED DOORS.

If you can’t trust yourself, who can you trust?

Cass is having a hard time since the night she saw the car in the woods, on the winding rural road, in the middle of a downpour, with the woman sitting inside―the woman who was killed. She’s been trying to put the crime out of her mind; what could she have done, really? It’s a dangerous road to be on in the middle of a storm. Her husband would be furious if he knew she’d broken her promise not to take that shortcut home. And she probably would only have been hurt herself if she’d stopped.

But since then, she’s been forgetting every little thing: where she left the car, if she took her pills, the alarm code, why she ordered a pram when she doesn’t have a baby.

The only thing she can’t forget is that woman, the woman she might have saved, and the terrible nagging guilt.

Or the silent calls she’s receiving, or the feeling that someone’s watching her…

B.A. PARIS is the New York Times, USA Today, and internationally bestselling author of Behind Closed Doors. She grew up in England but has spent most of her adult life in France. She has worked both in finance and as a teacher and has five daughters. The Breakdown is her second novel.

Behind Closed Doors,also by B.A.Paris was my favorite book in 2016 and I read 150 books. I love psychological thrillers and I seem to be reading a lot of them lately. The Breakdown is going to be right up there with my favorite books.

Cass is on her way home on a blustery, rainy night. Her husband has asked her to not take the shortcut that Cass likes to take, but she disregards his concerns, what could happen right, she will just take her time. It is raining hard and it becomes increasingly difficult to see where she is going, but she keeps going. Ahead she sees the taillights of a car ahead. Should she stop and see if there is anything she can do if the person needs help. She is apprehensive though, as you never know who is in the car, it could be very dangerous. She pulls in front of the car, hoping that maybe if the person needs help, he or she can toot the horn or flash their lights. That does not happen so after a period of time, Cass leaves and makes her way home.

The next morning Cass finds out that there was a woman murdered on the street she was on and it turns out it is a woman that she knows slightly. Now the guilt sets in and she keeps thinking that there could have been something that she could have done, or if she would have stopped the woman would be alive. She doesn't tell anyone, even her best friend or her hubby, or the police. There is a reward and a hotline for anyone with any information that anyone might have. Cass does call the hotline and tells what she knows but doesn't give her name.

Aside from her knowledge and guilt she feels about the woman that was murdered, she finds that she is starting to forget things and is worried that she has early onset dementia, like her mother had. This is disconcerting to Cass because at times she feels like she is going crazy. So with the insistence of her doctor and husband she starts taking medication that may help this affliction. The story gets going pretty fast from there and there are a lot of twists and turns until the last page.

Like I said earlier, I love the books by Ms.Paris. Well written, good character development. Some might say that is starts out a bit slow, but that is good for a psychological thriller, kind of sets up the suspense for the reader! This could very well be another favorite for the year for me!