‘It was the face of a woman who has come momentarily untethered from all of the vital positions and landmarks of her life, a woman who has forgotten not only the memory she was in the process of recounting but memory itself. He had once toured a mental asylum…’

The sheer terror and suspense of Misery left me speechless with shock during the entire reading experience. Bestselling writer Paul Sheldon has a car accident and wakes to find he is crippled. Soon after he realises he has been kidnapped by Annie Wilkes. From their first encounter Paul sees something amiss in Annie Wilkes’ behaviour and believes she is mentally unstable. His legs are broken, being confined to his bed, and he is addicted to the painkillers she feeds him. In his delirious state, she has him in thrall. Indeed Paul soon sees what happens when he contradicts Annie or awakens the ‘Dragon Lady’. What does Annie Wilkes want? Well, she’s the number one fan of his Misery books, and she can’t wait for him to write another one. This new book will be a single-copy special edition, dedicated to her. After all … she did take care of him, rescuing him from his car after the accident, and of course she loves him, right?

Seeing the breadth of the terror Annie embodied and how it affected Paul was one of the most thrilling parts of Misery. Annie’s sadistic nature and sly intellect grow with each part, and you’re left feeling as helpless as poor Paul. Just when you think things can’t get any worse, they do. Throughout, Paul has to tread carefully if he is to keep his life; she’s threatened to kill him on more than one occasion, and he sees it as dangerous to go against her. All the while he is bringing back to life a character he killed at the end of his Misery series, Misery Chastain, in his new novel Misery’s Return.

In many ways Misery is the story of a writer fighting against fears and paralysing impossible situations to come up with new ideas and find the will to write the story you feel like writing, and want to write.