THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW - A.J. FINN

“The Woman in the Window is one of those rare books that really is unputdownable. “ - Stephen King

There is a lot of buzz around A.J.Finn’s (pseudonym for Daniel Mallory) debut novel The Woman in the Window. So I ordered my copy from Amazon. It arrived promptly and I began reading. With the turning of each page I got immersed deeper and deeper into the world of Anna, the principal character of the novel. The pages kept turning themselves. Everything else, my family, my job took a backseat until I reached the chilling climax of the book.

The book starts slowly by building the picture of a middle aged woman Anna Fox tormented by her past memories. Anna  is living alone in her home in New York. Her husband and daughter has left her. She suffers from agoraphobia. She is seeking psychiatric help and is on medication. She has also developed a drinking problem due to her loneliness. It has been ten months since she last stepped out of her home. Her principal pastime is sitting by her window, watching and capturing her neighbours through her Nikon camera.

One day she notices the Russells, a family of three moving into the house opposite her. She sees a reflection of her own family in the Russells and becomes obsessed with them. She keeps peeking into their lives through her window. She develops a friendship with the Russell boy and his mother. Everything seems to working out fine when one night Anna sees a murder being committed in the Russell household through her window. The Police arrive but find everything in order. So what did Anna witness? Was it real or a hallucination? A result of her medicines and her alcoholism? In this world nothing is what it seems.

The novel feels like a Hitchcockian drama unfurling itself on the big screen. The writer starts slowly, building up the character and the world of its central character, investing it with a dreamlike quality. Gradually the writer builds up a claustrophobic atmosphere against which the drama of deceit and illusion is to be played out. Through flashbacks the writer brings out the nature of the extreme pain felt by Anna. The narrative picks up momentum once the Russells arrive. From this point onwards the narrative races on until it reaches its shocking final revelation. The story is full of twists and turns which keeps the reader transfixed till the end.

A.J. FINN

The Woman in the Window is one of the best mystery/thriller novels to come out in 2018. No wonder Fox Studios have bought the rights to the novel. Grab your copy of the novel before it hits the big screen.