Brooklyn Girl

Brooklyn girl is a novel written by French author Guillaume Musso and published on the 1^st of November 2016.

It is a thriller built around the lives of two people who are supposed to get married  in three weeks, but a series of unfortunate and incredible events break their beautiful story and separates them for a while.

The story begins when Raphaël, a famous French writer and single dad meets Anna, a successful doctor with many ambitions. One day, during a lovely vacation spent together, he notices that Anna has some secrets which torment her greatly. He forces her to tell him the truth, but it seems that he is not quite ready to face it, so he leaves in a great hurry, shocked by what he just saw.

Wretched by remorse, he comes back to find out more, but Anna is not there anymore, not in the restaurant, not at her home, not anywhere.

He decides to find her, so he asks a good friend of his, retired policeman Marc, to help him. They start a journey full of surprises, intrigues, crimes and lies, and they find more and more truths about the girl who they knew as Anna. But during the investigation they find out that her real name isn’t Anna at all.

What is the truth about this mysterious girl? Will they succeed in finding it? Will Anna and Raphaël manage to be together once and for all, without any secretes between them? Will the past be revealed and will be Anna finally freed of it?

I read this book at the end of last year. Actually it was not my intention to read it at all. First time when I heard about it was back in 2017, I think at the beginning of the year. It was very promoted in the subway, but sincerely, I wasn’t attracted to it. How did I come to find out its story? Well it was last year in December, before Christmas, when Bookster launched a challenge for the clients to read a book of their (bookster’s) choice. I waited for the book to come, and it did. I saw it and honestly I was a bit disappointed.

But I said, well, what can go wrong? I will try to read it. And so I did. First I read the notes from the back cover of the book. There was one who said:

“Unbearable suspense. Be aware that once you open the book, you won’t let it down until you find out who this girl from Brooklyn really is. There will be many sleepless nights.” – Metronews

As the book has 400 pages or so, I thought that there is so much truth in those words, that it  would probably take like two months until I finish it.

And I started reading it. And that was it. A detective novel. I never liked them and I never thought I would. But as soon as I read the first chapter the prophecy came true. I couldn’t stop. And I read one page after another. I was more and more curious. The events were more and more interesting and the characters more and more complex. Who is this girl and why is she saying that she committed such a horrible thing? I spent hours reading it as I was in the Christmas vacation. It only took two days to finish it.  Two days, and not two months as I was expecting. And in the end I was very satisfied that I found out the truth. The problem is that you make all sort of scenarios in your mind asking yourself: is this what happened? Or this? Or this? And you want to read more and more to find out if you were right, if you would make a good detective. And when you think you have the story all solved, at the next page you realize that you never thought at what is really happening.

After reading this book, you will start asking: do you really know someone? Because everybody has its secrets and they and only they can know what they are thinking.

© picnicontheshelf, January 17, 2018