You by Caroline Kepnes

by - Monday, March 07, 2016



When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does 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 orchestrates a series of events to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms. Moving from stalker to boyfriend, Joe transforms himself into Beck’s perfect man, all while quietly removing the obstacles that stand in their way—even if it means murder.



Reading You from the male protagonist's mentality and perception was quite the head trip. Joe Goldberg was all kinds of crazy. The epitome of unbalanced. His addiction and compulsion with women, especially Beck, was beyond intriguing. As was his creepy, stalkerish demeanor.  Goldberg's deranged personality was this psych major's dream! Dude was in-f**kin-sane!! I wanted to spend hours upon hours shifting through his deepest, darkest corners.

FYI: You is a darker type story line, but a different type of dark than say This is War, Baby or Captive in the Dark.

While the second person point of view (pov) definitely delivers an intimate and intricate feel, it's one I have never been able to just sink into. And I really wanted to sink into the dark f**ked up world of all that was Joe Goldberg. In all honesty, I don't think this story would have worked as well in any other pov. Written in this style, second person gave readers first hand insight into the mindset of our male lead that we wouldn't have gotten in say the first or third.

Sadly, due to my dislike of second person, I was never truly able to immerse myself fully into this book. I didn't crave it like I wanted to and instead of devouring our beloved sociopath, I kept putting his story down and walking away from it.You took me almost a month to finish, which is why the four star rating. My struggle, however, is more of a personal issue and has absolutely NOTHING to do with the actual writing ability of this writer.

I can confidently recommend this book as Ms. Kepnes provided readers with an engaging and well developed journey. Ms. Kepnes provided readers with an engaging and well developed book. It was her vivid and rich, expressive detail into the psyche of a true psychotic that had me coming back for more, regardless of my discomfort with the pov. I will be moving on to book two, Hidden Bodies. No way I can stop now, I NEED to find out how everything pans out. Does Joe get caught? Does he fall further into his obsessions? Does he find another mouse to his cat? 


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