Kristin's Bookshelf

📖 The Housemaid
✏️ By Freida McFadden
🎧 Narrated by Lauryn Allman
⭐️⭐️⭐️✨

Freida stans… don’t come at me.

I went into this completely blind. I haven’t seen the movie adaptation or had anyone spoil the plot, and I fully expected this to be a five-star Freida read. While I definitely enjoyed it, it didn’t quite live up to some of her other books for me. Maybe I just had too high of expectations. 🤷‍♀️

As over-the-top as the premise is, I found it surprisingly predictable. It also reminded me a lot of “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle”. Granted, I haven’t seen that movie in over 30 years, but I distinctly remember a nanny, a cheating spouse, a wife being portrayed as unstable, and a handyman. Maybe my memory is filling in the gaps, but I couldn’t help noticing the similarities.

That said, the thriller elements were fantastic. Once the story picked up, I was completely invested in seeing how everything would unfold.

Where it lost me was the character development. Millie and Andrew’s relationship went from zero to sixty with almost no buildup. One minute she’s his employee, and the next they’re in love. I wanted more chemistry, more tension, and honestly, I just hate the cheating spouse trope.

Nina was another character I couldn’t quite figure out. At times I felt sorry for her, and at others I found her incredibly selfish. Her daughter was equally difficult to like. I understand the attempts to explain her behavior, but without something more substantial behind it, she just came across as unnecessarily cruel to Millie.

In the end, Enzo was the only character I consistently liked, although I couldn’t help thinking he could have stepped in sooner.

Overall, I had a great time listening, but this wasn’t one of Freida’s strongest books for me.

#TheHousemaid #FreidaMcFadden #AudiobookReview #ThrillerBooks #Bookstagram