Shadow Selves starts in the midst of the action, after a visit to Dr J. Jones a hypnotherapist ends in a suicide. As a reader you have many questions about this book from the start, which helps to throw you off balance and create a sense of unease and as the plot twists and turns.
There’s a lot of good plot points throughout the book and I found it interesting that most of the story was written from the perspective of Callum, a fake therapist who has a lot to lose if he is exposed and I think that this perspective adds to the tension in the story.
The events of the book come to a fairly dramatic conclusion and I liked that Shadow Selves doesn’t necessarily end “happily”. There are more questions raised by the final page which I also think puts the reader off balance and lets the uneasy feeling linger with the reader after the story concludes.
Playing on the fear of manipulation by medical professionals, I think that as a thriller Shadow Selves works. I personally wasn’t hooked as I read, but it was an easy thriller to read and may be good for fans of the genre.
Callum is a fake therapist, taking money off clients without the expertise to treat them.
Kim is a troubled ex-patient, who now believes her shadows have come to life to try and kill her.
The news of a suicide shatters Callum’s illusion of a victimless crime, forcing him back on a collision course with Kim as he battles to save her. But to understand Kim’s problems, he’ll also need to investigate his mentor and associates in the therapy scam to uncover their role in the deaths and disturbed behaviour of so many others.
As the investigation turns sinister, the shadows appear to be more than figments of Kim’s imagination. Somehow they are capable of inflicting physical harm on Callum, and soon his life is in danger as well.
