Sob Story by Carol Anne Davis was both a dark and disturbing thriller that I found quite riveting. Not a perfect read, there were some flaws, but over all I was quite impressed and would definitely read another book by this author.

Amy is a shy, socially inept young woman who is away from home attending university. As many of her problems stem from her being on the verge of anorexia, she avoids any social gathering where food is being served. Being lonely, she jumps at the chance to become pen-pals with a young man who is serving a prison term, she doesn’t even take the time to consider that a seven year prison term for a act of violence against a woman is quite serious and could have repercussions. Of course Jeff, the prisoner, is writing to Amy and telling her exactly what she wants to hear, all the while making plans to visit her upon his upcoming release.

The author imparts a fair amount of information about eating disorders and at times this abundant information causes the story to bog down, but it does help the reader to understand Amy and her motives. In the same way, we learn a great deal about the prison system and Jeff‘s background which also helps to explain his deviant behaviour. In the end this book was not the action packed read I thought is going to be but it was a convincingly creepy psychological thriller that I found quite gripping. ( )