I liked it, a lot. I had to go to work, but still finished it in two days, because it was captivating, how it was written. It's more a psychological drama than a crime novel, and the protagonist is more delusional than evil. Page after page we follow his thoughts. David Kelsey had met a girl, Annabelle, and was sure of their love. He went away a month to get a good job, so to have money to marry her, but in that month she met Gerald and married Him. David kept writing letters to her, sure that she made a mistake, didn't love Gerald, and soon enough the 'situation' would be cleared and they would get married. In the meantime he kept his job from Monday to Friday, but spent away all the weekends. He had told everybody he had a sick mother in a hospice, when actually she had been dead since he was fourteen. For two years he spent all his weekends in a house under another name, William Neumester, living a fantasy life, imagining Annabelle with him, talking to her and buying things he thought she might like. He knew she was not really there, but liked that life; he imagined it would be like that once they finally married.
Sometimes Annabelle would reply to his letters saying things like 'yes I miss you too but I'm married and Gerald doesn't like you writing me' and 'I've got a lot to do here so I can't meet you, sorry', and David blamed it all on Gerald. Once he went to their house and spoke to both of them, until one day Gerald went to his secret house, they had a fight, David hit him and Gerald died. Fact is, David had a friend at work, Wes, and also knew a girl, Effie, who had fallen in love with David. A weekend they followed him to that house, so when Gerald went to David's house asking for him, Effie told him where David could be found.
After Gerald died, David went to the police with the body saying it had been an accident, and he did not know the man (as Neumester he didn't). Effie learned all about his secret: his mother being dead, his secret identity as Neumester, but told nothing to the police because she loved him. David sold that house and bought another one, but Annabelle would not go visit it. She had cried her husband's death, and was now going out with the son of a neighbor woman. David went there making a scene and she told him she intended to marry Grant Barber, and soon she did. David kept thinking it another of her 'mistakes', but would get angry anytime someone talked to him about his private life, not understanding the situation. Obviously.
Wes and Effie went to visit him one day, and that night they fought because of it. David's private life and romance was all his fantasy, so of course nobody else could understand it. Wes went out to calm down, and David went to his room: seeing a woman resting on the bed he imagined her to be Annabelle. Realizing it was Effie he was angry and disgusted and threw her out of it, before running away. Coming back, Wes found her dead and called the police. Now David was wanted, and soon the whole situation was discovered and made public. Annabelle said she had always been afraid of him, and David knew it was over. His mind lost it even more. He ran away imagining Annabelle was with him. He spent all he had in his pockets then went to an old school friend to borrow some more, but the friend called the police. David had no escape now, so he finally threw himself down to his death.
It was the only possible ending, I knew it, but it was very well written and interesting, and kept me gripped to the story.
He was very dangerous without knowing it. He actually never intended to kill anyone, but his mind was not right, and lived in a fantasy world. Annabelle never told him 'I don't want you, I love my husband' maybe because she was afraid of what he might do if she left him no hope. He never doubted for a second that she loved him, he kept his delusion alive in any way he could, he was happy in his fantasy world. Maybe nothing bad would have ever happened if Effie and Wes had not spied on him out of curiosity (read respectively jealousy and alcohol). Effie probably did it to find out if he had a woman. Maybe he would have gone on with his fantasy life forever, had they never known of that house, his secret hideaway, or maybe it would have happened anyway, sooner or later, maybe he would have tried to have Annabelle divorce Gerald and go away with him, and had she told him she did not want to he might have lost it definitely, who knows it. He never, not once, thought of being delusional, he was sure of Annabelle's love, so he never asked for help to get his mind back on the right track. He thought to be in the right (as people always do), and got angry when people could not understand the Situation.
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