Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an advance copy of this ebook to review. Ruth Ware is one of those authors that lands on many people's automatic read lists. This one was no different but the more I read of Ruth Ware, the more I expect from it. I think this book could have been better.

Ruth Ware is the queen of page turning thrillers. I've read a few of her other books and this one stands amongst some of her best work. I needed to figure out what was going on, so I definitely read this in one sitting. So many twists and turns.

I really liked this one. Everyone has secrets, and become paranoid about them especially with a house completely controlled by technology.

I really liked the idea of how more self aware and scared you can become by feeling like you are being watched all the time.

4 stars out of 5.

Nice and creepy, as expected from the author. I really enjoyed the story. Highly recommended.

Truthfully, I was very disappointed in this novel. I had expected great things from Ruth Ware, and this novel did not live up to the hype, in my opinion.

The pacing of this novel was very confusing. It was a quick read for me, but that could be because I am a fast reader in general (especially at a time like the one we are currently living in). However, I was very engrossed in the story and constantly wanted to know what was going on. I was genuinely scared at times, and had to flip my lights on during some chapters when I was getting creeped out - especially because I read this book over the span of two late nights!
Something I did enjoy was the writing style. This book is written in letters to a potential lawyer that Rowan, the protagonist, wants to use for her trial. She is essentially convincing him to come and help her case. However, I wish the letters were a bit shorter and more urgent sounding. It read as if she was just re-telling her side of the story, when in reality, I wish she would have done more convincing.
Another thing I really enjoyed was the ending. Believe it or not, at around the 75% mark, I saw it coming, but I enjoyed how Ruth Ware revealed it, and specifically how she wrote it. However, the main plot twist pertaining to the main character and the real reason why she applied to be their nanny I did not see coming at all!
I think what it came down to was the fact that I did not care about any of the characters. I am not someone who needs to read about likeable characters, in fact, I am a big fan of unreliable and unlikeable narrators. In this particular book, since I did not care about any of the characters, I found it hard to emotionally care about the plot line and the events that happened.
Overall, I gave this book a 2.25/5 stars. I do not understand all of the hype surrounding this novel, but I hope her 2020 release makes up for my thoughts on this one! Thanks to Simon and Schuster Canada for sending an eARC of this book my way!

Ruth Ware's ability to hook you into a story from the first chapter makes her books the perfect option for getting through a "book slump". The Turn of the Key begins when Rowan answers a job ad for a live-in nanny at Heatherbrae House, which turns out to be a beautiful “smart” home in the Scottish Highlands. She quickly realizes the downsides of this extensive modern technology, when she is under constant scrutiny from cameras installed throughout the house (in lieu of the mysteriously absent adults), and when loud music starts blasting in the middle of the night and lights are turned on and off sporadically.

As if that wasn't spooky enough, we find out at the beginning of the book, from her letters to her lawyer, that the story ends with a child dead and Rowan awaiting trial for murder.

I really loved the atmospheric setting Ware created with this story... is there anything better to read on a stormy day than a page-turning mystery with such a creepy setting? I was completely immersed in the story and couldn't put it down; even though I suspected the ending, I thoroughly enjoyed the reading experience!

This book was a slow start for me but it really started to build in the middle. I liked how it layered together and you weren’t sure what was going to happen next. The only thing I didn’t like was how it finished. There were so many unanswered questions at the end.

I always really enjoy books by Ruth Ware; I find her writing style to be easy; like a creepy beach read. Something you can pick up, enjoy and finish before the end of the day. I loved everything about this book until the ending! Please! An alternate ending is needed!

I’m a huge fan of Ruth Ware, but I have to admit that this book doesn’t compare to how much I loved The Woman in Cabin 10.

It was a very slow-paced read, there was barely any action and I felt like it was dragging on. The book did pick up near the end but overall, it was kind of excruciating to read.

I still gave this book 4 stars, so there are other things I quite enjoyed! Firstly, you can always count of Ruth Ware to deliver an atmospheric vibe! A super technological advanced mansion in the middle of the woods? Yes please. That definitely increased the creepiness factor.

I also really enjoyed the creativity of the writing. The book was narrated by letters written by the main character, as she was sending them to a solicitor in hopes that he would help get her out of jail. Super creative! I’ve never seen anything like that done before.

Finally, I loved the unpredictable twists and the great ending! The ending wasn’t a complete surprise, but I still really enjoyed it. Again, my biggest complaint is how slow-paced this book was.

I did receive an e-arc of this book originally and started reading as an eBook. But I struggled to get into the book and didn't get into the book until after it was released. I ended up listening to the audiobook from my library which was a bit easier to get into. I do love the narrator Imogen Church, who narrated the audiobook of Gilly Macmillan's "I Know You Know", which one of my fav thriller audiobooks. Not gonna lie the possibility of this kind of smart home, creeps me out because technology should not control that much of your life. I did somewhat predict one of the plot points that was revealed at the end but the journey of this book was a weird twisted ride. Some of the plot points were so unbelievable the children were at times quite terrible to the nanny and the parents tended to leave out things despite the mom making a huge binder full of information. There were times that I was listening where I was genuinely creeped out because it was at nighttime and Ronan was alone in a big dark house with creepy noises and lights that randomly flash. Not my favourite Ruth Ware novel (that will always be The Death of Mrs. Westaway) but was interesting and did pull me in. There was a big info dump for the ending and some of the stuff said I was like "WTF" but there was also some heartwarming things too.

I think this book was quite different from eveything I have read before. The story is the one oh Rowan, a Young nanny accused of Killing a lillte girl she was caring for. We slowly learn everything that happened in the form of letters she sends to a lawyer she wants to defend her. There is a very mysterious aspect in this book, the house she lives in having a reputation of being haunted. I loved the mystery, I loved the characters, the mystery surrouding the house, but I have to give it 3 stars, because having now finished it...i have to say i was a bit disapointed by the ending… It's a personnal comment, i am pretty certain that many people will love the ending, but for me, it was not as spectacular as I was expecting.

This book is terrifying when you have a baby, and it will rip your soul out. Readers beware, Ruth Ware writes cryptic and hard novels designed to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Ruth Ware has done it again with her newest book and I loved it. I think it is one of my favourites by her now and I highly recommend.

I wasn't too sure about it when I first started as I had heard mixed reviews, but I'm glad I picked it up! The ending as well, total plot twist and was surprising to me.

Thank you for the opportunity to read and review The Turn of the Key.

ARC kindly provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I read this back in August and I have been having such a hard time reviewing this because I don’t know how I feel about it, I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t enjoy it much either.

The novel started off intriguing and then it just fell pretty flat for me, I had a hunch about half of the things that happened and the ending didn’t make much sense to me.

I have a hard time recommending this because i’m not sure what type of audience would enjoy this but, if you would like to try this I would suggest you do, because I have seen lots of other reviews raving about this book.

I don’t think Ruth Ware is an author for me, I believe I have only read two of her books but this one wasn’t very enjoyable and the other one I had to DNF.

Creepy and suspicious just like any other Ware novel. Once again I found myself hooked on Ware’s words and story eagerly turning each page anxious to know what happens next. Ends with a classic Ware twist!

One of my favorite thrillers of the year! Unusual setting, super creepy, surprising, I didn't expect the twist at all. I recommend it!!

The Turn Of The Key Review

I really enjoyed this one. I’m definitely a fan of Ruth Ware. She leaves you wanting desperately to know what happened. I enjoyed Rowan as a character. I loved the description of the house! I found it very discombobulating which really added to the creepiness of the story. It wrapped up nicely. I would definitely recommend this one!

When Rowan stumbles across an ad for a live-in nanny, she’s looking for something else completely. But it seems like too good an opportunity to miss—with a staggeringly generous salary. And when she arrives at Heatherbrae House, she is smitten—by the luxurious “smart” house fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family.

What Rowan doesn’t know is that she’s stepping into a nightmare—one that will end with a child dead and Rowan in prison awaiting trial for murder.

I side-eyed Ruth Ware’s The Turn of the Key because it nods at James’s “The Turn of the Screw,” one classic I’ve abhorred since I had the misfortune to read it in a 19th century lit class. I hate James’s twisted, labyrinthine sentences, his dunce of a narrator, and the creepy setting. I like my gothic with a good streak of romance, like Jane Eyre, and female protagonists with a brain in their head, like Jane, like Stewart’s, Kearsley’s, and St. James’s. But I’d heard and read reviewers and Twitter friends praise Ware’s The Woman In Cabin 10 and The Death of Mrs. Westaway that I wanted to try one of her books. In The Turn of the Key, I got a fairly satisfying hybrid between atmospheric James and contemporary feminist gothic. Had the first-person narrator/voice been anything like James’s governess, I would’ve DNF-ed. As it stands, narrator Rowan Caine is what you’d get if Bridget Jones was trapped in a horror-gothic-thriller, which made her a heck of a lot more likeable than the anonymous prig James created.

Ware’s Key opens with Rowan writing to barrister Mr. Wrexham from her cell in HMP Charnworth after being convicted of killing one of her former employers’ children. Rowan recounts how she came to be arrested, tried, and convicted in the hope that Mr. Wrexham, with a reputation for acquitting the “no-hopes”, will take on her case. Her letters describe how Rowan came to work for the Elincourts and was broken by the mysterious goings-on in their Highlands-set, gothic, renovated-uber-mansion, Heatherbrae House: creaking footsteps, smart-home insanity, Alexa gone rogue, fractious, peevish children, and one sexy handyman/groundskeeper, Jack Grant. Frankly, the only sympathetic character in the lot of them is Rowan herself, a sane voice amidst the twistedness of the rest of the characters, though I like the descriptions of Jack’s muscles moving beneath his t-shirt (once a romance reader, always a romance reader).

Ware’s checks off her gothic boxes well. You start by isolating your protagonist sufficiently to ensure the heeby-jeebies for narrator and reader alike. Rowan’s employers, Bill and Sandra Elincourt, mum with four who also runs an architectural firm with her husband and renowned architect. They’ve lost nanny after nanny and promptly hire Rowan, who’d been working in a daycare till now, “Little Nippers”. The moment Rowan arrives from the train station with handyman Jack and the Elincourts’ Tesla, Bill and Sandra leave for a conference the next day. Rowan’s thrown into the brat-fray right away and the confusing smart-home surveillance features, going on and off in various out-of-whack-ways, make sleeping, eating, and being normal near-impossible.

The house itself is a masterfully-rendered setting because, despite its smart-home efficiency, it’s a stranger mixture of the renovated and abandoned. There are doors, stairs, and rooms that were never touched full of creepy, mysterious detritus from the house’s history. There are rumours of child-parent ick, of love gone wrong, of poisonings, and haunted and haunting grief. There is a heritage “poison garden” that is locked and unlocked on mysterious occasions. Poor Rowan is bug-eyed from lack of sleep, four little nasties, and the charade she’s set herself up to play as the “perfect nanny” when all she wants to do, Bridget-Jones-style, is smoke a fag, eat chips, and wear her PJs all day long.

Ware’s novel was an utter page-turner and I sacrificed precious work time to reach the end. Even so, having finished, I have the nauseous feeling I always get when I read a book written to elicit that very response from me. It was clever, well-written, and compelling. Ware brought her narrative to a slap-in-the-face melodramatic conclusion. Happily, it throws light on James’s misogyny. I cheered. It also leaves us with a suggestive HEA, which leaves me with the emoji sad face. I wish I might have been able to see the deserving Rowan be happy. I cannot fault The Turn of the Key for not being a romance, but there was enough there to make me yearn for it and for Ms Ware to try her hand at a happier ending; however, justice will be served and there is vindication for Rowan (another little stab at James I appreciate). Ruth Ware’s The Turn of the Key is deserving of “a mind lively and at ease,” Emma, from Miss Austen and yours truly.

Ruth Ware’s The Turn of the Key is published by Scout Press (Simon and Schuster Canada). It was released in 2019 and may be found at your preferred vendor. I received a e-galley courtesy of Scout Press, via Netgalley.

The book opens with Rowan writing a letter to Mr. Wexham, a well-known and successful lawyer, begging for his help. She tells him that she is innocent of the murder she has been charged with and needs his help. The rest of the story is her recounting what happened from the time she saw the ad in the paper looking for a nanny until the present.

There is an old house located in a remote area in the middle of nowhere in the Scottish Highlands. Rowan becomes a nanny for a family of three children in an old, renovated house in the Scottish Highlands. Shortly after accepting the job, the parents are off and she is left to care for the children. The house has a haunted history, and other nannies have left shortly after starting. The house has a creepy vibe, with cameras everywhere, noises in the night, locked doors, poison gardens and staff that seem to sneak up on you. Rowan has no idea what she is in for and neither did this reader.

I do not want to spoil this story for you, but it was another well-written Ruth Ware suspenseful thriller with a gothic feel. I thought I had it all figured out, several time, but then there was another twist. Rowan was a great character. She wanted to do a good job with the children and there were times she was a very sympathetic character. The final twists and reveals in the story left me with my jaw hanging. Bravo Ruth Ware, you always manage to shock me as well as entertain. If you enjoy a good suspenseful read with some amazing twists, then make sure you pick this one up.

Ruth Ware takes the readers to a isolated manor where nothing is what it seems:

All she was looking for a change when she stumbles across a nannying add that seems too good to be true; the money, the location though a bit isolated is beautiful and the house has been completely renovated and has become a “smart” home. She believes that she has hit the jackpot of jobs, even though there seems to have been a high turn over nannies before her. What she doesn’t realize as why all those other nannies left and the nightmare that is about to begin and will endothelial the death of a child. She is doing everything she can to explain what happened, what it was truly like living there and to prove her innocence before it is too late.

This is the first book that I have read by Ware and going into this book I had very high expectations, just based upon the reviews I had seen and it seemed to me that Ware and her books were turning up on all of my social media feeds. This book mainly met my expectations, there were a few times when I didn’t understand some of the main characters decisions while watching the children, seemed a little dumb especially for someone who had worked with children before and I was able to figure out one of the three main twists in the book.

Ware has a way of writing that even though I did not think this was going to be a suspenseful book it was full of it especially when Rowan starts her Nanny job. Ware knows how to create a creepy atmosphere and ambiance through her writing skills. I felt like I could feel the draft coming from the closet or hear the creaks coming from the ceiling. Chills I tell you, Chills. You keeping reading wanting to know what is causing all the strange happenings occurring through out the house and ground. Is it ghosts, the smart house, the children or her employer; I’m not going to tell.

I feel like the case against her would not have gone to court. The evidence was too circumstantial and no Crown would want to go to court with all the holes and lack of evidence, even with a confessions. A good lawyer totally would have been able to get that thrown out and it seemed to me like she was writing to a good one. While she is telling her story you cannot help but feel sorry for her and the for facts she tells this feeling just deepens, you want the purpose for her letter to succeed.

I really enjoyed this book and I know that I will read another book by Ware again. Ware really seems to have the gift for writing and engrossing you in the story so I look forward to discovering her other works.

Enjoy!!!!