The Patient

The Patient is written in the form of a series of blog posts by an overconfident, bright young psychiatrist called Parker H. He takes his first job at a state mental hospital in New England and really wants to make a difference. He is assigned a mysterious, dangerous, uncategorizable mental patient called Joe who has lived in the hospital for decades, since he was a young boy. Doctors, nurses or other staff who interact with or treat this patient often go insane or commit suicide. I will not reveal the twists and turns or the end, which I did not guess. It is fast moving, relatively short and I consider it to be both horror and a psychological thriller. It was well-written, creepy, and dark. The blog post format made it even more terrifying. Keep the lights on while reading this one. Recommended for fans of Stephen King.

First off, I am glad that this book was a novella because it is definitely a read in one sitting story. Otherwise it will drive you crazy with wanting to figure out the whys. It takes place mostly in an asylum and is about a young doctor, Parker, who takes on a patient only know by a short name "Joe" that has been there since childhood and has defied explanation for years in how he drives other doctors and orderlies to madness and suicide. This is creepy and mind twisting and did not turn out how I was expecting. For a novella, it is pretty good and wraps things up in the pages allotted without feeling like the story should have been longer though it did leave a couple plot holes. If you read this, be prepared to be thinking about it for awhile after.