This book will give you nightmares
I love Sadie Jones and the way in which her book make small family dramas so tense,
Newly weds on an adventure but how much do they know each other.

I cried.

Everything about this book seems explosive. I mean, imagine having a sensation of snake mating under your chair while reading a book...

It's a very twisty book that spins out of the zone of predictable about halfway in.
I can't say I found it super shocking, the word that comes to mind the most is actually beautiful. And this feeling strangely lingers...even after that ending.

It's very atmospheric but not necessarily in a creepy crime genre kind of way. For me, reading this book made me more interested in visiting France than afraid of this scenario potentially playing out on my holidays there.

The writing is simply stellar. An engaging, slow trickle into the unknown...and those snakes. The metaphors and beyond metaphors of what snakes represent to most people - I think these start tickling your curiosity even at the first glance at the synopsis.

Sadie Jones's writing reminded me of Dennis Lehane, especially Since We Fell. Both books seem to have layers of mystery, character building (the battle between who will turn out to be the alpha gender in the end...), the intriguing backdrop that supposedly has little to do with the action plot other than the symbolism (or does it?!) but which serves for a mind-blowing journey because how many thrillers have more layers than just the cliff-hanging stage. And then that I-saw-it-coming-but-REALLY??? ending.

And that's how you score when it comes to creating unforgettable fiction!

Big thank you to Random House UK and Vintage Publishing for gifting me this copy in exchange for my review (that I'm so sorry took this long to get to).

A true summer recommendation to those wishing to visit France in real life, or fictional.

I really enjoyed this book. It was engrossing and original and nothing like I was expecting it to be. I have never read this author before but I will certainly look out for more of her books now.

Wow. This was completely different to the usual offerings. A novel that is dark (think Stephen King) but with the characters and flourish of something much more literary - Edward St Aubyn, perhaps, and especially given the milieu that the characters inhabit. Bea and her husband are happy, or so it seems. They've got just enough money (thanks to the 'cushion' Bea insists on), and are planning a holiday in France. That's when things start to go wrong. We meet Bea's drop-out brother Alex, her dysfunctional parents, the village's bumbling homicide police. By the end of the novel, Hitchcock's psycho would not be out of place. The story is grim, brutal, yet beautifully written and - probably - moral at its core. I hugely enjoyed it (if enjoyed is the word). By the hideous finale, the eponymous and symbolic snakes at the top of the farm house are the least of Bea's problems.

Dan was brought up by his single mother in a South London flat. After his foundation year at art college he marries Bea, he knows there is family money but Bea wants nothing to do with her parents and they settle into life struggling to make ends meet. They decide to go for a trip to Europe, to spend their precious savings and decide what to do with their lives as Bea has made a promise to her brother, they go to stay at his hotel in Burgundy. However nothing is as it seems, the hotel is empty and unfinished, Bea's parents turn up and then Alex disappears.
I loved this book simply because it is so clever and with so many twists and turns. None of the characters is particularly likeable, Bea is self-righteous, Dan easily swayed by the chance of money and the rest of the family is even worse. At the start of the book I thought it was going to be a 'navel-gazing' piece of hard work, it was just not that. There are so many sub currents in the plot - wealth, abuse, values and morals are key but add in racism, poverty and crime and the surface is barely scratched. Although the snakes of the title are present, it more about the ideas that snakes conjure up, the ideas of venom, slippery, shedding skins, suffocation, poison etc, an unusual but very apt set of similes. This is a brilliant novel that begs to be appreciated and I particularly liked the fact that there is no happy ending, how could there be?

An unpredictable and wild ride of a book with so many twists and turns that your senses are completely knocked off course. Like many other readers I found the ending devastating...perhaps that was a triumph or a failure of the novel, I’ll leave you to decide.

Bea and Dan are a newly-married couple living a simple life in south-east London. She has found her calling as a psychotherapist, whilst Dan is an unfulfilled artist, forced to sellout as an estate agent to make ends meet. Dan’s frustrations reach a fever pitch and they decide to take a few months off work to travel Europe. Their first stop is France and Bea’s brother’s hotel which is where their problems really begin. Alex is a recovering addict suffering from depression who lives in a dream world of fake guests rather than the reality of the dilapidated chateau which he has failed to renovate at all. Then Alex and Bea’s parents turn up, who Dan has never met, and he begins to realise that his wife has been keeping some pretty big secrets from him, namely the extent of her family’s wealth. Pretty early on, the reader comes to realise that Alex’s problems stem from more of a poisoned root than just money, a fact which Dan remains ignorant of for the entire novel. Then Alex turns up dead - was it a tragic accident, an inevitable suicide, or something more sinister?

The literal and metaphorical snakes are a heavy theme in the book, alongside the corrupting power of money. Alex’s hotel rooms are named after the deadly sins, which are all central motifs, with each character representing all of them in turn. Jones touches on many contemporary issues, including billionaires attempting to evade tax, beauty, and racism. I found some of the characters to be frankly irredeemable, which made it challenging to really empathise with their plights at times. Dan massively frustrated me but ironically, when I retold the plot to my husband, he felt that his actions were entirely justified. And therein is the real success of the book, it stays with you, haunts you almost, as you keep thinking about the events and themes. My gut feeling is that I hated the ending but, to be totally honest, perhaps the narrative would have lost its power without this. Frustrating, affecting, upsetting and haunting...man, this one gives you all the feels!

A brilliantly tense and original novel. Please buy this and be prepared for a real immersive read. The characters are real and the story compelling.
4/5 on goodreads.

It's tricky to write a review of this one without giving away any spoilers and I would recommend that readers come to this without knowing too much. I am prepared to share that it's an astonishingly good book! The characters are so well drawn, and there is an unsettling air of menace and claustrophobia as soon as Dan and Bea arrive in France and this gets worse and worse as the novel goes on! I found it impossible to stop revisiting the story and its many themes once I'd finished the final page.

I've already started recommending it to all my friends and it would be an excellent choice for a book group. A haunting, memorable read, I loved it!

I absolutely loved The Snakes. I've long been a fan of Sadie Jones' novel but this one is outstanding because it contains all the elements that I loved from her previous novels - domestic detail, atmosphere, narrative, character - but with a splash of Patricia Highsmith. The sense of menace that builds within the novel - the symoblic Snakes in the attic - and the ending are brilliant. Definitely in my top reads of 2019

Thank you to netgalley and Penguin Random House for this e-ARC

I finished reading Sadie Jones' novel 'The Snakes' a while ago and yet I cannot stop thinking about it. It is an outstanding novel and incredibly thought provoking, tackling the very complicated, and corrupt nature of money upon human relationships (particularly familial ones), especially its perversive role of power and controlling those we claim to love (and there is, of course, the unpleasant matter of how the copious amount of money has been earned and at whose disadvantage).

This is such a cleverly crafted novel, Jones' best work so far. The novel is beautifully written, with gorgeous descriptive passages about surroundings and excellently depicted fully rounded complex characters ('His voice was a sandpaper baritone with a diesel boom, consistently aggressive, the difference between a joke and an attack not easily felt out.') and the author a master of pacing and rhythm.

The novel is a horror story where the author unravels concepts of good and evil in great depth and great unease to the reader. The setting is mainly a paradisiacal hotel (whose rooms are aptly named after the Seven Deadly Sins – Dan and Beatrice stay in the Hubris room) set in the idyllic French countryside (their neighbours are cultish Christians with an altarpiece in their barn and who are strange and feel dangerous), and Beatrice and Dan represent a modern-day Adam and Eve (with the male/female roles inverted – Dan is the one attracted to the forbidden fruit while Beatrice represents purity and honesty in her attempt to shrug off the grasping fingers of greed). The literal and figurative snakes slyly slither into their lives (Alex is obsessed with capturing them, Beatrice's encounter with the snake occurs when she has let her guard down and is sleeping). Throughout the novel, we are aware that something is nightmarishly wrong and out of place (and wish Dan and Bea would just leave) but we are drawn to the characters through their revealing conversations (including their views about religion and money) and their predicaments. The final chapters will blow you away, absolutely fantastic writing with a very cinematographic finale.

3.5 stars
The Snakes is quite a strange book. To start with, the genre is undetermined: it's too slow for a thriller and not much is really happening; possibly a family drama. The characters are well drawn out and the writing is atmospheric but on the whole, I thought the story was pretentious and let down but the ending.
Many thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the ARC.

You can rely on Sadie Jones to write good, well-rounded and naturally flawed characters and this novel is no exception.
Psychologist Bea, and her husband Dan, decide to take a few months out travelling but their plans are thwarted by Bea's family. She has tried to keep her life separate from her parents' embarrassingly lavish and borderline-corrupt lifestyle but it was bound to catch up with her, and it does – with consequences.
A fantastically written, slow-burner. It has some potentially triggering themes, including abuse. I'm still reeling from the ending, I know other readers haven't been happy with it but I think I understand it and it wouldn't put me off recommending it to other readers.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read The Snakes in exchange for an honest review.

Much of this book was so well written and intriguing. The actions taken by some characters were unbelievable at times, although I'm quite happy to suspend disbelief for the sake of a good story. However as I realised what lay behind the main characters loathing of her mother, it became slightly appalling and extremely frustrating. Felt cheated by the ending, which did not give the resolution or retribution you might hope for. I know many authors don't like to ties everything up in a bow at the end and this was probably intentional but it did leave me dissatisfied.

Bea and her husband Dan are just about getting by and eking out a living in London. Bea loves her work as a psychotherapist while Dan is desperately unhappy in his estate agent job. Needing a break they decide to visit Bea’s troubled younger brother, Alex, who is apparently running a family hotel in the south of France. When they arrive they find the hotel empty aside from Alex and when Bea’s parents arrive for a visit Dan finds himself caught in a murky maze of family dysfunction mixed with a huge amount of wealth which culminates in a devastating tragedy.

Set in the present day, this really is a novel of our time. Bea and Dan have well paid professional jobs but are just about scraping by while living in London. Dan has all but given up on his dream of becoming an artist and the arrival of Bea’s parents and the realisation of how huge their wealth actually is awakens a huge resentment in him. Dan is a really interesting and pivotal character in the book. Bea’s father, Griff, assumes Dan’s mixed race automatically meant he had a terrible childhood and when Dan spends an uncomfortable afternoon in a police station, followed by a spell in a five star hotel where Griff’s name opens all kinds of doors Dan can see the two forks in the road where his life can go. Bea is blasé about the family money, refusing to touch a penny on principal but Dan starts to see the money as more than security but as a way of earning respect. Bea’s family is hugely dysfunctional and Dan soon learns that such wealth also comes with a horrific price.

This is a really interesting novel that stuck in my head for a few days after I’d finished it. The relationships between the family are quite unsettling and it’s easy to see why the author settled on The Snakes as a title. Two different readers would probably view the characters in different ways and that’s what makes the book so fascinating. The ending was genuinely upsetting too so I’d recommend preparing yourself. Absorbing and complex, this is an excellent novel but a hugely accomplished writer.

I received a ARC from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for a fair review.

I found this a gripping read, with so many layers to peel beneath. The characters were brilliantly drawn, true to life, with flaws and morals or lack of. The focus on greed and the evil money provokes made for a great central theme, looking at the impact on family and loved one that money and power and control all have. Literally a nest of snakes. Thank you for the opportunity to read this.

This book was eloquently written but after investing so much time in this family and its dynamics I feel cheated by the ending.

Bea is making her own way in the world, turning her back on the money and privilege her family could offer but dark deeds within have left her shunning their offerings. Having met the man of her dreams but feeling stuck in a rut they decide to visit her brother, Alex, in France before travelling further into Europe.

The hotel that Alex runs is in disrepair and there is little sign of any visitors. They are enjoying each other’s company when their parents arrive and the consequences of this prove fatal, but who is to blame?

There is no doubt that this author is gifted with words and we are led on a journey of intimate discovery of each of the characters. My heart was in my mouth for the last 30 or so pages and it was therefore somewhat of a disappointment that the ending was so cruelly and abruptly halted. What happened next???

Divided into four parts and set, for the most part, in contemporary Hampstead, Peckham and Paligny, rural France, we follow the lives of millennial Bea (tattooed with a tiny flame to signify her link with Dante’s adored Beatrice) her husband Dan and her addict older brother Alex, whom she loves dearly despite – and perhaps because of – his many shortcomings. He is the only one in the family who has ever been kind to her, she tells Dan.
On the surface, Bea is typical of her age and education. She is a psychotherapist; she worries about the state of the world; she lives in a tiny flat, paying a crippling mortgage; she loves her new husband very much. However, she loathes her parents, Griff and Liv, and will have as little to do with them as possible. They do not attend her wedding; she refuses to share in any of her father’s substantial fortune, and she can hardly bring herself to speak to her mother. As the story develops the reader is able to fully sympathise with her unusual position; Mr and Mrs Adamson’s surname is most apt, reminding the reader of the central character in the bible story about original sin, a story which grows in significance as Bea and Dan arrive in France to stay with Alex.
In Alex’s defunct hotel in Paligny the snakes of the title climb up the creepers and enjoy the safety of the attic. He tries to trap them with little success; indeed one afternoon, Bea falls asleep in the garden, waking to discover one curled up on her belly, asleep itself. No harm is done but the strange atmosphere at the hotel is ominous, unsettling the holidaymakers. It comes as little surprise when the first tragedy of the novel occurs.
Just as the snake in the Garden of Eden is both a snake and a symbol of evil, Sadie Jones explores the nature of evil throughout the novel. We fear for Bea; will she succumb to all the corruption that she’s fought against? Will her husband be tempted by riches he can hardly imagine? Who else will be drawn to Griff’s wealth and Liv’s extravagance? To write more about the actual plot would be to spoil the slow build-up of tension as Bea and Dan begin to understand how little they know of each other. The severity of Griff and Liv’s crimes is finally understood and, whilst neither of them commit murder in person, they both destroy their children. This is a very sad, compelling read. Sadie Jones reminds us that evil is part of life. It is insidious and destructive and those who do evil neither see nor care that this is so.
My thanks to NetGalley and Chatto & Windus for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.

Yes yes yes. An amazingly written, tense and atmospheric novel full of layers and convincing characters. I missed my stop on the way to work so many times whilst reading this, on the edge of my seat until the final devastating moments - I’m still reeling from the ending.

I absolutely adore this an will be recommending to all my friends.

I'd say The Snakes is like a concoction of Virginia Woolf meeting Sally Rooney. It grabs you from the very beginning with its consuming portrayal of a young woman, and the way her interior life is portrayed is especially strong. Super twisty and gripping, I was literally racing through the final chapters as I NEEDED to find out what happened! Sadie Jones has absolutely smashed it and I'll be sure to post about this one.

I recently read Sadie Jones’ excellent Fallout and worried this wouldn’t compete. I was rapidly proved wrong as I became instantly involved in this story about Bea, a young woman trying to escape her rich and toxic family, and her husband Dan, an artist working miserably as an estate agent but respectful of Bea’s insistence on taking nothing from her father. A trip to Europe begins with a stop in France at her brother Alex’s run down, snake infested hotel, closely followed by the (to Bea), alarming news that the parents are coming to stay.. This is a story about money and family, greed and damage. The story moves into thriller territory towards the end, but despite the breathtaking pace, Jones never loses the smaller moments, or the perfection of her characterisation.