ISBN: 9780778311553
Publication Date: September 7, 2021
Publisher: Park Row Books
“I’ve never met someone like me, but when I do, eventually, I think it will be like two wolves meeting in the night, sniffing and recognizing a fellow hunter.”
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My thoughts:
Never Saw Me Coming is a psychological thriller about a group of psychopaths who consent to be part of a study at a university in exchange for free tuition and room and board. Someone has murdered one of the group and Chloe must team up with 2 others in the group to figure out who is responsible.
I won't say I absolutely loved this one, but I was entertained. Having a cast of characters who are psychopaths was interesting. The story is told through several points of view. Chloe being my favorite. Chloe really has no F's to give. She has a mission for revenge and will do whatever it takes to accomplish it. I'm not well versed in the psychology of psychopaths so I can't really comment on the accuracy of the characters. I did figure out the killer, but I that didn't take away from my entertainment. I would recommend this one.
Check out this excerpt:
One
Day 60
As soon as the door to my new dorm room closed, I went to the window, scanning
across the quad for him. It wasn’t like there was any possibility he would just happen to be out
there among the families lugging moving boxes or the handful of students sprawled in the grass.
But there! A head of dirty-blond waves. Will. My mouth opened. Then the person turned
and I saw it was only a girl with an unfortunate haircut. Seriously, you’d think she’d put in more
of an effort for move-in day.
I turned and faced my empty dorm room with its sad linoleum floors, mentally going
through my to-do list. 1. Get rid of Mom. Check. She had already left and was probably
speeding up the I-95, popping open a bottle of champagne now that she was finally rid of me. 2.
Claim the most advantageous space be-fore my roommate, Yessica, arrived. 3. Make six to
eight friends before 4. My mandatory check-in appointment at the psychology department. 5.
Find Will.
We had a double with two bedrooms, one clearly larger than the other. While my normal
instinct was to claim the larger one, I immediately saw the problem with that. The larger
bed-room had windows that overlooked the quad. What if I wanted to crawl in or out of my
window in the middle of the night? People will record anything even remotely interesting on their
phones these days, and I could be easily seen from the other dorms and academic halls that
lined the quad—too much of an audience for my liking.
I took the smaller room. My generosity would score me points with my new roomie, but
more importantly, the room had a view of the brick wall of the building next to us and there was
a metal fire escape attached directly to the window. Easy access in and out of my room without
detection—perfect. I dumped some of my boxes into the room and made the bed, placing my
stuffed plushie whale on top to clearly stake my claim. The voices inside the dorm were calling
me and I had to establish myself quickly.
I gave myself a brief once-over before leaving the room, reap-plying my lip gloss and
fixing my hair. The hair had to be just right—a loose, effortless side French braid that actually
wasn’t effortless. You have to be the kind of girl who “doesn’t put any effort in” but naturally rolls
out of bed looking like a horny but somehow demure starlet. If you meet some standard of
objective attractiveness, people think you’re better than you actually are—smarter, more
interesting, worthier of existing. Combined with the right personality, this can be powerful.
Brewser had one long hallway with rooms shooting off on either side. I peeked into the
room next door where two brunettes were wrestling a duvet out of a plastic package. “Hi!” I
chirped. “I’m Chloe!” I could be whatever they wanted me to be. A fun girl, a potential best
friend, someone to tell secrets to over midnight snacks. This type of socializing was just me
playing little roles for a few moments, but when I need to go all in, I can. I can make myself
younger when I want to, opting or looser clothes that hide my body and making my eyes shiny
with dumbness—a whole costume of innocence. I can look older with makeup and carefully
selected clothes, showing skin when necessary. It’s easy because people tend to see what they
want to.
I went door to door. Room 202. “Omigod I love your hair,” I said to a bubbly blonde I
suspect will end up popular.
Room 206. “You’re not brothers, are you?” I said shyly to two boys on the crew team
(nice bodies but baby faces—not my taste). They grinned at me, looked at my boobs, and each
vied to say something clever. Neither was clever.
Room 212 was a pair of awkward girls. I was friendly to them but didn’t linger long
because I knew they would never be key players.
While I met a few more people, I was simultaneously assessing who seemed like they
were going to be part of Greek life. Will was in a frat—SAE—and one of my first orders of
business was to get in with that frat. The crew boys were already in the hallway loudly talking
about going out to a club that night. That was good—an outing, and the crew boys seemed like
they would be the type to pledge a frat. “I love dancing,” I said to what’s-his-name, the taller of
the two, fingering the end of my braid. “It’s the best way to get to know people.” He smiled down
at me, his eyes crinkling. If high school taught me any-thing, it’s that social life is a game that
revolves around navigating hierarchies. Be someone guys want to fuck or you will be invisible to
them. Be someone the girls want firmly tucked into their inner circles, whether as friend or
enemy, or die the death of being totally irrelevant.
Author Bio:
Vera Kurian is a psychologist and writer and a
longtime resident of Washington DC. She has a doctorate in social psychology,
specializing in intergroup relations, political ideology, and quantitative
methods. She has studied fiction at Breadloaf, Sewanee, VONA, and attended
juried workshops at LitCamp, Colgate, Juniper, and the Marlboro Summer Writing
Intensive. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and was a semifinalist
for the Mark Twain Royal Nonesuch Humor Writing Contest.
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| Photo by Fredo Vasquez Photography |
Social Links:
Author Website
Twitter: @vera_kurian
Instagram: @verakurianauthor
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