The Alphabet House
Jussi Adler-Olsen has taken a break from his popular Department Q series and brought us a deeply researched, hauntingly psychological thriller that will captivate and horrify at the same time.
Two British pilots and childhood friends—James and Bryan—embark on a reconnaissance mission over World War II Germany. However, before they can complete their mission, they are shot down, and they know they will be tortured for information and then killed. With German soldiers close on their heels, they scramble aboard a train, toss off two German SS soldiers, and assume their lives. What the Brits do not know is that this train is bound for the Alphabet House, a mental hospital where the SS soldiers will be subjected to months of radical treatments. The pilots’ only hope for survival now is to fake insanity, endure electroshock treatments, and finally escape. What these two friends slowly realize is that they are not the only ones in the Alphabet House faking their psychosis.
At first, after skimming the book like I usually do, I was hesitant to read a novel where the entire first half has the lead characters in a single room and confined to a bed. The first half of the novel is set during World War II and the second in 1972. However, I could not have been more wrong. Jussi Adler-Olsen’s slow pacing and unexpected twists ratcheted up the psychological suspense with each turn of the page. The second half of the book is a complete 180 from the first. The pacing is brisk, but Adler-Olsen maintains the dark, brooding psychological thriller until the very end. If I had any concerns with the novel, it was a lingering question of James’s willingness to endure his life, and the violence could be a bit too graphic for some readers. However, these two issues aside, The Alphabet House is a very good read.
