The Sanatorium

2.5 stars

There were quite a few problematic things in this book. To start, the first 150 pgs or so were incredibly dull. I appreciated the backstory later in the book however trying to read through it was like nails on a chalkboard for me. Throughout the book, the main character had many flashback to what happened with her brother, Sam. This was quickly dismissed after Elin found out what actually happened. To me, this was a little odd as the author spend so much time building this up in the beginning of the book.

Elin also made horrible decisions and did not seem to be great at her detective work. They seem to elude to the fact that she had been on leave, but this isn't something that should just be completely foreign to you when you need to do it again after a short(ish) leave. She just seemed to have everything so wrong after being absolutely sure she had it right fairly often.

I felt like reasoning behind these killings were sort of anticlimactic and didn't make much sense. Only one of the murders did I feel like really had a reason before it almost turned into more of a political statement. I was also incredibly surprised when the killer was revealed. Elin repeatedly referred to the killer as being big and strong which was a very good red herring as I would have never guessed who it ended up being partially because of this.

The last thing that really seemed to bother me was the epilogue. I understand who the author is making it seem like is stalking her, but what I don't understand is why. Maybe thats something I'll understand better if/when the sequel is written, however, seems odd that after getting away he would seek her out. Just my opinion on that, but I guess I'm also not in his situation.

I feel like this book could have gone in so many different ways and would have been a lot better. However, I do think the author did a really good job at creating the spooky atmosphere for this book in the beginning, but it just quickly fizzled once everything was revealed.