#the maidens by Alex michaelides

[kissingcars]

My first read of 2023, perfect for my UK trip!

[utterlyconfusedacademia]

Me adding a new dark academia book to my overflowing (and mostly unread) collection:

[no-where-new-hero]

I promise this is the last anxious thing I’m going to say about my Story, but I feel like people are either going to think I’m A, doing a straight BookTok girlie “dark romance,” B, endorsing predatory behavior, or C, victim shaming, when I’m actually trying to do a secret fourth thing, which is to portray the psyche of someone who has hinged years of self-worth on a very unequal relationship that is specifically not romantic but then discovered that it is a load-bearing wall and decided the only thing to do is build a castle of “power” on top of it rather than knock it down and realize she is, in fact, like other girls. Since the genre is horror I hope people will be uncomfortable with what's going on but I want them to be uncomfortable in a very specific manner--not the ordinary disgust or righteousness but guiltily sympathetic to two people behaving rather badly (and I have no idea if I pulled it off).

[theartofperishingslowly]

Need the professor from the maidens and the professor from the secret history to meet. I just need to know what would happen.

[minimallycreative]

"Henry looked at her blankly. Mariana knew he didn't understand. Boundaries, by definition, are the first thing to go when a child is abused. All Henry's boundaries had been torn to shreds when he was just a little boy. Consequently, he didn't understand the concept. Nor did he know when he was making someone uncomfortable, as he usually was, by invading their personal or psychological space-he would stand too near when he spoke to you, and exhibited a level of neediness Mariana had never experienced in a patient before. Nothing was enough. He would have moved in with her if she'd let him. It was up to her to maintain the boundary between them: to define the parameters of their relationship in a healthy way. That was her job as his therapist."

—The Maidens, Alex Michaelides

[coffeeadiction0]

Hypothetically speaking... if Julian Morrow and Edward Fosca were to meet...

[tired-yashika-core]

me reading the maidens 3 years ago-

oh my god-wow-wow-wow-wow-wow-such good writing-bet the ending will be a lovely mystery-fucking loving the suspense-ew ew ew ew wtf how did this turn into pedophilia ew i hate the ending oh my god-how could someone just reduce beautifully mysterious characters into people who just want sex with minors oh my god-

[cromwelll]

Currently Reading – August 11, 2024

𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑀𝑎𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑛𝑠 𝑏𝑦 𝐴𝑙𝑒𝑥 𝑀𝑖𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑠 -> 56%

𝑇ℎ𝑒 7½ 𝐷𝑒𝑎𝑡ℎ𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝐸𝑣𝑒𝑙𝑦𝑛 𝐻𝑎𝑟𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑏𝑦 𝑆𝑡𝑢𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑇𝑢𝑟𝑡𝑜𝑛 -> 56%

[annafromuni]

The Never-Ending Tale of Alex Michaelides's The Fury

Hell hath no fury like a reader bored. Not only bored, but irritated at what should have been a succinct twisting tale full of drama and thrilling suspense. Instead, I seem to have been subjected to an unfortunate case of deja vu and a pretentious, unreliable narrator who cannot stand to listen to anyone else speak but himself. Alex Michaelides’s The Fury, a novel linked to The Silent Patient and…

[readingoals]

Absolutely hated this book. It just wasn't good. Full thoughts under the cut for length.

I didn't like any of the characters, even the ones I assume I was meant to. I understand the MC was a therapist but she felt less like a person and more like a way for the author to info dump about all the therapy terms he knows. She just wanders around tripping over clues (and manhandling evidence!!) and ruining the flow with paragraphs of psych bullshit. Also every man that met her seemed to be in love with her which really detracts from what little character she has. It felt like another male writer trying to write a ~strong female character~ and instead writing a caricature of a woman they personally want to fuck.

And she wasn't the only one. None of the characters were particularly well written or believable. In fact nothing in this book was well written. References to classic literature and greek mythology felt shoe horned in which is an incredible feat when they were mentioned on like every page. And don't get me started on the big reveal. The motive is ridiculous and the whole murder plot really made no sense. And thats like the number one thing a mystery/thriller novel should get right!! It really felt like the author decided to add a ~twist~ just to shock the audience with little to no thought about whether or not it actually made sense.

Overall just a pretty weak attempt at a thriller. Whole subplots just fizzle out, the pacing is frustratingly slow for most of it and the characters are entirely forgettable. Honestly it's been about a month since I read it and most of what I remember is just how frustrating it was to read. It probably would have been smarter to DNF it but I had hopes that the final reveal would make it all worth while. Unfortunately it just made it more of a disappointment.

[e-b-reads]

Some things about The Maidens and The Silent Patient

These books aren't exactly tumblr classics, but they are titles I see tossed around in the public eye occasionally. I read The Maidens back in December and The Silent Patient more recently, and after marinating a few thoughts, have decided to post! I will not spoil the plots, but I will talk about, for example, whether there are major twists, so read on at your own peril.

I read The Maidens first and The Silent Patient second, even though they were published the other way around. This turned out to be an interesting order, because after reading The Silent Patient, I thought, "oh, now I understand why he got a publishing deal for that second book." I feel like Alex Michaelides had a good idea for a twisty plot, and was the right kind of writer to carry it off, and then when he went to try to write another twisty book, he made it too different and too similar at the same time, and I just didn't buy it.

The Silent Patient is pretty good, not because I love the characters (I don't think the reader is supposed to), but because I was curious what was going to happen (and, even more, what had happened in the past), and Michaelides revealed just a little at a time in a tantalizing way, and then hit with a big reveal near the end that I hadn't predicted, but that did make sense, so it was satisfying. I suspect that the normal procedure when it comes to in-patient therapy was flouted several times, mainly to get the plot to move along, but this kind of works with the character reveals, and I'm ok with some procedure smoothing for the sake of plot as long as it's believable in the book, which this mostly was. Overall, not a book I will keep and re-read, but an enjoyable thriller.

As far as The Maidens, I eventually realized that my problem with the book was that I didn't get full pictures or ideas of any of the characters at all, so none of the choices made or emotions expressed or, yes, twists and reveals of motivation really made me feel anything. When the main character made poor investigatorial choices based on strong emotion, I thought, "OK, I guess she would do that," with no emotion of my own. When an illicit relationship was revealed, along with the real murderer, I was neither shocked nor validated in an earlier guess; I mostly thought, "huh." The voice was (understandably) similar to that in The Silent Patient, but there, the first person narration meant that any confusion or lack of clarity around characterization was Theo's own personal lack of clarity about someone, so it worked. The Maidens is primarily in third person, so it didn't work at all.

Because of this drawback, I didn't have many big feelings about the plot one way or another. What I did find potentially intriguing is that The Maidens takes a classic sort of "dark academia" trope (I've been trying to define this sub-genre to myself) of one charismatic teacher with lots of student followers, and then subverts it. But since I didn't really care about or fully understand any of the characters, I couldn't decide if this was well done or not. The murderer reveal felt a little out of nowhere, but then so did many of the choices made by the characters, so it wasn't very jarring, either!

Obviously, people's preferences as to prose vary, but in my opinion, Michaelides' writing is fine, but has some weaknesses. His plot idea for The Silent Patient was good, and his style of writing worked for it. His plot idea for The Maidens might have been good if executed differently, but something about his style of writing didn't work with it, and so I didn't feel like I was reading it to find out what happened so much as reading it so I could say I did.

[punki-miltonia]

Ten Word Book Reviews: The Maidens

All the possibility, none taken; inauthentic, vapid; left wanting more

[stina-is-a-punk-rocker]

‘the maidens’ by alex michaelides, and a bunch of irrelevant tangents about my life because I find myself that entertaining

Much like people, there are some books that you find when the stars align. It’s like the Fates themselves intervene to provide you with a pocket of time that you’re so unoccupied and there’s literally nothing else better to do than the book equivalent of a one-night stand.

‘The Maidens’ came at the right place and the right time (lol that’s what she said): a Scrabble competition, everyone else being very good at Scrabble and me being very bad, and no other pdfs on my phone.

In retrospect, it’s a solid 6/10. I’ve read worse (hello Wattpad), but I’ve definitely read better, and as far as books go, it’s pretty… forgettable. I have the rare luxury of not having come from The Silent Patient to have a bias about Alex Michaelides’s work (despite me being told numerous times by numerous associates to read it. I have this thing where the more you tell me to consume a certain piece of media, I either don’t do it, or I do it out of spite. It’s called being a petty motherfucker), so the only opinions I had were nice cover + cool font. Which are the only opinions you should have about a book before you read it, in my opinion.

Spoilers ahead, so be warned. Be very, very warned. Also, trigger warnings for pretty dark subject matter, which anyone who’s read the book already knows, so I’m gonna include that under the spoiler umbrella.

I’m a tad hesitant to call it a dark academia, although I feel like that’s what was attempted. Sure, there are a couple of references to Greek mythology and literature sprinkled here and there, but it’s more like a bad sitcom referencing pop culture than anything that provides substance to the plot. It’s one of my biggest gripes with the whole book- everything from the title to the synopsis is a red herring; and, like, not that you can’t do a little hoodwinking here and there, but this is just disingenuous.

It’s the most obvious and yet the most vexing mystery ever, because- it’s kind of obvious that it’s Zoe. But her motive, and the way she goes about it is so… it just doesn’t sit quite well in my stomach.

Being traumatized does not excuse someone from traumatizing others, and there’s a discussion to be had about media villainizing traumatized characters. On the other side, there’s a way to craft a, for lack of a better word, ‘evil’ traumatized character that still humanizes them and doesn’t make them come off as a Scooby-Doo villain. Zoe’s gone through some pretty horrific shit- losing her parents at such a young age, a paedophilic uncle, and that uncle manipulating her even post mortem. And then she went on a killing spree, and tried to frame her professor for the murders, and almost killed her aunt- which, as we can all agree, are Bad Things to Do. And here’s where I came to the realization that, ah. Alex Michaelides is a dude.

Another discussion: can male writers do justice to traumatized female characters?

Because Zoe isn’t the only one. Which brings us to our heroine: Mariana, whose beauty never scared me, but it did make me want to put my head through drywall.

It’s the white woman in a horror film all over again. And it’s especially agonizing, cos this bitch is supposed to be smart. But she’s not. And it bothers me (picture me saying this in an increasingly whiney voice).

She suspects Edward Fosca killed those girls? What better way to deal with this revelation than having dinner with him alone! And getting drunk! She’s dealing with a patient who’s definitely harming himself and potentially a threat to others? Eh, forget about him (also, leave Henrys out of this, they get such a bad rep). She constantly acts on impulse and it’s painful to watch- telling literally everyone she meets and has one (01) conversation with about the Super Kool Mystery she’s solving, attacking Edward Fosca for some inane reason I can’t even remember, and fancying herself a member of the Famous Five when she’s more Secret Seven.

And the writing is just one step away from E. L. James’s inner goddess, cos Mariana’s reading facial expressions like tarot cards and I get that it’s probably meant to rub in the fact that she’s a therapist but imagine you’re reading a book about a dentist and they start talking about the oral hygiene of every person they see. It’s corny as hell, reading about the anger in whoeverthefuck’s eyes and the complicated look in someone else’s like. Give it a fucking break.

Honestly, the other characters are pretty irrelevant, and are either red herrings (Edward Fosca) or mostly irrelevant (Sangha, Clarissa, the other Maidens) or supposedly relevant but still end up being pretty irrelevant (Sebastian, who is, as the youth say, problematic, but also too romanticized initially for me to ever believe in him).

It’s easier to be lenient with this book if you came in expecting a digestible thriller, but if you were expecting a dark academia like I unfortunately did… expect to be disappointed.

[stratosvere]

I hold it true, whate'er befall;

I feel it, when I sorrow most;

'Tis better to have loved and lost

Than never to have loved at all.

[mthollowell-writes]

"Edward Fosca was a murderer. This was a fact. This wasn't something Mariana knew just on an intellectual level, as an idea. Her body knew it. She felt it in her bones, along her blood, and deep within every cell. Edward Fosca was guilty."

-Alex Michaelides, The Maidens

[claireelizabethsblog]

~ December's Books Reviewed ~

The Dreamer Trilogy by Maggie Stiefvater

(1,101 pages total)

I wasn't expecting to enjoy this trilogy as much as I did. I loved the characters in particular, but the plot was also engaging and went in directions I wasn't expecting. I would say that my one regret would be that I hadn't read the previous trilogy first. Maybe I'll go back and read it later but considering I now know where all the characters stories end I don't know how much enjoyment I'll get out of watching people pine and/or fight until they work out the relationships I know they will get to. That being said, I didn't feel like I missed out on any enjoyment while reading it as a result of not reading the first trilogy. I fell right into the story and the characters easily and really truly did love all the dynamics etc.

I gave this trilogy between 4-4.5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️(🌗)

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

(541 pages)

Absolutely incredible. So worth the wait (I've been trying to find this book in a shop for AGES!) and very pleased that I finally found a copy. Absolutely chilling at points and definitely almost has minorly horroresque elements (but this is coming from someone who really hates horror books so probably isn't that bad to most!) It almost made me cry (and I'm not a cryer) too. Basically, I'd definitely recommend!

I gave this book 5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The Poppy War Trilogy by R.F. Kuang

(1,862 pages total)

*SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW*

A little heavy on military scenes for me. I found it a tad confusing at points, and definitely began to run out of steam towards the end of the trilogy. However, it did keep me engaged through all three books and I did finish the trilogy so it was far from bad. Overall I think it was an interesting read, and I did really like the sort of slow realisation that you had that the "protagonist"/speaker was actually most definitely the villain. I think loads of people would absolutely love this trilogy, and Kuang is a fantastic writer, it just maybe wasn't for me.

I gave this trilogy 3.5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️🌗

The Maidens by Alex Michaelides

(356 pages)

Was okay. Not great, but certainly not bad either. Kept my attention throughout, and I honestly wasn't expecting the twist at the end so that was undeniably successful. I will say that without knowing anything about the author, it was very very clear to me from about 20 pages in that he was a male writer writing from the perspective of a female protagonist. I googled and I can confirm the author is male. He didn't do anything overtly sexist or anything, I think there is just a vibe that you can pick up on.

I gave this book 3.5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️🌗

The Betrayals by Bridget Collins

(423 pages)

The only reason this book isn't getting 1 star (and the only reason I think I was able to finish it) is because of its potential. The game at the centre of the story is never explained, nor was the government, nor (as far as I could work out, but I confess to beginning to slightly skim read) was the entire character of "the rat" and the point of their storyline. The relationships and descriptive language felt uncomfortable to me, and a very old fashioned approach to many things. The "twist" felt badly set up and overused. Additionally, the entire thing was just unnecessarily complex, like the author was trying to show off how clever and intellectual they were, but failed.

I gave this book 1.5 stars ⭐️🌗

Curtain: Poirot's Last Case by Agatha Christie

(284 pages)

Quick, easy, enjoyable. Almost got emotional reading the end of Poirot, but it also was a very fitting end for him too. I loved the symmetry with the first case and book too. Basically, a Poirot novel is never not going to be good.

I gave this book 4 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️