When it comes to journal excerpts in contemporary suspense, readers should be skeptical. Like the now expected unreliable narrator, journal entries are a device for the author to mess with perceived reality.
The first time I encountered this was not in suspense but in literary fiction. In 2010, Louise Erdrich published Shadow Tag, a compelling story of an abusive marriage. After Irene discovers that her husband, Gil, is reading her journal, she begins deliberately manipulating her entries, while saving the truth for another diary, which she keeps locked in a safe deposit box.
The two journals alternate with a third person narration. The effect on the reader is disarming, while the brain scrambles to make sense of what is real.
A few years later, Gillian Flynn used a similar trick in Gone Girl. Nick Dunne wakes up on his fifth anniversary to discover that his wife, Amy, has been kidnapped. Alternating with his narration are selections from Amy’s diary, detailing their courtship in New York, wedding, and a turn in fortune after Nick loses his job and they are forced to move back to Nick’s hometown in the Midwest. The escalating tension in the entries lead the police to suspect Nick was an abusive husband.
But then — twist! — it turns out Amy staged her own disappearance to frame Nick. Her journals are partly fictional and designed to guide police to conclude that he is the culprit.
Because of the popularity of Gone Girl, knockoffs were inevitable. One of the better imitators is Alice Feeney’s Sometimes I Lie.
Knowing that readers will be skeptical of narrators in this genre, the book’s opening lines tell us that the protagonist, Amber, is an occasional liar. So straight out of the gate, defensive reading is required.
Amber is presently in a coma after a car accident. In flashbacks, we see the events that lead to the present. The police also find Amber’s childhood diary in which she talks about being adopted by the family of a school friend named Taylor.
Any savvy reader knows to be skeptical of the journals. After all, we know Amber is dishonest. In a clever twist, it turns out the police have made an error. The diaries were written not by Amber but about her. Taylor was her childhood nickname. Because of their mistake, everything the reader thought they knew about Amber is true of a supporting character instead.
The most recent use of purloined journals is Carola Lovering’s Too Good To Be True.
Skye is a lonely book editor in New York when she meets Burke at a Montauk hotel. They quickly fall in love and get engaged. The reader knows something that Skye does not: Burke is broke and married, trying to scam money out of Skye’s wealthy family to help his first family. We learn of this nefarious plan in journal excerpts that Burke is writing at the suggestion of his marriage counselor. Once he and Skye wed, Burke will steal two million dollars and run off with Heather, his true love and mother of his three children.
It is hard to read about what Burke and Heather are doing to their unsuspecting victim, even as a third narrative spells out a legitimate vendetta Heather has against Skye’s mother.
Just after their Italian honeymoon, Skye is in for a shock when she discovers Burke’s journals. And — twist! — the reader is too when it is revealed Burke didn’t write the entries. Heather did. And — twist! — the real Burke has fallen in love with Skye. Her narration about him is accurate. The journals are fiction written by a spurned spouse.
Because of the careful sleight of hand by the author, Burke’s love for Skye is a surprise. I was not wild about Skye’s quick forgiveness of him. Their relationship was still started in deceit. But the plotting was clever.
My general reading rule is that when I see the same trick done in five different books, it’s becoming a cliche. Future authors are going to have to come up with another variation on the unreliability twist. But what will it be?
Books Smitten 