Play Book Tag discussion

I am absolutely gutted. Did not expect that AT ALL!

A young woman, Rowan, takes a nanny position with a family with 4 girls ranging in age from 18 Mos. to 14 YO who live in a remote isolated house in Scotland, one that ...if I walked around to the back, I would see a house that had been ripped apart and patched back together with glass and steel.. It's a smart home, completely wired, with an app controlling every thing from locks to blinds to lights and cameras everywhere. It is for sure the creepiest 'home' ever, and I'm very glad I started reading this after I returned home from visiting a friend in her 'smart' home - though decidedly NOT as wired! Hopefully my next visit will be far enough distant that I will have recovered from this read.

From the very beginning you know there is death as Rowan is writing from prison where she is being held for the murder of a child. You know there are secrets; she even tells you there are secrets. But those secrets grow and grow and though the clues are there - oh so very present everywhere - I was so caught up in the story and mood and discomfort of it all that I did not process them. What starts as a pretty straightforward gothic story, familiar, classic, soon becomes much more complex and twisty, then socks you in the solar plexus. Though you think you know exactly where this ends, if you are truly pulled deep into the story, you just don't. Ware pulled one over on me just brilliantly.

Ruth Ware just gets better and better, taking classic crime fiction elements and making them so modern and fresh and new. Truly one of my favorite authors.

I liked the twisty nature of this one as well!

I haven't read this one, and I haven't read Ware in a while. Putting this on the list!

Meli wrote: "I haven't read this one, and I haven't read Ware in a while. Putting this on the list!"

I thought of you often while reading this, Meli!

Theresa wrote: "Meli wrote: "I haven't read this one, and I haven't read Ware in a while. Putting this on the list!"

I thought of you often while reading this, Meli!"

SOLD 🥰
I should see if this is "chick-lit" for a challenge I am doing. Probably, cuz woman 🤬

I remember reading this soon after it was published and really liking it.

I personally would never consider this 'chick lit' but then I don't really know what defines something as 'chick lit' other than a romance dominating to some degree the plot, and that's not really present here.

Ruth Ware has impressed me since her very first book, In a Dark, Dark Wood, though with a few reservations at that and The Woman in Cabin 10, her second book. But with no doubt that here was a major talent in crime fiction. I still have some of her works to read -- only other I've read so far was The Death of Mrs. Westaway which I gave 5 stars last year.

BTW I only read them in print. I rarely listen to audiobooks and I doubt I would ever listen to books like this. I know some have been less than impressed by Ware's work and I wonder how many of those listened to it rather than read it in print. I think there is something about sitting and reading a book like this, completely absorbed, unaware of your surroundings, doing nothing else but reading this story, that absolutely pulls you completely into it and surrounds you with the creepiness and escalating tension.

I'll confess that I had very disrupted sleep last night even though I finished readng a good 4 hours before going to bed. It was definitely in my thoughts.

Chick lit is just a dismissive way to say "women read this" which I fucking hate. I don't think everyone uses it that way, but it is demeaning and useless and there is always a better, more clear descriptive genre name to use. I will rail against that descriptor any chance I get.

I read In a Dark, Dark Wood and was 'meh' on it, but The Death of Mrs. Westaway I loved.

Many a book has been ruined for me by the audio... and it is not because the narrator was bad. Usually even though they're great I just can't follow along and engage like I do with print :(

I am with you on chick lit, Meli. Also the use of women's fiction as I think that is just a PC way of dismissively saying it is chick lit.