My first ever Freida McFadden read, and I am hooked already. The setup, the red herrings, the twists: This was the perfect book to start my addiction to McFadden’s twisted storytelling style.

The Housemaid is the first in a set of three stories following Millie, a housemaid with a secretive past, looking to start over and put her previous choices behind her. She begins working for high-class Nina Winchester, who is shrill, obsessive, and deeply unappreciative of her handsome, doting husband Andrew. After an ominous warning from sexy gardener, Enzo, Millie starts to notice some of Nina’s strange tendencies and even begins to get a little too close to her boss’s husband in the process. As Millie falls harder for Andrew, her hatred for Nina’s personality grows until her entire employment is flipped on its head and she starts to see that both Nina and Andrew might not be the people she thought they were. With Enzo’s help, Millie learns the truth about Nina and Andrew and decides she has to make things right before it’s too late for everyone.

The pros: The pacing is fantastic, and I’m saying that after reading the entire book in one sitting. I felt like the development of Millie and Andrew’s relationship was paced really well without giving away much of the twist, and the POV shift between Millie and Nina was shocking and unique to my previous thriller novels.

I also really appreciated the way the twists were set up throughout the book, another nod to the pacing. I love a good double twist ending, but rarely do I see the first one revealed halfway through the book. With the narrator change, I was already shocked at the revelation that came with it, but it was a clever way to trick me into letting my guard down, making the second (third?) plot twists at the end even more surprising. The full-circle reveal with the police officer was extremely satisfying. IYKYK

The cons: For some people, torture can be a bit of a turn-off. Without revealing too much of the twist ending, I will say that this book does contain torture scenes (inflicted upon characters both deserving and undeserving of torture), which I was not expecting or prepared to read. The same can be said for the small bit of smut– if you weren’t looking for it, you definitely wouldn’t expect to find it in the middle of this thriller.

I wanted more from Enzo, which I eventually got in books #2 and #3, but this one as a stand-alone left me confused how important he really was. Nina’s daughter, Cecelia, was also a confusing addition for the first half of the story, and while her role did impact my perception of Nina, because I am also a mom, I found her irritating. I wouldn’t necessarily say these characters were useless, but because the story was so Millie-involved until the second half, I did wonder a few times what I was missing about these two, or if Enzo was really just there as a red herring.

This book was a great refresher for me. I typically stick to romantic comedies and thrillers, so this was a nice mixture of both with all of the best parts of each. I immediately read both follow-up books, which speaks to how addicting McFadden’s characters are to the reader, and I have every intention of slowly making my way through her other books as well. The actual readability of it is easy to read and follow without becoming predictable or overly cheesy. This one was good enough to convince me to… loan it out to a friend (a sin to many book hoarders like myself). She loved it too.

My rating: 4.25 out of 5 stars

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