MR. NOBODY is an intriguing book about a man found on a beach shore with no memory of who he is, but might know things about the doctor who is treating him...things that she has worked hard at to leave in the past.

I debated on my rating for this book. It's definitely more than 3 stars, but not quite 4. The first 25% was brutal to get through, and I debated leaving it unfinished (which I HATE to do). However, after that, I got wrapped up in the story and found myself really caring about the characters and trying to anticipate the ending, which was not expected. The ending chapters felt a little flat as well, but it's a great page turner from 25% to 90%.

Author Catherine Steadman's first novel, SOMETHING IN THE WATER, was a truly great read. This fell just a bit short, but I'm happy I got through it and am anticipating her next read. She is a great writer and I can tell she cares about the characters she writes.

Thank you to the author, Ballantine Books, and NetGalley for an ARC.

This book was a good mystery and actually had 2 mysteries interwoven. I enjoyed this more than her first book. Somethings seemed farfetched, but that happens a lot in this genre. The story was very fast paced and had me wanting to keep reading to find out what happened next. Thank you to Netgalley for this review copy.

Dr. Emma Lewis is an expert in her field of neuropsychology, who is asked to treat a patient known as Mr. Nobody. He was found washed up on a beach, with no memory of who he is. Is he faking, hiding something? Emma is hiding something, and I wish it had been revealed earlier on.
Good story, but I felt I was missing something.

Emma Lewis hasn't been back to her hometown for 14 years, back when she was known as Marni. Now she is a Neuropsychiatrist helping a patient who was found on the beach with no memories. When they first meet, the man being called Mr. Nobody calls her Marni? How does he know her when he doesn't know anything else? I enjoyed this mystery immensely.

“Mr. Nobody” by Catherine Steadman begins with an unusual first person narrative that leaves readers wondering what happened before and what will happen next. Steadman structures the book in a unique manner, and identifies the time and the main character of each chapter.
In Chapter one, (day one) readers meet “The Man.” Descriptions in the present tense bring realism to the man and express his confusion, his bewilderment, and his vulnerability. The next chapter jumps to day six, and continues in a first person narrative by Dr. Emma Lewis. She talks to herself and speaks to reader as if chatting with close friends. She relates experiences, describes incidents, demonstrates professionalism, and projects trust and confidence. Steadman alternates chapters between the man and the doctor and skillfully presents the events from both sides separately as they eventually merge. There is a tantalizing end to each chapter that entices readers to continue on to the next chapter with the alternating point of view and forms a bridge to bring readers back to this scenario in the future chapter. Then the man speaks…
The story advances with detailed information about Dr. Lewis’s search for answers for “the man,” now called Matthew. Dr. Lewis is determined to identify the problem, either physical or psychological; there are many questions, but few answers. Details about “the man” emerge slowly and deliberately within the context of the rest of the story, but information about “the man” is sensitive, perhaps even covert, and more than one secret is involved. As Dr. Lewis gets closer and closer to finding answers, the action becomes frantic, the situation grows dangerous, and the solutions are shocking. I will not give away the unanticipated end.
I received a review copy of “Mr. Nobody” from Catherine Steadman, Random House Publishing Group, and Ballantine. I was glued to the pages as I read, and absolutely did not anticipate the dramatic conclusion.

I liked the authors first book, “Something in the Water”. Unfortunately, her second book was an example of disappointing nonsense in which the reader is just strung along by the ridiculous plot. I feel like I was led on a wild goose chase. I can’t really explain how annoying this book was without spoilers, so I’ll hide the rest of this review.

<spoiler>Dr. Emma Lewis is a psychiatrist specializing in amnesia cases. When the leading expert in the field is otherwise occupied, Emma is called in to treat a patient who was discovered on a beach in Norfolk. He has no memories of who he is or how he got to the beach and it appears that he may present a rare case of fugue, or psychologically induced amnesia. They decide to call him Matthew. While Matthew has no memories, Emma has way too many of them, because it turns out that she used to live in Norfolk but she and her mother and brother were forced to leave there 14 years ago following “an incident”. Strangely, Matthew (who remembers nothing) seems to have some knowledge of the “incident”. Emma sort of describes the “incident” at about the 50% point in the book. But that’s just a tease. She doesn’t get to the heart of the story until the 65% point. It doesn’t matter anyway, because it turns out that the incident has absolutely nothing to do with anything else in the book. You can safely ignore it. The real crux of the story is that Matthew has gone to extraordinary lengths to get a second opinion. None of this was believable. In case we needed more silliness, the author threw in a love interest for Emma, a married man she has known for about 12 minutes. I feel used, abused and duped by this book. I listened to the audiobook, read by the author. Sadly, she read the entire book with an urgent whisper, and she cannot do male voices at all. 2.5 stars </spoiler>

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

Overall I definitely found this book engaging and entertaining. The timeline was a bit hard to follow at first but got easier as the book went along. One of the things that I did find difficult was the near hysterical tone of the book. The story of Mr Nobody was suspenseful enough without the crazed tone that carried along throughout the entire story. The father’s story being revealed bit by bit was just too over the top for me. It contributed to the hysteria in a way that did not engage me as a reader. That being said, I found the book a good read and thank the publishers and NetGalley For the ARC.

I love thrillers that keep me guessing until the end and this book certainly did that. From reading other reviews, I know some people weren't happy with how the book ended. I am not one of those people. I loved the end - the twists, the lies, how the truth was all discovered. This is Catherine Steadman's second book and I have thoroughly loved them both! She will definitely be going on my "authors I read no matter what they write" list.

**I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review**

Published by Ballantine Books on January 7, 2020

Mr. Nobody combines a medical thriller with a lost-memory thriller. On both fronts, the novel achieves only modest success.

Dr. Emma Lewis is an English psychiatrist who has an interest in memory disorders. She wrote a paper arguing that certain patients who suffer from a fugue state have been misdiagnosed as malingerers. In rare instances, she believes a fugue state can be attributed to traumatic stress rather than a neurological disorder.

An American neuroscientist, preeminent in the field, refers a patient who turned up on an English beach near Norfolk. The press have labeled the patient Mr. Nobody. This could be the case that makes Emma’s career, but the hospital where Mr. Nobody is being treated is in a town that Emma fled long ago, leaving tragedy and her birth identity behind. She has to work up the courage to return and hopes that nobody will recognize her. Of course, her hopes are promptly shattered when Mr. Nobody calls her by her former name.

Mr. Nobody (hospital staff eventually call him Matthew) has a desperate desire to connect with Emma but he can’t remember why. Matthew reminds Emma of her father, leading to melodramatic sentences like: “The look in his eyes, it reminds her of someone a long time ago, but it can’t be, it can’t be him.” Since Matthew is clearly too young to be Emma’s father, it isn’t clear why she even entertains the possibility. The military take an interest in Matthew, thinking he might be a missing soldier, a theory that might explain the fighting skills Matthew displays when another patient threatens Emma with a cane.

Secondary characters of note include a police officer who knew Emma back in the day and the officer’s wife, a reporter who is investigating the Mr. Nobody story, much to the displeasure of the police. The officer can’t tell his wife anything (she would blow Emma’s changed identity if given the chance), which causes some marital discord. That plotline eventually leads to a predictable resolution.

Most of the novel’s characterization is reserved for Emma. She comes across as a typical thriller protagonist who is forced to confront the past from which she is trying to escape. Her childhood trauma seems insufficient to warrant her change of identity, and the novel’s ultimate lesson — only you can change yourself — loses its value when applied to a character who is clearly smart enough to have internalized the lesson long before her encounter with Matthew.

The attempt to give Emma’s life a feel-good ending is forced. The plot creates more interest than suspense, if only because it follows a circuitous route to its less than credible destination. Catherine Steadman plants a few false flags, one of which supposedly reveals Matthew’s true identity well before the novel ends. A savvy reader will know that there is more to Matthew’s story. An information dump in the final pages offers a needlessly complicated and improbable explanation of how Matthew wormed his way into Emma’s life. The selective nature of Matthew’s memory loss and his ability to manipulate it is just too convenient to be credible. Some of the story reminded me of the movie Memento, which covers much of the same ground more convincingly.

On the other hand, Steadman’s prose is competent when she isn’t resorting to tiresome descriptions of Emma’s distress. The story moves fairly quickly and the climatic action scene isn’t bad. Emma isn’t a shallow character, although Steadman gave me little reason to empathize with her messed up life. Readers with daddy issues might like her more than I did. I am recommending the book because the story held my interest, but I do so with reservations because this isn’t one of Thrillerworld’s better attempts to freshen the lost memory theme.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Took me a little while to get into this book, but once I did I could not put it down! The pace quickly picked up. likeable characters and a few good twists! I liked even more than her first book!

I really enjoyed this science and memory related aspects of this book. The story was more of a slow burn mystery than a thriller. I was definitely engaged and interested in finding out the main characters past. The ending is when I started to lose interest. But definitely an enjoyable read.

Mr. Nobody by Catherine Steadman
4 STARS

Synopsis: A psychiatrist treating a man with no memory discovers that her patient knows far more about her past than his own.

The first 80% of this book was a five-star read for me. I was loving the characters, the story line, and was excited to see how everything would relate. Then the twist occurred, and I found myself being slightly disappointed. Overall, I still enjoyed this book & would recommend it to fans of suspense novels, but I wish the last 20% would have gone in a different direction! I am excited for more work from Catherine Steadman!

I DNF'ed this book as it was very difficult to get into and I didn't enjoy the characters or setting. Thank you for my advanced copy.

This is definitely my kind of book. A man turns up with no memory and no speech and an expert is called in to examine the situation. Of course there has to be a connection, but what is it? I am fascinated by memory, but parts of the book fell flat for me. Perhaps because I just read a book with similar themes. I preferred this book to that one a great deal. It was a good book, just not a great book. But I would recommend this read to friends and family.

The first part of this book was really good. The mystery of who "Mr Nobody" is and how he ended up on the beach captivated me from the start and made me keep reading. Then two things happened that made this book just an ok read overall.
One is--I really hate it when everyone else in the book knows something that the reader does not. Emma has some sort of giant secret from her past that has forced her to change her name and move away, now she is back in her home town after a number of years and is frightened that it will all come out again. And when it finally does...I was underwhelmed with the information and wondered why the author drug out the reveal for so long.
The second thing was that the conclusion to the mystery about Mr. Nobody/Matthew was just bizarre and a really strange, pretty much unbelievable resolution. I didn't buy it at all, it almost seemed like one of those crazy movie-of-the-week shows from the 80s or a very bad Lifetime movie. I love a good amnesia story but this one's conclusion was just bad.
Maybe Steadman's books are just not for me, this is the second one of hers that I've read and been not terribly impressed with the plot line.

Honestly, I am conflicted about how to review this story. It was heart pounding and atmospheric. It kept me guessing. But, it was really convoluted. I read it slowly, over about a week, to let it sink in. It was a different type of thriller than I am used to, and I was invested in the main character, Emma. So, 3.75 stars.

Well written and very creepy and twisted, however it became predictable. This really had me going until the big twist then it became too easy to guess.

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and author for ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A man is found, washed up on the British beach of Norfolk. He has injuries to his head and no identification on him.
He is brought to the hospital and begins to recover physically, but has no memories of who he is or where he's from.
The press dubs him Mr. Nobody.
The nurse he connects with decides to call him Matthew until they find out his identity.
Dr. Emma Lewis, a neuropsychologist, is brought in to consult on the case. This is her area of expertise and she will help to decide if the patient is in a fugue state, or if he is malingering. This is a great career opportunity for Emma, but there is a problem. She left this town in her teens, changing her identity and trying to escape from the trauma of her past. But she cannot resist the chance to help diagnose the patient. She studies his charts and tests and then meets with him. She is shocked when he knows things about her that no one else does.
This psychological thriller was very gripping in the beginning. The pace slowed down a bit toward the end.
A fascinating and intriguing storyline that kept my interest.
The ending was only okay for me, I had been hoping for more of a twist. Definitely worth the read.
Thank you to Random House Publishing Group for the e-ARC via NetGalley.
3.5 stars, rounded up to 4 stars.

So I have some very mixed feelings about this book. The pace is one of the things that I can't place how I feel about it. This book follows the story of Dr. Emma Lewis as she tries to diagnose Mr. Nobody, a man the police found washed up on a beach with no memory. Throughout the whole first half of the book, the reader knows that something has happened to Emma in her life but we don't know what that is. This was one of the most truly frustrating parts of the book and I almost put it down. However, at the exact moment I almost put it down, I found out what happened in its entirety and I'm glad I kept reading.

I truly loved the main character, Emma, and how she developed. I loved the scientific fiction side of this novel with the whole concept of mental illness and dissociative fugue. One of the things I was confused about was how quickly the resolution to the story occurred compared to the buildup. I wish some less time was spent building up and more time was spent explaining the resolution.

This book was a wild ride. I stayed up until 1 am to finish it because I had to know what happened. I really loved how in the end, we get to see how everyone turned out and where everyone ended up. That was what bumped it up the extra 0.5 stars for me. Well written, well researched, well executed!! 3.5 stars from me!!

I love any thriller that has memory loss or amnesia. At the start of this book, I was intrigued by the plot: a man has no idea who or where he is. However, the pacing was incredibly slow, and the plot started to feel borrowed from other stories. Something In The Water wasn't one of my favorite books, but I did appreciate the tense, unique plot. This follow-up lacked the unique story, the intriguing setting, and the feeling of apprehension.