The Maidens by Alex Michaelides

Hello! This is my second review and is fittingly on the second most popular 2021 Goodreads’ Choice Awards novel in the Mystery & Thriller category! To start off, I like it better than The Last Thing He Told Me (you can read my review on it here). I mean this was a THRILLER and it kept me guessing until the last moments. And the reveal, oh it’s a reveal alright. Maybe I just need to read more thrillers or be a better detective but I truly did NOT see it coming. And looking back on it, there were definitely some clues dropped in by the author throughout so it wasn’t one of those cheap twists where it feels like it came out of nowhere (because it did). This thriller definitely didn’t disappoint but I don’t think it will have too lasting of an impression on me either. The author’s very popular debut novel The Silent Patient was referenced in this novel and I thought that was very cool. And I added it to my to-read list. Then I realized after searching through my book library that I had already read it last year (and it was even one that I read as part of a book club). But sadly I’ve basically completely forgotten it! I think I remember that it was good, but not good enough that I remembered reading it…So I better get to this review before I forget this one too!

“there were spires and turrets above her head, and beach trees lining the streets, shedding golden leaves that collected in piles along the pavement. Long rows of black bicycles were chained against the wrought-iron railings. And above the railings, boxes of geraniums enlivened the red brick college walls with splashes of pink and white.”

To start off, I just really liked reading this book. The writing flows well and is very… atmospheric. The majority of the novel takes place at St. Christopher’s, a college of Cambridge University and the author takes pains to bring the campus and surroundings to life. He goes into detail over the trees, campus, points out the buildings, halls, describes the landmarks, weather, etc., which I really appreciate because it helps bring the story to life- I feel inspired to visit Cambridge (or at least England) now! The setting of the scene is definitely important to me as a reader – it’s what sets books like Harry Potter and Hogwarts apart from most other stories that take place in England. I can just about envision myself in the pages of the book, walking on this old campus steeped with history and it brings a little something extra ~magical~ to the story.

The story is narrated by Mariana, a psychotherapist who specializes in group therapy and is still recovering from the death of her husband over a year ago. The novel begins as she’s brought into action when a student is murdered at St. Christopher’s and she’s called to support her niece, a student at St. Christopher’s and the murder victim’s best friend. There she becomes embroiled in the murders as more girls turn up dead and Mariana is forced to stay, partly to protect her niece and to bring the serial killer to justice but also, I think, to protect this place she cherishes. After all, St. Christopher’s is where Mariana met and fell in love with her husband, Sebastian, when they were in college over a decade ago and it holds many fond memories of their early years together (more on this later but Mariana’s love for Sebastian is just a tad obsessive imo).

“For Mariana, this was the clue – the suffering – the sense that these monsters were also in pain. Thinking about them as victims allowed her to be more rational in her approach, and more compassionate.”

There’s a couple of points I found particularly interesting – the first is that Mariana is a psychotherapist. I’m extremely biased because I LOVE psychology, especially on criminal and forensic psychology and took a few psych classes in college (including one on profiling mentally ill mass murderers). I just recently read/am reading two non-fiction books that explore psychotherapy (I recommend The Noonday Demon: An Atlas on Depression if you can get through 800 pages – I’m definitely still working on it…and Not in Your Genes: The Real Reasons Children are Like their Parents, which was an interesting read and pretty informative, but I’m not sure how I feel about the method Oliver James used to present his case – basically how nurture and not nature shapes us.) and Mariana’s role as a therapist is very prevalent throughout the novel. For one, she’s crafty and is able to do some serious sleuthing like conducting interviews and viewing the crime scene under the pretense she’s been asked by the police to provide counseling/profiling. Amateur detective role aside, Mariana’s also constantly internal monologuing about being empathetic to her patients, many who are extremely troubled, and also the killer. Of course she’s horrified by the brutal killings and wants to catch the killer but by bringing in the POV of a therapist, the author provides a more nuanced narrative that allows us to delve beyond “the killer is a crazy monster” mentality to try and understand how his mind works and why to figure out who he is. But again, I’m very biased towards crime and psychology so this angle definitely got brownie points from me!

“After all, everyone’s entitled to be the hero of their own story. So I must be permitted to be the hero of mine. Even though I’m not. I’m the villain.”

And on the point of empathy, while Mariana is extremely empathetic, the killer has none. From his journal, we get a glimpse of his background as he basically psychoanalyzes his own childhood to get an understanding of the “monster” that he turned out to be. It’s not really the ravings of a mad man but his narrative is a little repetitive. It’s a little confusing since he seems, at first, like he wants to get out of murderous mindset, but then he also seems very set in his ways… Mostly we get over and over again that he’s abused by his father from an early age, lacking a protective mother figure and surrounded by death growing up on a slaughter farmhouse. But he spends most of his narrative just very angry. Angry at his parents and angry at himself, which is fair. But there’s also very little development. He’s angry, hateful and pretty dramatic (I guess that’s where the narcissism kicks in) calling himself a villain and dramatizing his own actions like he’s the main character of a Greek tragedy. I feel like we could have learned this all in one of his journal entries instead of the dozen throughout the novel but it’s also a nice break in the narrative when we get snippets from his POV. One key point we learn later on is why he kills the way he kills (surprise he’s superimposing his mother on his victims) and his general profile early on (charismatic, narcissistic, most likely well-educated and quite a showman) so we can start trying to guess who he is, obviously the most fun part of any murder thriller. And the author does a pretty good job of making it a tough one!

I mean, Mariana seems to be SURROUNDED by psychos. As the book progresses, everyone starts to look like a suspect and Mariana (and myself) becomes deeply paranoid. She hears footsteps following her and is convinced someone is always watching her. The one thing is that we kind of just assume the killer is a male. I don’t think it’s ever explicitly referred to in the journals (the gender of the author) but all the suspicious characters in the novel are all male. And that makes sense since the killings of the young women are so brutal and the vast majority of serial killers are indeed male. But it does automatically exempt half the population… But back to all the males that are suspicious in the novel. Is it the narcissistic charming professor (the obvious choice), the sweet bumbling Fred (who is also low-key sus because he just happens to be everywhere and has a hint of a dark temper), the porter Morris who’s definitely hiding something, or even Henry, Mariana’s patient from London who’s extremely troubled and inappropriately attached to Mariana. From the journal we know the killer grew up with a violent father and mostly absent mother, which could fit for any of the above (is it that common of a family background?), including Mariana (now wouldn’t that be an interesting twist, if Mariana was the killer all along), so we’re basically left guessing who it is until the final moments. For what it’s worth, I had my money on Fred because he just seemed too nice and helpful. I mean who’s that willing to help a stranger they literally just sit next to on the train? But overall, I thought it was well-constructed with the ending a shocking but fitting conclusion.

And now for a few bones I have to pick with this novel. There’s just a few things I wish had been explained or that I’m left puzzling over. Obviously, this section will contain some mild spoilers as I have these questions in retrospect after finishing the novel! So skip this section if you don’t want to ruin the twist for yourself.

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Okay, FIRST OF ALL why is no one else suspicious of the professor. I mean, the whole killing ritual is so specific and his MO clearly points to the professor. Yes, the professor is the very very obvious choice because he fits the murderer’s profile to a tee and all the victims just happen to part of his very special group of all female students, the Maidens. So clearly it can’t be him right. But back to the Maidens. The Maidens is a very exclusive group (they say they’re a study group) of uncommonly attractive, successful and powerful girls at Cambridge, all handpicked by the professor. And they have secretive rituals and initiations. Come on, is that not weird to literally ANYONE? Like by the third girl you’ve gotta be seeing a common thread here right? There’s only 8 girls in this group and three of them are dead. And the remaining girls are mad suspicious with their secret meetings, rituals, and generally unfriendly attitude towards outsiders. And of course all this weird ass shit is centered around the enigmatic professor. Mariana is stretching a little far and definitely projecting some of her own issues onto the professor and she definitely just doesn’t like him (and he doesn’t help his own case by acting weird af) but the fact that the murdered girls are all part of the Maidens should put the professor under a good deal of university and police scrutiny. So it’s a little frustrating that he just gets the pass by everyone…And it’s also strange that the girls are so unsympathetic to their lost members. These girls are supposed to be such a close-knit group but they all see the deceased members as stupid and go as far as to say it’s their own fault they died. And as Mariana points out, this is very atypical group behavior, especially when confronted with a loss. There should be sadness, anger and sense of loss. But there’s none of that and we never really learn or get an explanation on why this group is functioning so abnormally. I mean yeah, it could be just that the professor is sleeping with them all but that seems like a copout answer.

Also who tf is trailing Mariana this whole time? It could just all be in her mind and she’s paranoid. But there’s definitely a few times when she definitely is being followed by a shadowy male figure. We never find out who that is. Maybe it’s just to add suspense and heighten the sense of paranoia in the novel. Either way, I wish there was some closure on that point since Mariana repeatedly brings up that she feels eyes on her and that she’s being followed.

“And it was here that Sebastian first entered Mariana’s story, when she was just a little girl. Like all good heroes, he made his presence felt long before his appearance. Mariana didn’t know what he looked like yet, this romantic hero in her head, but she was sure he was real.”

“And she suspected, if she was beautiful, it was solely because Sebastian: basking in the warmth of his sunlight, she blossomed like a flower.”

Lastly, Mariana, girl, you’re just wayyyy to obsessed with Sebastian. Sebastian died only 14 months ago and they were together for almost two decades so the fact that she’s still mourning makes sense. But her whole attitude towards Sebastian and her memories of him just border too close to infatuation for me. From the beginning, I thought it was a little weird how much Mariana seemed to idolize him. Mariana characterizes him as holy and mythical (words she used to describe him) and she credits so much of her own personal growth to him. Mariana also had a tyrannical father who she strove desperately to impress to gain his love (we learn all about this in Oliver James’ book referenced above) and an absent mother so she’s struggled with self love and worth for much of her life. And then bam, as if on cue, in comes her knight in shining armor, Sebastian. It’s all just a little too romanticized with Mariana falling in love at first sight and then basically spending the rest of their time identifying herself through him. We can see that Mariana thinks she’s outgrown her childhood but really she’s just transferred this love seeking quest from her standoffish father to the all-perfect Sebastian. Come on Mariana, you’re clearly a very intelligent and attractive (as many men kept repeating throughout the novel) lady, why let yourself and your worth be defined by your father (this actually is excusable since you were a kid) and your husband (this is where my problem with Mariana is)? You’d think as a psychoanalyst Mariana would have a little more introspection on this point. But alas, none of us are perfect and this obsessive streak with Sebastian, though a little overbearing, makes it point and we’re reminded that Mariana, even with all her therapist skills, is still only human. And in Mariana’s case, maybe because she’s so well-attuned with the inner workings of the mind, it makes her all the more blind to herself (and BOY is she blinded).

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Okay end of the “spoiler” section. I didn’t actually get into who the killer is but there’s definitely points that are very suggestive in there! As with all thrillers, the twist and the build up really are the crucial elements and overall this novel executed these very well. If you’re looking for a moderately quick read set in a beautiful but gloomy England, then I definitely recommend giving this book a try! This now ranks as my new favorite thriller of year so far but we’ll have to see if that holds true after I finish reading my next novel, the third and my last Goodreads’ Choice Mystery & Thriller book, Billy Summers by Stephen King (can you believe it, it’ll be my first Stephen King novel!). For now, toodles, and take care until next time!