Beside Myself

By Ann Morgan

As gripping as Room, as powerful as Elizabeth is Missing, Beside Myself is the story of twin sisters, a childhood game with devastating consequences and the slippery nature of identity

Helen and Ellie are identical twins – like two peas in a pod, everyone says.

The girls know this isn't true, though: Helen is the leader and Ellie the follower.

Until they decide to swap places: just for fun, and just for one day.

But Ellie refuses to swap back...

And so begins a nightmare from which Helen cannot wake up. Her toys, her clothes, her friends, her glowing record at school, the favour of her mother and the future she had dreamed of are all gone to a sister who blossoms in the approval that used to belong to Helen. And as the years pass, she loses not only her memory of that day but also herself – until eventually only 'Smudge' is left.

Twenty-five years later, Smudge receives a call from out of the blue. It threatens to pull her back into her sister's dangerous orbit, but if this is her only chance to face the past, how can she resist?

Beside Myself is a compulsive and darkly brilliant psychological drama about family and identity – what makes us who we are and how very fragile it can be.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Jan 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781408870327

Ann Morgan

Ann Morgan is a freelance writer and editor based in London. Ann's writing has appeared in the Guardian, the Independent, the Financial Times and the New Internationalist. She has sub-edited for publications including Tatler and Vanity Fair. Following the success of her project to read a book from every country in 2012, Ann continues to blog about international literature at ayearofreadingtheworld.com. Her first book, Reading the World: Confessions of a Literary Explorer, was published to great critical acclaim in 2015. Ann Morgan drew on her experiences as a Samaritans volunteer for her powerful portrayal of psychological stress in Beside Myself, which is her first novel. annmorgan.me @A_B_Morgan | #BesideMyself

Reviews for Beside Myself

[carpe_librum · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'm a sucker for a book about twins, and my expectations for an enjoyable read were blown completely out of the water by Ann Morgan in Beside Myself.Twin sisters Helen (bossy) and Ellie (submissive) play a game one afternoon to swap identities, but Ellie won't change back. What happens next is an ever growing divide between sisters and fascinating process of character development and decline.Beside Myself is a suspenseful read and an interesting look at identity and mental illness. I couldn't help but wonder what I would have done in Helen's situation.Beside Myself by Ann Morgan is my favourite book of 2016 so far, although I'm not sure if it can stay at the top for the entire year, let's see.* Copy courtesy of NetGalley *

[sharn_3 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This book is tagged as thriller and psychological thriller, couple that with it being a story being about identical twins (I am an identical twin myself) who swap places (always fun when you're a twin) and I was most certainly reading this book. There may have been psychological aspects but I found nothing thrilling about this book at all so that left me disappointed. Also, there wasn't a character in this book that I liked.The story is told in third person (that's what I remember most but it wasn't all 3rd person, it was odd) and alternates between the past and present which at first, was confusing because there are no labels on the chapters but by the end you expect it. The first 20% or so, I had no idea where the story was headed.As you know from the synopsis, the story is about twins that swap places and then one of them, Ellie, chooses not to switch back.... for the rest of their lives. No way. I'm not buying it. I even said to my husband, "There is no way their mother can't tell." and no way that this can't be proven somehow, someway over the next 30yrs or so. I didn't like the "twist" either, felt shallow and just added insult to injury.

[herschelian · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A prank pulled by six year old identical twin sisters has a lasting effect on their lives and their family.This is a very powerful book, the descriptions of bi-polarity were extraordinarily accute. I did not find this book a 'comfortable' read, but none-the-less I am very glad I read it. A really good first novel.

[nyiper · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Whew....I found myself exhausted with all of the things the author could come up with for "Ellie" so DO to harm herself and others as the book progressed---and yes, mental illness plays a big part in the various players in this novel. I kept reading and hoping...where was this particular twin going----and yet there were still so many pages to go! I'm afraid that it just seemed to me to take an awfully long time to get where we were going and although it was cleverly written and highly detailed, I think I was disappointed overall, wondering what had been accomplished in the end. Very sad story in so many ways and without good solutions---perhaps too similar to real life.

[twink_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I went to high school with a pair of identical twins. It was darn near impossible to tell them apart. They did have different personalities and interests and as time progressed it was quite easy to tell which was which. But, they did like to play games. They would occasionally attend each other's classes, with the teachers being none the wiser and would find great fun in pretending to be the other in social situations.And that's the premise behind Ann Morgan's new book - Beside Myself. Helen and Ellie are twins. Helen is seemingly more intelligent than than Ellie. One day, Helen decides that it would be fun to switch identities for a day to fool people. But when the day is done...Ellie decides that she has no intention of switching back. And no one believes a word Helen says when she insists she is Helen, not Ellie. Turns out Ellie was a little smarter than Helen gave her credit for.But...."If I keep just keep being Helen, I tell myself, then sooner or later the truth will be there for everyone to see." Or will it?When I first saw the synopsis, I was intrigued - I love psychological twisty thrillers. But Morgan's story unfurled in a way I hadn't predicted. The driving force and voice behind Beside Myself is that of the original Helen, now an adult. We are treated to flashbacks of childhood and of original Helen's life as the years go by, told in an erratic timeline.Helen has lived her life as Ellie - the twin not expected to amount to much, with her limited intelligence and her emotional and mental instability. Now living life as her twin, Helen manages to fill Ellie's shoes, descending into a life of drug abuse, mental illness and poverty completely alienated from her family.In the present day, original Ellie is in a coma and her husband is desperate to find her sister, hoping that will help to wake her up. And so the twin's lives will cross paths again. Will the truth ever be revealed?Beside Myself isn't really a thriller, but instead is a exploration and descent into the madness and mind of a severely damaged woman. I found many of the scenes and circumstances difficult to read. Helen is not the only damaged person in her family - Mom has her own issues. This is a dark read, with language and situations that suck the reader into the murk that is Helen's mind and world - a truly scary place.Readers will have to be on their toes in the beginning of the book to keep straight who is talking - it it Helen - or is it Ellie? And you might need to take a break from the intensity of Helen's madness - I had to. But I'm in awe of Morgan's writing and depiction of a mind in chaos. Morgan throws in a nice twist at the end that was unexpected.

[sparemethecensor · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

DNF. Starts so slow. Poorly written. The conceit of the plot is just so implausible. They're six years old. Hard pass for me.

[fictionzeal · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Who am I again? I’m Ellie. No! Maybe I’m Helen. Are you all confused yet? Well, don’t be. Helen and Ellie are twins, although Ellie was painfully shy and Helen was ‘the boss’ of the two. Ellie always followed along with what her sister wanted to do and obeyed everything she told her to do. So, when Helen instructed Ellie to act like her to see if they could fool people, Ellie paid attention and actually got it right. She got it so right that it began to be difficult even for Mom to tell them apart. Now, Ellie kind of liked being in the place of Helen, the smart one and the popular one, and decided that’s whose identity she would keep … with devastating consequences for Helen. After the girls are grown at the outset of the novel, one is mentally challenged, to say the least, and the other is in a coma. Will you be able to tell which one is which?At we read, we’re understanding things primarily from Helen’s perspective. The chapters alternate between when Helen and Ellie were six years old to some twenty years later. It begs the question of children being molded into the role of how they are labeled by parents; family; adult friends; and teachers. For instance, if we are called ‘lazy’ or ‘clumsy’ when we are children, do we make those labels fit as we grow up? Perhaps the extent to which Helen was changed, as a result of their identity switch, is a bit overdramatic but the concept for fictional purposes makes this a very gripping and interesting psychological thriller. The author, Ann Morgan, does a great job of getting into the head of Helen and making us believe it is all possible. Rating: 4 out of 5.

[susan.macura · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The first thing the reader must do is plow through the very slow start to this tale. The second thing the reader must do is get beyond the unbelievable story line – that twin sisters trade places as a game to fool their parents, but when the twin who is the weaker of the two refuses to trade back, the stronger twin is then forced to accept the identity and treatment generally given to that weaker sibling. This book traces their route to adulthood, complete with mental illness and self-medication attempts, as they are forced to finally confront this lifetime lie when the “star” of the family is in an accident that puts her in a coma. While there are quite a few unbelievable moments, there are some interesting twists on the road to a final understanding of what it means to be human.