Review: The Winter Girl by Matt Marinovich (audio)

Title: The Winter Girl

Author:Matt Marinovich

Narrator:Quincy Dunn-Baker

Published:January 2016, Recorded Books

Length:6 hours 26 minutes

Source:Publisher

A scathing and exhilarating thriller that begins with a husband’s obsession with the seemingly vacant house next door.

It’s
wintertime in the Hamptons, where Scott and his wife, Elise, have come
to be with her terminally ill father, Victor, to await the inevitable.
As weeks turn to months, their daily routine—Elise at the hospital with
her father, Scott pretending to work and drinking Victor’s booze—only
highlights their growing resentment and dissatisfaction with the usual
litany of unhappy marriages: work, love, passion, each other. But then
Scott notices something simple, even innocuous. Every night at precisely
eleven, the lights in the neighbor’s bedroom turn off. It’s clearly a
timer…but in the dead of winter with no one else around, there’s
something about that light he can’t let go of. So one day while Elise is
at the hospital, he breaks in. And he feels a jolt of excitement he
hasn’t felt in a long time. Soon, it’s not hard to enlist his wife as a
partner in crime and see if they can’t restart the passion.

Their
one simple transgression quickly sends husband and wife down a
deliriously wicked spiral of bad decisions, infidelities, escalating
violence, and absolutely shocking revelations.

Matt Marinovich makes a strong statement with this novel. The Winter Girl is the psychological thriller done to absolute perfection.

My thoughts:It’s no surprise that I’m a fan of pyschological thrillers, so when I saw this as a choice to review, I jumped at the chance. I’ve never heard of Matt Marinovich, so I wasn’t sure what to expect…and boy was I in for a surprise…this was quite a ride!

While I did like this book, it was definitely darker, twistier and more disturbing than most of the psychological thrillers I’ve picked up so far. There is also little to no character development, which allows for the shorter length of the book. But, that’s not to say that there isn’t a lot happening, because there is – often at the same time. This adds to the tension of the book, and with all the little plot-twists, there’s an intensity that has you wanting more. This was a hard book to walk away from until you knew how it would end…as weird as that sounds.

Because there was little character development, it was hard to make connections with any of the characters. You never really felt like you knew that much about them. You just feel this odd compulsion to find out what is going to happen next to them and how they are involved in what is going on. There are secrets and crazy sexual games and personal agendas that will have your head spinning trying to figure it all out. 

A short book, but one that packs a punch…this is one twisted, evil book. If you end up reading it or listening to it, let me know! 

Audio thoughts:This is the first time I’ve listened to Quincy Dunn-Baker narrate a book and I thought he did a great job. As creepy as this book was, his voice added just a little bit more of a  creep factor to it, in a good way…this was a dark, twisted book and having a male narrator just fit. Good choice with this narrator!