This particular book, "See What I Have Done" is written by Sarah Schmidt and will be released August 2017.

It has been touted and reviewed as being one of the Fall Blockbusters, but I see that as wishful thinking. The book offers a twist on the tale of Lizzie Borden and her little killing spree.

There are only so many ways you twist the 4-line poem below into something fresh and new. That boat has sailed. The story has been told in various TV shows, movies and a few real-life stories (the Menéndez brothers in California).

There is nothing new under the son regarding the tale of Ms Borden and her homicidal activities. If you're looking for something original, this is not the next big thing in the literary world. I give it 1/5 ⭐️'s only because the cover art is pretty good.

Below is the plot for "See What I Have Done"...

"Lizzie Borden took an axe
And gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one."

This book got so many good reviews and my curiosity was definitely piqued. However, it just didn't do it for me. I think the combination of multiple points of view, lack of chronology, and purposefully disjointed narrative from most (if not all) of the characters was just one thing too many. Two of the three might have been ok, but this was just too loosely held together and I felt like I was scrambling around picking up pieces rather than looking at a finished whole. So just not for me.

The words seem to vibrate from the page, conjuring a hallucinatory miasma of astute psychological and physical detail. I loved the way the author passed to and fro from the minds of the four main characters – the younger generation in this long-lingering, ever-fascinating tale of mystery and murder.

While I enjoyed the characters and the overall purpose of the novel, See What I Have Done, an atypical murder mystery, the same elements I liked, ended up obscuring my general enjoyment by the end.

I absolutely love the cover art for this book, both versions I have seen (the pear and the pigeon). It perfectly encapsulates the point and nuance of the story. Therefore, I am going to use the cover as a way to talk about the two things I liked about this book: the characters, and the purpose of the novel.

This is not a gory recreation of the crimes, it is a story that delves into the memories of those involved with the crime. (While there is not a great deal of gore, there is an extreme amount of sensory descriptions, smell and feel, that could cause a stomach to turn over). While there could have been a picture of an axe, or splatters of blood, instead it chooses to be understated and to have a sinister feeling to it once you’ve read it. This book does not thrive on the details of the court case or even of the murder itself, instead placing emphasis on the events that came before and afterwards. The manipulation of time and memories throughout the novel is done in a way that subtly juxtaposes these experiences and ghosts.

Instead of an axe that puts the focus of the book squarely on the crime, the covers are of a pear and a pigeon. By taking the focus away from the actual murder, Schmidt instead explores the characters: Lizzie, Emma, Benajmin, and Bridget. Without giving us any answers, or culprits, Schmidt instead highlights the struggles, strife, and desires of all of them. By giving them history, in our own way, we can identify them as suspects, never knowing if that one slight, that represented the release of the dam, could be responsible for the murder of Mr. and Mrs. Borden.

One of the most disturbing narratives, to me, was Lizzie. There is a childish immaturity within her personality that is coupled with a morbid curiosity. Being able to peer within her thoughts makes me realize why she would be the prime suspect, but Schmidt does not allow us to walk away with easy answers. Instead Schmidt focuses on other ‘suspects’ and allowing us to witness that day from various angles.

However, hidden beneath what I enjoyed in the novel, is what mainly hindered my enjoyment. While I appreciated the memories behind each character, at the same time I felt like I was lost within a sea of pasts and ghosts. Reading through the book made some moments drag and the frequent interspersion of these moments made me need to reread the passages to witness that events of the present.

Overall, the detailed setting and history of each character, served as both a positive and negative, obscuring the view of the day for its readers. That being said, the level of intrigue generated by the memories and Schmidt’s careful ability to point the spotlight of blame on each, is one of the highlights of the book.

“Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one.”

Told from the perspectives of Lizzie, her older sister Emma, Bridget, the family maid, and a mysterious character called Benjamin, who arrived in Fall River with the girls’ Uncle John Morse, See What I Have Done offers an interesting insight into the daily lives of the Borden family and shows how truly dysfunctional they were. Lizzie was a master manipulator, and poor Emma was always at a disadvantage when Lizzie decided she wanted something.

It’s always fascinated me how someone was able to hack two people to death with an axe, without anyone hearing or seeing anything. Sarah Schmidt does a great job of exploring each character, giving new insight into this infamous cold case.

3 stars--I liked the book. (5 stars for that cover though. I love it, and it's perfect for this story!)

This is the second or third novelization of the Borden murders I've read, and definitely my favorite. This is a very visceral book; everything having to do with the senses is emphasized. (And none of it is good.) Especially scents and tastes are described so graphically that I could imagine every one--and they made me shudder.

For the Borden household is not a happy place. From the days-old mutton soup, to the scent of rotten pears, to the tang of blood, everything in this house is described so perfectly you'll feel like you're there. (But you won't want to be!) Lizzie herself is fascinating in this account; she is definitely suffering from some sort of personality disorder. The rest of the family, too, seem stunted by unhealthy relationships and their own personal failings.

Is Lizzie guilty? I'm not sure we'll ever know, but as for this book's conclusion, I'm not going to spoil it!

I received this review copy from the publisher on NetGalley. Thanks for the opportunity to read and review; I appreciate it!

This book is set in 1892 and is a fictional account of the murder trial of the infamous Lizzie Borden who was convicted of killing her father and stepmother. The story is told from four viewpoints Lizzie's, Emma her older sister, Benjamin a man hired by the girls uncle, and Bridget the maid. This is a dark, disturbing tale of a troubled family. It's well written and informative but I found it hard to keep my attention in parts.

Pick this one if you've always heard the Lizzie Borden chant and wondered about the rest of the story. What a dysfunctional family! Schmidt has done a good job of bringing the whole thing to life, with all the unsavory aspects of the situation. This was better than I'd hoped, in large part because of the writing. Reimagined events are sometimes frustrating because you want to know where the truth really lies but I didn't have that problem here. Good job- thanks to Edelweiss for the ARC.

I am fascinated by the story of Lizzie Borden and the murders she was accused of committing. This book sounded like it would be a thrilling piece of historical fiction with what could have happened on that fateful day. Theoretically, it did deliver on that just far, far from the "thrilling" part. The narrative jumps between four characters--Bridget, the maid; Emma, Lizzie's older sister; Lizzie herself; and some random street thug--primarily around the days before, during, and after the murders. I just didn't find any of these voices particularly compelling, not even Lizzie's. The author does lay a very thick environment with a Borden household described as awful and oppressive, but other than being told this information, there really isn't much the reader actually sees. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop--were there beatings, emotional abuse, etc? Nothing reared itself to help show this cloying and weird environment. Then there's just the gross level with lurid descriptions of vomit, eating blood, keeping a piece of bloody skull for years, and even more blood licking. There's also a fascination with pears (and the ad nauseum descriptions about sticky juice) that I'm sure is probably symbolic of something, but that was entirely lost on me. I was hoping for a much different, and much better, story in the end.

This is the first time I had not been able to finish a book I had requested, I feel awful, but I did not like this story, it did not hold my interest at all. I am sure the author is talented and others perhaps love this, but I feel truly sorry I just could not finish it. I know the story thr book is based on and it has always been iinteresting but this book just did not hook me. I am so sorry.

A good book for this author's first. A nice story but without much mystery or suspense. The writing a bit choppy as she moved the narrative from one character to another. A rather flat ending.

In the annals of murder and horrific crimes, one that seems to have persisted through history is the story of Lizzie Borden and the murders committed when her parents were horribly killed by someone wielding an ax.

What Ms Schmidt has done in her novel is to try to work her way into the minds and hearts of the principal characters present in that event. What she has created is an atmospheric presence of both macabre horror and the development of the principal characters that is mesmerizing and frightening.

Lizzie Borden, the younger of the two sisters, is the prime focus of both the novel and the murder investigation. The author portrays her as a manipulative person walking the line between a type of insanity and normalcy. She is a forever child even though at the time of the murders she was thirty-two. She positions herself as always being ever so demanding as if she never really went beyond the age of a seven year old. Her needs were huge and she demanded her sister Emma's attention and was resentful if others veered away from her wants.

Her father was seen as a brute, abusive and controlling while establishing a love hate relationship with his offspring and his second wife, Abby. Lizzie's relationship is cold just like the feeling one got from the way the household was structured. There was always something sinister dwelling in this loveless abode.

The characters are interwoven in this harrowing tale told from the perspectives of Bridget, the maid, Emma, Lizzie, an uncle, and a character named Benjamin who might have been the murderer or who it is forwarded was possibly hired to do Mr Borden harm.

This atmospheric novel was well done, creating the Gothic, frightening scene within the house where murder most foul was done. Did Lizzie Borden commit this atrocity against her parents or was it someone else? One perhaps will never know as Lizzie escaped prosecution largely because of her being a woman. Was Lizzie the ultimate manipulator? Was she the person who killed so wantonly? One thing is for sure Lizzie Borden's name has gone down in history as perhaps being the most vile murderess of her time. She has become a most frightening person and Ms Schmidt, in her debut novel, has done justice to a character who has occupied people's mind for quite a long time. Did Lizzie take that ax and give her mother forty whacks and then proceed to her father and give him forty-one? One will always wonder if indeed she did.

Thanks you to NetGalley and Atlantic Monthly Press for an advanced copy of this book for an unbiased review.

I have never heard about Lizzie Borden before but because this book is based on a true story I was very interested. And I could not have been more disappointed. I was so looking forward to reading "See What I Have Done" and wanted to like it so, so bad, but it just didn't work for me. The atmosphere throughout the whole book was so unpleasant that I couldn't wait to finally finish it. Not much was happening and now that I'm done with the book I'm no wiser than I was after the first chapters. I can't give it more than 2 stars and I'm even tempted to take another star off for all the descriptions of vomit.
Nevertheless I want to thank NetGalley, Atlantic Monthly Press and Sarah Schmidt for the free ebook in exchange for an honest review.

This novel, coming out August 2017, is a novelization of the Lizzie Borden story. This story focuses on the other surrounding characters to the drama: Lizzie's sister, Emma; a housemaid, Bridget; a young local boy, Benjamin; and the Borden's uncle, John. Overall, a pick. But, TBH, I would have enjoyed a little more blood and drama ;-)

I received an advanced copy of this novel from the publisher, via netgalley, in exchange for an honest review. Thanks!

Well-written and thoroughly engrossing - the kind of book you can't stand to put down. Perfect for summer!

I really thought, when I requested Sarah Schmidt’s first novel, See What I Had Done, that it would be the book I talked about all summer. It was compelling and entertaining certainly, but it fell short of what I had hoped for.

See What I Have Done is a fictionalised account of the sensational murder trial of Lizzie Borden, who was accused in 1892 of killing her father and stepmother. The novel is narrated from four perspectives: Lizzie’s own vague and troubled account of the day of the murders; Emma, her older sister, who has returned home and tells us about the darker side to her younger sister; Bridget, the Irish maid who has fought with Lizzie’s stepmother about her wish to leave her employment; and Benjamin, a mysterious stranger who has been watching the house.

I really enjoyed the first three quaters of the novel, as the events of the day slowly unfolded from four narrators who seem to be keeping the whole truth from us, but after taking a few days away from the book I just couldn’t get back into it. It began as creepy and compelling and though the end was strong, these qualities were not sustained throughout the novel. The book is startlingly similar in premise to Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, which is also the story of a sensational murder trial of a woman in the 19th century in America, and to Burial Rites, where the story of the accused murderess takes place in 18th century Iceland. All of these novels are strong in their own way, but since I only read them all in the past few months I felt that they were too similar, and that See What I Had Done didn’t live up to my high expectations.

Although a jury of her peers found Lizzie Borden not guilty of the murders of her father and stepmother, Andrew and Abby Borden, the court of public opinion found her guilty as charged. The mystery behind these brutal murders continues to this day, almost a full 125 years since it happened, while scholars continue to try to figure out the truth. Of course, a good historical mystery is exactly the type of fodder to feed any good that fiction writer's imagination. No wonder Schmidt takes this story on, and gives it an angle that makes the few facts available even more sinister than the legend or this memorable gruesome poem.

Lizzie Borden with an axe
gave her mother forty whacks;
when she saw what she had done
gave her father forty-one.

Think what you will, but the only thing in that little rhyme that is provably accurate is that Abby died before Andrew. Schmidt seemingly took the popular view of these events, and with it, built up a psychological thriller of a novel, looking at the events through the eyes of four characters - three real people and one fictional person. Lizzie is the primary narrator here, with her sister Emma and the maid Bridget filling out the last of the real individuals here. With them, Schmidt adds someone called Benjamin, a drifter hired by John Morse (the girl's biological mother's brother), ostensibly, to teach Andrew a lesson because of how poorly he treated his daughters. Schmidt allows each of these characters to tell their own story, in alternating chapters.

Before you dismiss this book as overly macabre and morbid, I will remind you that (as my regular readers will know), I don't usually read crime or adventure novels. However, this really isn't one of those; it's much more of a psychological study. To be precise, what Schmidt has done here is get into the heads of these people, and through their thoughts, we learn first about their states of mind, and with them, events surrounding the murders with some flashes back into their pasts. For example, in the parts focusing on Lizzie, every so often Schmidt adds the line "The clock on the mantle ticked ticked" (hence, the title of this review). With these repetitions of that one line, it slowly becomes an ominous and hypnotizing statement, with each recurrence. Doing this gives us the feeling that Lizzie's mental state is far from normal. Despite this, Schmidt also includes are flashes of clarity in Lizzie's mind, which makes us wonder if her condition (call it sanity, if you will) is increasingly deteriorating or just some kind of an act.

With Benjamin, the one fictional character, Schmidt takes another approach altogether. Here is a man with a purpose both to and within the story. Benjamin gives us insight into John in general, as well as into his relationship with his nieces, and with Andrew and Abby. More importantly, because of John's malicious intent for sending Benjamin to the Borden home, both John and Benjamin then become suspects in the murders, a theory that comes totally out of Schmidt's vivid imagination.

What brings all of this together is Schmidt's writing style throughout this novel, which I found both fascinating and disturbing. While on the one hand Schmidt gives each of her characters very distinctive voices, she also instills in all of them some level of discomfort. Bridget's distress starts out as annoyance in her treatment as an employee, and later the inability to cope with the double murder. Benjamin expresses more anger than anything else, which adds to the pain from the injury he has when Schmidt introduces him to the story. Emma's anxiety focuses mostly on Lizzie, as well as her guilt at trying to leave her sister behind and escape this toxic family. Lizzie's narrative, on the other hand, constantly moves between strangely erratic to a type of sinister playfulness. Into all this, Schmidt intertwines the text with dark, poetic metaphors (including quite a few involving sticky-sweet pears) that further contribute to the overall eerie and Gothic atmosphere.

One might think that this would make for a novel that is overly depressing or disturbing, rather than a gripping or forceful read (can you call a book you've read on Kindle a "page turner?"). Thankfully, the descriptions of blood and the bodies were somewhat less gruesome than they could have been, most probably because of the lyricism of Schmidt's prose. Despite all this, while I think Schmidt gave us a lusciously written, masterfully riveting novel (no small achievement for a debut work), something is preventing me from giving it a full five stars, and I can't put my finger on it. Maybe it's because this book (unpleasantly) haunted me, and maybe I'm ashamed of my own morbid curiosity, I'm not sure. All I know is, I couldn't stop reading it, and for that, I'll highly recommend it with a very strong four and a half stars out of five.

DNF...I feel a though I have read, or read something very similar before. The writing style felt very familiar, could not get into it.

Yikes! This was an unsettling book. Definitely one of those "oh my God, why did I wait until 11:30pm to start this, this book is so creepy and weird, I should definitely wait until daylight and read it in a public place but at the same time I have to finish it otherwise I'll be up all night being creeped out & wondering what will happen next" kind of books.
Super highly recommend-- I will 100% be recommending it to everyone I know. A+ read.