Gripping and unputdownable psychological thriller…
I was so intrigued with this book and definitely was not disappointed.
I was hooked after the first couple of chapters and did not want to stop reading.
There is so much great information and so many moments where the facts are so accurate and reference true crime that I would have to remember myself I was reading fiction.
Matthew Blake did a wonderful job and I could simply not put the book down until I finished this amazing thriller!
Thank you so much to NetGalley and Harper Collins for this ARC

In the course of an average of thirty-three years spent asleep, what unfolds in the realm of slumber, and what latent abilities lie dormant within us during that time?

Anna Ogilvy, a promising twenty-five-year-old writer with a luminous future, took a dark turn one fateful night, inexplicably murdering two individuals. Since that haunting incident, she has remained in an unbroken sleep, earning her the sensational moniker "Sleeping Beauty" in the tabloids. Afflicted by a rare psychosomatic condition identified by neurologists as "resignation syndrome," Anna exists in a perpetual state of unconsciousness.

Enter Dr. Benedict Prince, a forensic psychologist specializing in sleep-related homicides. Tasked with unravelling the perplexing "Anna O" case, he aims to awaken Anna, enabling her to face trial. Yet, navigating the treatment of such a high-profile suspect proves delicate for the doctor, who harbours his career secrets and contends with a complex personal life.

As signs of Anna's awakening surface, Benedict recognizes the urgency of discerning the truth surrounding that ominous night and determining whether Anna should be held accountable for her actions.

While only Anna holds the key to the events of that night, only Benedict possesses the skills to unlock it. However, both are imperilled by the revelations that await them.

The E-Book could be improved and more user-friendly, such as links to the chapters, no significant gaps between words and a cover for the book would be better. It is very document-like instead of a book. A star has been deducted because of this.

This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and I would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

Anna Ogilvy sent a message to her mother ‘confessing’ to the brutal murder of two people. When the bodies are found, Anna is with them, knife in hand and covered in blood. Case closed.
Four years later, Anna hasn’t stood trial, and has not even answered one question about the case. Since the night of the murder, Anna has been asleep. Dr Benedict Prince, a specialist is sleeping disorders, is given the task waking her up.
The story is told from several points of view and hops between times lines. The chapters are generally quite short, which helps to move the story along. The ending came as a surprise which is good but I couldn’t help feeling that it stretched believability.
Many thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I love anything to do with psychology and the study of how our minds work. Anna O hits all the plus points for me.

There is lots of references to the world of psychology and how sleep can affect us.

Matthew Blake throws in a lot of true crime story references in this story, and i found myself doing a lot of googling. It fascinated me finding out what people get up to in their sleep 😮

Now i found myself being led up the garden path, and thinking id figured out the plotline, yep i did feel smug. But, i was also quickly made to look a fool when I fell for the traps.

I found that the line between truth and fiction were starting to blur, and at times the writing was so well done I thought I was reading about a true crime story.

Really enjoyed Anna O and I would recommend to all.

Thank you so much to the publishers and to NetGalley for allowing me to read this book ahead of its release!

I found Anna O to be a really original and clever thriller. It hooked me quite instantly and I had no idea where it was going for the most part. Towards the end I had started to figure out and predict the twists correctly which is always a bit disappointing, but otherwise I really enjoyed this book!

I loved the sound of this when I first heard about it, so was excited when Netgalley accepted my request. It's one of those books that pulls you in right from the start.
Mostly told from Bens POV with extracts from Anna's diary and a few others POV interspersed, it's a slow unravelling of events from the night in question.
The chapter length and pace was really good, but there was a point at almost half way where I felt things were slowing down and could potentially start to drag, however, it wasnt long before I was gripped again and didnt want to put it down.
I would describe this book as gripping, and that final 25% was a teasing slow burn, but in such a good way that I couldn't stop reading, even while I was meant to be working.  Honestly, I can't say I was surprised by the ending, and I did manage to piece it together before the final reveal, but overall I found this a very different and enjoyable read, which at times almost felt real.
I appreciate this isnt the finished copy, so this maybe just an arc problem but I found it a bit difficult to keep up with the dialogue, and at times I wasn't sure who was speaking and had to re read bits to work it out.  Also, there were a few continuity errors that I'm hoping are ironed out too.
Absolutely a recommend read that I think will be a big hit.
4.5⭐️

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this pre-publication.
The premise of the novel sounded interesting, unravelling the truth of a murder allegedly committed by a young woman who then falls asleep for four years.
I found the mechanism of interspersing excerpts from Anna O’s diary quite interesting for most of the novel. However, there is a lot of repetition in the book and the last few chapters felt both confused and contrived, leaving me somewhat disappointed when the truth is finally revealed.

Anna has been asleep for four years after being found at the scene of the murders of two of her friends. If/when she awakes, she will be on trial for their murders. It’s Dr Ben Prince’s job to try to wake her, but at what price…?

This is a very clever novel and I was hooked for the first three quarters of it. However, I felt it lost its way in the final quarter and my concentration waned.

It’s an incredible premise for a psychological thriller and I’m sure it’ll be a big hit, but unfortunately not a hit for me personally due to the meandering ending that doesn’t seem cohesive with the rest of the novel.

I’m giving it three stars however for the premise and the fact that the majority of the book is well done.

I was so excited to read this story, as the premise seemed really interesting. I found the first maybe 30% of the book really intriguing but then it turned really repetitive and felt that it ran for way too long. I could see quite a lot of the twists happening, and then some of them were drawn out for ages. It was a classic "it's this person... No this one.... No this one" and I kind of just wanted to scream "just tell me!". I'm really disappointed I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I was going to.

I was excited to start this one; the premise had me intrigued and I was looking forward to seeing how it progressed.
While the initial pace drew me in, I soon found it repetitive and drawn out. The characters were boring and I struggled to remain engaged.

Anna O has a great premise and it starts well. I liked the restrained voice of the narrator, Ben – which contrasts nicely with the (melo)dramatic set up – and it has some interesting characters. However, overall I was disappointed.

I appreciate it’s a high-concept novel, not a piece of gritty realism, and I’m not one of those people who gets upset about minor departures from procedure, but there were some major implausibilities in here. Some I can’t explain without spoilers, but the obvious ones are that Ben and his mentor, Bloom, who are supposed to be brilliant psychologists at the top of their profession, make the most basic errors in their casework and appear to have had an education which begins and ends with Freud.

The story is weighed down by a baggy structure which leads to a lot of repetition. The Hitchcock, literary and mythological references feel heavy handed – and there are just too many of them.

I worked out where the story was going fairly early on (to be fair, I read a lot of crime fiction) but I was interested enough to skim-read to the end and see if I was right (I was).

A shame because there’s great potential in Anna O – perhaps Blake had too many choices and couldn’t pin down where to go.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I hadn't heard much about this book or author beforehand but was intrigued by the blurb. Once I started, I found it so hard to put down as I wanted to read more and more, especially as the plot developed and characters got super interesting. When I did finally finish and put it down, I actually said out loud: "That was a great book". It's probably the best book I have read this year (and I'm up to 85 at the moment).

Fabulous plot, great characters and full of suspense. I had no clue until the reveal and this was really satisfying!

Highly recommended read.

Anna O by Matthew Blake is a thriller with a unique storyline.

Dr Benedict Prince works at the Abbey an exclusive sleep clinic. He is tasked with trying to wake up Anna who has been asleep for the last 4 years after being found covered in blood next to her 2 best friends bodies.

This is a really interesting and compelling look at sleepwalking and what could potentially happen when you are asleep.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will definitely be recommending it to people I know.

Thank you to #Netgalley and #Harper Collins for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Anna Ogilvy has been asleep for years - ever since she apparently killed two of her friends whilst sleepwalking. Now she has been transferred to Ben Prince's sleep clinic, and he has ideas on how to wake her. In attempting to do so, however, he becomes drawn into investigating her past. What really happened that night? Did Anna mean to kill her friends? And how is her case linked to the Stockwell Monster, an earlier incident in which a women was convicted of murdering her step-children in her sleep?

Anna O is a thriller with an interesting-sounding premise, but it's considerably less pacy than the blurb promises. There are few moments of tension and the mystery that underpins the novel is both slack and contrived.

As a narrator Ben is unfortunately not very interesting. He is a divorced dad who lives in isolation. His only friends are his boss and his ex-wife, and his conversations are almost entirely about his work. Aside from his daughter, he is entirely surrounded by unsympathetic female characters.
We also spend some time with Anna via her diary, which is supposedly a key piece of evidence that was removed from the scene. Her voice is a little stronger than Ben's, particularly when she is investigating the Stockwell killings, but the narrative still moves very slowly for a thriller.

Ultimately, this is a novel with a good enough elevator pitch that I'm sure it will be successful. However, the reading experience is not of the same calibre as the high-profile thrillers it is being compared to and I was never truly drawn in to Ben and Anna's worlds. The contrived ending would be more forgivable in a pacier book, but Anna O instead chooses to linger, giving the reader time to question some of the more improbable details and distasteful displays of gender politics. I suspect the inevitable film will be differently paced.

Thank you to the publishers and Netgalley for providing a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

I found the premise of this book really exciting - the idea that Anna O murders her best friends and promptly falls into a coma-like sleep - but the execution was really quite disappointing.

We are introduced to Dr Benedict Prince, who is given the seemingly impossible task of waking Anna Ogilvy after 4 years. In tandem, we have access to Anna's diary, leading up to the events of the night in question, to shed light on whether she actually wanted them dead, if she did it subconsciously or if she had actually been manipulated into doing it. There's also a cast of supporting characters who all add different dimensions to the story.

My main issue with the book was how repetitive it was. Thoughts which should have taken up a few lines seem to go on for many paragraphs. Impending doom is impending for a really long time, and it actually has the opposite effect on the suspense levels. The pop culture references are also distractingly frequent. You could easily cut 25% of the book and it still have a similar effect.

I guessed the 'twist' fairly early on, and that ruined it for me a little - I don't think there were enough key players to make it a proper guessing game. The ending is rather abrupt and rushed, and left me feeling relieved it was over.

I also felt Prince's backstory could have been dealt with in a different way. He comes across like a character who has no idea about his entire history, which makes it difficult to root for him. I also felt there were quite a few continuity errors along the way, so things just didn't add up,

All in all, it felt like it could have done with a better editor - I was disappointed with the book and wouldn't recommend it.

@currentlyreading__
Book 89 of 2023

Thank you to @NetGalley, the publishers @harperbooks and the author @matthewblakewriter for the advanced e-copy of 'Anna O' ahead of publication in February 2024.

Once in a while, as a reader of yet-to-be-published books, you come across one which you know will be a big hit. As you're reading you imagine it on ITV as a prime-time drama series and start piecing together who you'd have play all of the characters. This is one such book.

'Anna O' is stylish psychological thriller with killer twists I, a seasoned professional reader although I say so myself, did not see. Our eponymous character Anna Oglivy committed a heinous crime and then went asleep for four years. Our male protagonist Dr Ben Prince, a psychologist specialising in sleep disorders, is seconded by the MoJ to wake Anna. The so-called Sleeping Beauty is a mystery to Dr Prince as well as the heinous crime she is alleged to have committed. If you’re after a thriller with an edge, characters you’re totally invested in and a plot to make those cogs whir, this one is for you!


#bookstagram #bibliophile #bookworm #book #booknerd #bookstagrammer #kindle #instabook #reader #bookobsessed #bookstagramuk #readersofig #bookreview #netgalley #matthewblake #annao

Anna Ogilvy is asleep, and has been for years, ever since she sent a message to her parents to say she thought she had killed her two best friends. The authorities want to prosecute, so turn to Dr Ben Prince, Harley Streey psychologist and sleep specialist. Can he wake her? And were the events of Anna’s last night of consciousness really as they were reported?

The premise of this was intriguing. What could lead to someone falling asleep and never waking up? Can you kill people in your sleep and if not, what led Anna to murder?

The writing was good, and I was immersed fairly quickly in the story.

In the end, however, I felt that it didn’t really pay off. The plot became far too convoluted and at times confusing, whilst certain elements were easily guessed. It just didn’t quite do it for me I’m afraid.

Mostly enjoyable, the twists felt a bit complicated and came all at once. I personally would have preferred them spaced out, brilliant concept!

When an author gets compared to another, in this instance Thomas Harris, you wonder if they'll live up to the comparison. Does Matthew Blake? No, not quite. Anna O doesn't quite reach the heights of Thomas Harris at his Silence of the Lambs best.

The mystery at the heart of Anna O, did the so-called 'Sleeping Beauty' murder her best friends or not, is artfully crafted, intriguing and keeps you guessing until the end. The characters, particularly Anna herself and Dr Benedict Prince, are engaging. It's impressive how Blake gives voice to Anna, a character who spends much of the book asleep. The science behind Resignation Syndrome and sleep therapy is clearly well researched, interesting and presented in such a way so as not to overwhelm the reader.

It's just a pity that the end, when it comes, is such an anticlimax. Maybe it's a case of one revelation too many, but for me Anna O would have worked better if the last three chapters had been excised.

Thanks to HarperCollins and Netgalley for providing an advance copy.

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting" (Wordsworth’s Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood). For Anna O we shall have to read rebirth because she has been in a sleep state for 48 months. When I first read the precis for Anna O, I was concerned with having to read through 48 months of patient obs but I should not have worried as its nothing like that, Anna O committed a crime which brought great notoriety but seemingly she knew nothing about it because immediately after the crime she fell asleep, a sleep lasting 4 years. That was until an eminent pyschologist, specialising in sleep disorders, was seconded by the Ministry of Justice in an effort to wake her. We learn from the Covid Inquiry how useful a diary can be and Matthew Blake uses this literary device to fill in the backstory of Anna O. You have to understand that after she awakens, Anna has amnesia, no knowledge of what has gone before. Weirdly, although it's not mentioned, she slept right through Covid 19! So, was she guilty of a crime she had no knowledge of? How would it be handled by The Crown Prosecution Service? Things hot up when another similar crime is discovered.
I really enjoyed this lengthy thriller especially with the double twist at the end. They say revenge is a dish best served cold, in the novel the dish is sub zero and it's just this one factor that spoiled it for me. Yes, there was an explanation but I just didn't buy it. So that was the only spoiler. I would heartily recommend the book though, as it gives the reader many opportunities to play detective.