Note: Spoilers! I have rarely written reviews, but my disappointment in THE LISTENER compels me to express my opinion. In no small part, this is the result of my inability from scouring both the Amazon site as well as many other sites, to read a review that actually explains the last part of the book. The first two parts of the book were slow-paced, but absolutely engrossing, as psychiatrist Henry Harrison has to deal with and address his own demons arising from service in "The Great War", as he attempts to undertake the talking cure with Betram Reiner, a psychological casualty of WWII. The book is written in first person, present tense--a slightly off-putting mode of expression that treats every beat as one that is happening at that particular moment (as in the reportage of a journal or diary). There is no retrospection nor gained wisdom from the passage of time in the use of this technique. Best I can make out from the tedious part 3 of the Book, Betram is alive (or not); Betram is, himself, a paranoid schizophrenic (having invented both a brother who is on a mission to kill him; having engineered, at great lengths, a fake suicide; and having been recruited by the OSS to infiltrate the Nazi storm trooper machine that killed innocent Jews in Eastern Europe--but towards what end??);and Harrison's 2nd wife, Mathilde, leaves him either because she loves him too much and can not abide seeing his breakdown, or, rather, leaves him to re-enliven her affair with Betram. Finally, Harrison is the victim of a total mental breakdown, and we are left unknowing and unfulfilled as to whether Bertram ever existed or was merely a figment of Harrison's tortured psyche. I don't get it....Perhaps the fact that I listened to the Recorded Books version is the culprit here? ( )

Tossing a book on your DNF pile after 191 page is akin to giving up on a 20 year marriage. On the one had, you've already been through so much with the book that it's a shame

to give up on it within 100ish pages of the end. On the other, there's no point in losing any more of your life to the book if you're not happy. Sadly, but not regretfully, I decided to divorce myself from Shira Nayman's novel about a the lead doctor at a mental institution in post WWII New York and an odd patient who seems to know so much about him and one of his former patients.

I had high hopes for the book. It caught my eye in a copy of BookPage. I love to read Gothic fiction, and what's more Gothic than an insane asylum - well, other than a spooky British mansion? I didn't have any expectations that it would be as wonderful as Patrick McGrath's Asylum, but I was expecting it to be interesting. I found this book rather boring. Even the scenes where Dr. Harrison is spying on others having sex weren't enough to make me want to continue. I'm sure that it was headed somewhere, but I just didn't care.

I am still on the search for a new fabulous Gothic read. I think Kate Morton might be my next best choice. In the meantime, I cannot recommend The Listener. ( )