Book Review: The Woman Inside by E.G. Scott

Publish Date: January 22, 2019

“The darkest roads lead us to light eventually.” — The Woman Inside

Rebecca didn’t know love was possible until she met Paul, a successful, charismatic, married man with a past as dark as her own. Their pain drew them together with an irresistible magnetism; they sensed that they were each other’s ideal (and perhaps only) match.

But twenty years later, Paul and Rebecca are drowning as the damage and secrets that ignited their love begin to consume their marriage. Paul is cheating on Rebecca, and his affair gets messy fast. His mistress is stalking them with growing audacity when Rebecca discovers Paul’s elaborate plan to build a new life without her. And though Rebecca is spiraling into an opiate addiction, it doesn’t stop her from coming up with a devious plot of her own, and this one could end absolutely everything.

What follows is an unpredictable and stylish game of cat and mouse—a shocking tale of unfaithfulness and unreliability that will keep you racing until the final twist and make you wonder how well you really know your spouse.

Fasten your seatbelts, this book is a wild and insane thriller that left me speechless. It’s packed with crazy people doing crazy things and I got to see it all unfold. I really enjoyed it.

Rebecca and Paul have been married for 20 years and seem to be in love now more than ever. But – their loving demeanor is a complete facade. Paul’s cheating and Rebecca has found a new partner in life called Pills and she’s higher than a kite most of the time. The narration rotates between Rebecca and Paul with other characters sprinkled in between and I didn’t know what to believe because Rebecca and Paul are very unreliable narrators.

All of the characters are unlikeable and make very bad decisions. There were so many times where I shook my head or thought, “OMG, you didn’t just do that…” It’s full of sociopaths and insane people that I’m hoping don’t exist in real life.

Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“Time had passed in the intangible way that it does when you aren’t paying attention.”

“It’s amazing how good you can be at something precisely because you don’t give a shit about it.”

“Typically, men murder their wives with practical motives in mind: to escape their marriages, often because of affairs, or money and drugs and alcohol are often a big factor. Women who murder their spouses are far more likely to do so out of passion.”

“It only takes one slip. Any relationship is a high-wire act. Maintaining an affair is like walking a greased tightrope with a gorilla hanging off your back. If things go wrong, the destruction can reverberate catastrophically.”

This book is about addiction, lying, infidelity, love, stalking, marriage, obsession, secrets, and family. You probably won’t relate to any of characters but you’ll have so much fun watching things fall apart and people imploding on themselves. This book is like a train wreck or watching a Mission: Impossible movie. It’s action packed and I had physical reactions to this book! It got my heart racing, I shook my head in disbelief, laughed out loud, and gasped in surprise many times, especially at the ending.

For me, the first 33% of the book was a teeny bit slower than I’m used to, but the authors used this to build the characters, the suspense, and leave little clues for you. The rest of the book has wild twists and turns and picks up the pace rapidly enough for me to want to binge read it. That ending!! It gave me a book hangover that still makes me think about it every time I recall the big finale.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars