I Am Watching You by Teresa Driscoll (Epub)

Description

When Ella Longfield overhears two attractive young men flirting with teenage girls on a train, she thinks nothing of it—until she realises they are fresh out of prison and her maternal instinct is put on high alert. But just as she’s decided to call for help, something stops her. The next day, she wakes up to the news that one of the girls—beautiful, green-eyed Anna Ballard—has disappeared.

A year later, Anna is still missing. Ella is wracked with guilt over what she failed to do, and she’s not the only one who can’t forget. Someone is sending her threatening letters—letters that make her fear for her life.

Then an anniversary appeal reveals that Anna’s friends and family might have something to hide. Anna’s best friend, Sarah, hasn’t been telling the whole truth about what really happened that night—and her parents have been keeping secrets of their own.

Someone knows where Anna is—and they’re not telling. But they are watching Ella.

User’s Reviews

Review “Perhaps one of the best psychological thrillers released this year…” —India Today From the Publisher A teenage girl has disappeared. What would I have done if I had seen her on a train, harassed by a group of strange men only the day before? Would I have intervened? And if not, how could I have forgiven myself when I learned what happened? These are questions I had never asked myself—until I picked up I Am Watching You. Reading about the impact on an ordinary family when their beloved daughter Anna goes missing, I was chilled to the bone, but also conflicted. Especially when Ella, the witness, begins to receive ominous postcards every night bearing the message “WHY DIDN’T YOU HELP HER?” Where should my sympathies lie? With the witness, who could have acted but didn’t and is tormented by guilt? With the remorseful friend who didn’t save Anna? With the victim’s parents, who just want to see their daughter alive and well? Or even with the mysterious watcher, who will do anything to “protect” those he loves? I have to be honest: there were times during this fast-paced roller coaster of a novel when I wasn’t certain. Now even the most benign interactions I see in the world seem to have a shadow lurking behind them. I Am Watching You had me absolutely hooked from the first page and kept me guessing until the last. This multilayered, suspenseful novel will pull you in so many directions, and you just might find yourself asking the same question I did: Would I have intervened? – Jack Butler, Editor

Reviews from Amazon users, collected at the time the book is getting published on UniedVRG. It can be related to shiping or paper quality instead of the book content:

⭐ I am really sick of the many, many mysteries that have become best-sellers lately which don’t have any suspense or mystery in them.I feel like warning other people who love mystery not to bother — unless you are quite forgiving and don’t expect any real surprises or things that make sense.So, SOME spoilers*******The writing is flat, the characters are flat, but this didn’t, at first deter me from reading it. Agatha Christie is not exactly a great prose writer, and she does manage to surprise the reader and to build interesting cliffhangers and plots.About 50% into the book I was getting a bit fed up, because there was NOTHING happening. There were chapters ending with stuff like “She couldn’t tell anyone what she knew” or “He had done something disgusting” — not exactly this, but this kind of attempt to create suspense.Well, if you do that, then DELIVER. Instead, it just kept going on, and on and on in the same vein, with us not finding anything else, just more of these from the same characters.One girl has a problem with an abusive dad (GROAN) and thinks he may have something to do with her friend’s disappearance — resolved off page. The dad of the disappeared girl has such a big secret he almost kills himself in a barn. The secret turns out to be so pathetic that I got mad at having to read his thoughts for chapters and chapters. Then, shoot, maybe the girl isn’t dead, and we have several chapters of EVERYONE looking at the TV at some police negotiation with a kidnapper.But HEY, it isn’t her. The way they saw that it isn’t her is sooooo ridiculous that I laughed quite a bit.In the meantime, chapters and chapters about the woman who saw the girls on the train but didn’t tell the police they went off with young men because she couldn’t decide if that was slutty, dangerous or normal. She is supposed to be the main character and she goes on and on and on and on about her flower shop.Then about her son, who got his girlfriend pregnant. NONE of this has any bearing on the mystery.Then she hires a private detective because she is getting postcards saying “I’m watching you.”A lot about the detective, his pregnant wife, their baby being born. Not a lot of detecting. Oh, also the “standard police trauma” (he shot an innocent kid) being introduced late in the game and in a perfunctory manner.There are some police people with a grudge against each other which means zilch to the investigation and changes nothing.Clues that are not clues (just people acting strangely) are given chapters and chapters and chapters to then mean nothing and often get resolved off book.About halfway into the story a POV in italics of the typical psycho (“I’m watching you…I don’t like her to be watched…etc”) gets introduced and is repeated in the same cliché way several times.FINALLY, the mystery is solved in the MOST RIDICULOUS POSSIBLE WAY. Not through anyone figuring anything out, not by the several police that have been introduced or the private detective — but because the flower lady SEES A PHOTO.At this point I was covering my mouth in disbelief that any book that sells this much could be so awkward, badly written and unsurprising.Just think of the worst, most awkward episode of one of these TV series about crime. It will be better than this, because it will, at least, be forced to have clues and real suspects.I am AT A LOSS! Truly. I loved Gone Girl, I thought Girl on the Train was disappointing after 60%, this one was just a HUGE waste of time for anyone who truly loves mysteries and wants to follow clues, suspects and be surprised. If you’re like that, give this a WIDE berth…

⭐ I think the author wanted to really get into the various characters, but I found the book very frustrating to read. What was supposed to be a hook at the end of many chapters, never led to anything. I really didn’t care about the pages and pages of Ella’s flower shop. It just seemed like filler. Something to fill pages. There was too much telling and not enough showing. Also, the mix of first person, then third person, was distracting.It’s hard for me to get used to the British lack of tension in a mystery, if this is what this was. Using a knife as a weapon, though dangerous, isn’t as scary as a gun. You can outrun, or outmaneuver a person with a knife, but it’s hard to outrun a bullet. She tries to make the use of the knife seem really threatening. Maybe up close and if the assailant has a hold of you, but they have to catch you first. Any smart kid can dodge a knife. I just didn’t find this very tension-filled at the end. Sorry for the spoiler alert.I found this an okay read, but I kept thinking, when is something going to HAPPEN! The author’s attempts at ending chapters with a hook, left me frustrated. Nothing was revealed until the epilogue. If this is her style of writing, I probably won’t read any of her other books. They make me want to throw it across the room, which I couldn’t because it would break my Kindle.

⭐ I’ve read several reviews on this book, and only hesitantly selected it for a quick read. I was initially thinking that I’d write a review that simply said “if you like to read about poor decision making and guilt, then this book is for you.” However, as the story progressed, I’ve found that it became a powerful and impactful plot line with rich characters and a number of unexpected twists. It was quite a pleasure to read and potentially one of the better books I’ve read recently.Some reviews have made claims to the effect that an astute reader may figure out the ending. I consider myself reasonably astute, but I was so far off on my theory that I was thrilled at the actual ending. I’m impressed if you can figure this one out; you’re a much better detective than I am.The character development is surprisingly rich. It starts off fairly flat, but gains depth and complexity as the story evolves. The author switches perspectives each chapter, and terminates each one with a mini-cliffhanger, leaving the reader somewhat frustrated at the dangling threads. However, by the end of the book, the threads are all tied up.So, I highly recommend the book, and suggest that you stick with it through the beginning where the tone comes across as dreary and whiny. It more than pays off for your patience in the end.Enjoy.

⭐ Really disliked this book. The premise showed promise, but I never bought it to the beginning, where we were supposed to believe the protagonist was expected to track down girls she didn’t know and call their parents to report on their behavior on the train. Huh? Who on earth would do that? So the rest of the book never made much sense. Ella is quite possibly the most boring character I’ve ever read. Being in her pov was like sinking to the bottom of a very deep pond. Henry was almost as bad. And the ending was a huge WTH. The bad guy came out of absolutely no where and was so poorly motivated to go after Luke. What a waste of time reading this mess.

⭐ I’ll start by saying that I usually kind of roll my eyes at 1 star reviews because they’re usually overtly ridiculous or irrelevant. But after finishing I Am Watching You, I can honestly say that I did not enjoy this audiobook at all and only completed it because I wanted to see it through to the end.I was skeptical in the first few chapters because Ella is such a boring, insecure main character from the get-go. Unfortunately, the entire book is full of dull, undeveloped, and cliche characters. Each chapter is told from the perspective of a different character, each worse than the last. I very much enjoy an unlikable and complex character, but they have to at least be *interesting.* You won’t find that in I Am Watching You.The writing is pretty bad in general. Lots of boring, woe-is-me fluff from each character constantly. It’s unrelenting. Despite perpetual negativity about how Anna’s disappearance affected each character, I never actually felt any true sadness, grief, or anguish over Anna. In fact, I never cared about Anna’s character at all. Why would I? She’s never even part of the story. It felt so hollow.I Am Watching You is supposed to be a suspenseful thriller, but I never felt any real suspense or danger at all. Nearly every single chapter ends in a forced wannabe “cliffhanger” that, again, just made me roll my eyes. The ending pretty much came out of left field…and not in a good way. It didn’t make any sense.I am genuinely perplexed that this audiobook has as high of ratings as it does. Too many boring red herrings that go nowhere, boring characters, no suspense at all. Seriously…go with another audiobook. This one is worth skipping.

⭐ It takes a lot these days to impress me, to keep my attention, to make me not lose interest. It’s just how it is, people. I received this book free with my Amazon Prime membership. I started this book, hoping it wouldn’t be as lousy as the free one from last month, just being honest. I was shocked instantly with the fact that this book is set in England. I somehow missed that in the description. That’s usually a turn off for me, but I kept reading anyway. I’m so glad I did. I love the way this book flows from different characters perspectives. It’s a bit like a tv episode where I wasn’t quite finished with that character and now we’re jumping to another. It’s a good thing though. It kept my mind spinning in several different directions at once. The characters are complex and there’s a few different storylines going on at once. I didn’t see the ending coming and I was thrilled by that. I won’t go into more detail, as I really don’t like the reviews that openly discuss the characters and give away too much. I highly recommend this book and I’ll be looking for more from this author.

⭐ When I first started this book, I really felt like it was all over the place. There were so many elements to the story that just didn’t connect. I was intrigued to find out the ending, so I kept reading to find out what happened. Luckily, in the end, all of those little pieces fit together so neatly to create a really great mystery!I Am Watching You switches between multiple perspectives. The first is, obviously, the witness: Ella Longfield. She has experienced such a whirlwind of hate after coming forward as a witness after Anna’s disappearance. Her business suffered, she questioned her mental state constantly, and has slightly neglected her family due to all of the stress. She seems like a genuinely apologetic woman, trying to make amends and not involve the police in her problems when Anna’s family has had such a rough time. I really enjoyed getting to know her and experiencing the issues in her own life. At first, I didn’t think most of these issues were pertinent to the storyline but, I promise you, it all makes sense in the end.The other POVs are Anna’s father: Henry Ballard. He’s a farmer with a wife and another daughter who is obviously hiding something. We get the sense from early on that his secrets pertain to Anna’s disappearance. His own life is in shambles; he has had to sell off some serious acreage to pay the bills. Being a farmer isn’t exactly a lucrative career. Then there’s the friend, Sarah, who was with her that night and is hiding her own secrets. It’s easy to tell that she feels guilty for what she did that night, but we don’t find out until the second half of the book what exactly she did wrong. The final POV is the private investigator, Matthew Hill, who was hired by Ella to determine who is sending her the postcards. We get a glimpse into his life as well, but his most meaningful experiences involve the police investigating Anna’s disappearance.Obviously, when you read the title, it’s clear that someone is watching Ella. We get short chapters as the watcher, where it’s obvious this person’s mental state is very fragile. He or she has created an obsession with Ella and wants to be involved in her life. Every aspect of I Am Watching You showcases different stages of parenthood and having children. It was subtle, but I figured it out near the end of the novel. We get to experience what it’s like to lose a child, like Anna’s parents; what it’s like to be a new parent, like the Private Investigator Matthew Hill; what it’s like as a child to be neglected and abused by a parent, like Anna’s friend, Sarah; and what it’s like to have your children experience life-altering event as a teenager, like Ella and her son, Luke. I’m not a parent myself, but it was easy to get into these situations and realize how hard being a parent actually is. Some of them were handled really well, while others were shown in a more negative light.Like I said, literally EVERYTHING comes together in the end. There is no stone left unturned, no questions that I had to ask about the plot or the characters. Everyone involved in the whole narrative has a role to play in the ending. Although I do enjoy when some books leave things a bit open for interpretation, I can appreciate an author who ties everything up with a nice big bow. That’s how I Am Watching You ends, and I enjoyed every thrill-seeking moment of it!

⭐ I’m a huge reader of suspense, thriller, and mystery, which is why I was drawn to this book as one of the offers for Amazon’s September first picks. This book isn’t a typical thriller or murder mystery, and I was a little put off by some of its narrative qualities when I began it. The further I got into it, however, the more I found myself absorbed by the author’s lovely narration technique and the characters and themes that weaved the story together.Ella, the point of view character, becomes a witness when a girl she saw on a train to London vanishes without a trace. The novel then skips a year in the future, when we are launched into the fallout of the anniversary of Anna’s disappearance, and how the lies and secrets her friends and family have harbored come to the surface.I think the most important thing I would note to people about this book going in is that it’s not exactly about Anna’s disappearance, and thus, this book does not follow the formula of a typical thriller. This is the reason I was taken a little aback as I began it, and why it took me a while to warm up to it. By the end of the book, I found myself completely enchanted by the story Ms. Driscoll had told.The narrative technique is a little strange. We are given a switching POV between multiple characters; Ella “The Witness,” Sarah “The Friend,” Matthew “The Private Investigator,” Henry “The Father,” and finally the mysterious “Watcher.” Ella, the central character, tells her tale in the 1st person while the other characters are written in 3rd person. This isn’t an unusual narrative technique in my experience, but it is definitely a polarizing one, and some people don’t like it for reasons I completely understand. I always find it a little off-putting, but the chapter titles help to identify whose head we are in and in this book, I felt like the switching POVs worked for the story.In reality, while Anna’s disappearance is the catalyst for the events that follow and her case is investigated (and concluded) through the length of the story, the book’s central themes are not the murder investigation. This is a book about family; it’s about the tendrils that tie families together and the alarming fragility in how easily they can break. It about the brazen thoughtlessness of youth, the ignored grief that comes with age, and the delicate balance of life. Ms. Driscoll takes her time with the story, painting elegant backdrops of Ella’s flower shop business and Anna’s childhood farm, bringing them to life in a narrative that is more poetic than suspenseful. My only complaint is that the author did overuse chapter cliff-hangers a little too much. There are so many half-truths being told by the characters, so many lies and innuendo that I feel the narrative would have flowed fine if not for the many sudden stops drawing attention to yet another twist in the road.The final chapter brought tears to my eyes. I don’t cry a lot because of books (the last book I cried reading was “The Time Traveller” by HG Wells so, judge me with what you will), but I felt so connected not just to the characters, but to the beautiful themes of family, trust, love, and loss, I couldn’t help but be touched by the final page.I would recommend this book to people who are looking for a character driven story and want to read a book not about a crime, but about the ripples such an event leaves in its aftermath. It’s an interesting mystery, but not a strong one. If you are looking for a solid thriller or mystery novel, this will not sate you. That said, I think it’s a beautiful, thoughtful piece of fiction.

⭐ I was thoroughly frustrated with the endless chapters that ended with a clue-cliff hanger. Stuff like:”Jenny doesn’t move. Just staring at him, tears still dripping from her chin. “There’s something else I need to tell you, Dad.”” … end of chapter.Then you have to wait several chapters to find out. It is a sad way to cover for a weak story construct. As well as weak characters. Not a backbone in the lot. I suppose it is a good character study of how people let their flaws overwhelm and suffocate their better instincts. Still, it distracted from what could have been a good novel. I found myself looking at the ceiling and taking a deep breath every time a chapter ended with a dangling clue or when a character did something stupid because of a personality flaw. See a shrink, for crying out loud. No one even seems to want to grow a backbone. Well, maybe the son. Someday.Unless you like being manipulated by the author with way too many cliff-hangers, stay away from this book.

⭐ This book is written in 1st and 3rd person from the perspectives of the Father, witness, friend, and private investigator, all of which have zero to do with the outcome.This means that dialog is dull, matter of fact and ultimately pointless. Examples from the book, “He tells me…” “I laugh. He laughs.” “Luke glances…” “she is taking a break…” “He is pleased about that…” Instead of the author creating an environment where the reader can conclude the emotions of the character, the author simply tells you what the character is feeling. Every chapter of the witness, the Father, and the friend is a redundant, woe is me chapter which at the end is irrelevant. The private investigator’s biggest contribution is somehow recognizing that a hostage isn’t the missing girl based on body shape. Something the girls family somehow failed to see first. The story is full off random characters that have little to do with the story. The author could have added humpty dumpty to the list of pointless characters. The author uses the epilogue to try to close the holes in her story and tie-in the random characters as people that were truly behind everything. Eye roll. Character development is non-existent. We know more about the family dog Sammy than we do from the missing girl Anna. I would have felt more emotions if the dog had died. The author reveals what happened to Anna in one sentence in the epilogue.This book should have been called “You disgust me” since it’s the sentence that shows up the most in this book. Don’t waste your money on this nonsense unless you need a book to put under that wobbly table, with the short leg.

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