Thank you to the lovely people at Atria Books for my copy of You by Caroline Kepnes.  All thoughts and images are my own.

THE DETAILS:

Title: You
Author: Caroline Kepnes
Genre: Millennial Thriller
Pub date: September 25, 2014
Read if you like: Black Mirror, obsessively updating your social media, & second person narration.

MORGAN’S THOUGHTS:

This book is dark.  Like think about it for long after you finish, terrifyingly dark.  Will force you to reassess everything you post on social media dark (which for a blogger is a special kind of dark).  Might keep you from falling asleep or have you repeatedly checking to see if anyone is standing outside your window dark.

I’m not normally one for thrillers – they just don’t float my literary boat – but this one spiked my curiosity because of the new Lifetime show starring the one and only Penn Badgley (John Tucker Must Die, anyone?).  And I have to say, it kept me hooked the entire time.  It’s not a whodunnit kind of thriller, more one where you know something is going to go really, terribly wrong and you have a good idea of what that will be but you keep reading anyway.

Kepnes throws you into the mind of this very terrifying guy.  He’s highly imaginable, or, at least, he was for me.  You’ve seen him before – he’s the cute guy who works behind the counter of your local bookstore or cafe or record shop – who is extremely smart and always manages to make you smile and you’ve definitely imagined what it would be like to date him.  How he’d ask you out, how he’d take you to some bar you’ve never heard of and kiss you outside when it’s time to go home, how’d you spend Saturdays reading your individual picks on his couch, on and on.  In Beck’s case, Joe is all of those things. But he is also really, really dangerous.  And you’ll have to read the book to find out just how dangerous he is.

If you’re young and dating in NYC (like I am), this might scare you out of ever going out with anyone ever again.  But if you’re willing to take that risk and want a good roller coaster of a read, start here.

INTERESTED IN YOU?  CLICK HERE TO SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL INDIE BOOKSTORE OR HERE TO BUY IT ON AMAZON.

SYNOPSIS: (AS TOLD BY THE BACK OF THE BOOK)

When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he goes what anyone would do: he googles the name on her credit card.

There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City.  She has a public Facebook account and tweets incessantly, telling Joe everything he needs to know: she is simply Beck to her friends, she went to Brown University, she lives on Bank Street, and she’ll be at a bar in Brooklyn tonight – the perfect place for a “chance” meeting.

As Joe invisibly and obsessively takes control of Beck’s life, he beings quietly removing the obstacles that stand in the way of their love.  Joe will do anything to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms – even if it means murder.