Carrie Morris, from Booka in Oswestry, said: "I read it a couple of years ago and it still haunts me. It is one of the most unnerving books that I've read and there's a real sense of menace and horror from the outset... What's so compelling it's clear what has happened and how it's happened- it's the why that the reader wants to know."
But in the Gothic novel a certain imperative applies. A strong tension must be sustained: a movement, preferably quickening and twisting as it advances, that will sweep readers into the very pit of their anxiety and fulfill the implicit promise of the story, which is to deliver them screaming into the final ghastly horror of the thing.
The narrative structure of “See What I Have Done” squanders that tension. There are too many voices and shifts in the time scheme as the novel moves into its final hundred pages. The effect is to undermine the dynamic previously established, both in the Borden household and in Lizzie’s sickening mind... In “See What I Have Done,” Sarah Schmidt has created a lurid and original work of horror. It’s a pity that some of its force has been dissipated by its disorganized and overlong second half.
The blurring of voices and perceptions, particularly between Lizzie and Benjamin, and obsessive repetition of words and symbols only add to the irresistible momentum and fevered intensity of the book: part fairytale, part psychodrama... Schmidt’s unusual combination of narrative suppression and splurge makes for a surprising, nastily effective debut. Neighbours, doctor, police: visitors to the Borden house in the aftermath of the murders react with incredulity. “I don’t think I believe it myself,” says Lizzie.
