Just tell me the words "dark English Manor", "governess", "Gothic mystery" and you've got me opening the book. This one doesn't disappoint. From the moment, Alice steps foot in the manor as governess, you know there's going to be trouble and that trouble extends all the way to New York City.

This was a quick, enchanting read about a house that is haunted by the spirit of a captain’s late wife.

Alice, the newly hired governess for the Captain’s children, moves into Winterbourne and quickly realizes that there’s something disturbing occurring behind its walls.

Before she knows it, the spirit has possessed her and she will find her life spiraling down towards a different path than she had previously hoped for.

This book was dark and haunting in a very gothic type of way. It was also moving and engaging. Easy to read while waiting on edge for the coils to ensnare those soon to be caught in the trap. I didn't find it frightening or spooky so much as disturbing and atmospheric.

A home and family is cursed by a slow growing madness. I enjoyed the claustrophobic setting of the novel, along with the steadily increasing horror, but found the ending to be somewhat of a let down.

I should have not start that book at night. That not only made the story more creepy but lovable too. I ended up reading for about 5 hours straight waking up to more reading day after.
What can I say, except, the book cover matched the story, made me entertained and of course the gothic plot made this a super read! Next. Book by this author please!!!

I loved this spooky and atmospheric tale of two women bonded by blood but separated by generations as they slowly fall under the seductive, destructive spell of a malevolent house. This is an excellent entry into the canon of “houses with bad attitudes” and is perfect for readers of Simone St James and those who enjoyed The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters.

Layered and atmospheric, with gothic twists and dark arcana. This engrossing tale features "Winterbourne Hall"; a house holding tight to all its secrets...it wants you to see, but don't you dare look.

Of course Winterbourne Hall lives up to its name...cold, empty and except for all the stories that lie shrouded in mystery, with a slight longing to be lived in again.

Told from dual timelines,
1940 and present day,
This story unfolds with haunting letters and broken dreams.

Alice, comes to Winterbourne Hall with longings for a new life, hoping to escape from her past. She is to be the new governess...

Rachel, comes to Winterbourne Hall looking for answers to questions she doesn't want to ask...

Winterbourne Hall casts a large shadow over all its secrets...the lives of these women will never be the same again.
5⭐
Thank you to NetGalley, Minotaur Books; St. Martin's Press and the author Ms. Rebecca James for the opportunity to read this Advanced Readers Copy of "The Womanin the Mirror". The opinions expressed in this review are mine alone.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review & opinion. Unfortunately, this book didn't work for me. I would like to think at some point I will go back and finish it, but it took me almost a week to read through about 35% of it, and it just wasn't capturing my interest.

The Woman In The Mirror is told from the perspective of Alice Miller in the 1940's, who works for the de Gray family in their dark and sinister home, looking after the twin children. The other perspective is Rachel, a woman who was adopted in the States and has no knowledge of her biological family - until she gets a letter saying she's been left a family home in Cornwall, England. Rachel quickly learns that the home, named Winterbourne, is full of secrets that aren't very friendly.

I found it a little confusing jumping back and forth between the two POV's, with a lot of missing information, or hidden information, which I'm sure I would have discovered if I had kept reading, but it just wasn't doing it for me, I didn't connect to either main character, finding Alice erratic and confusing, and Rachel standoffish and cold. I don't know if I read enough of the book to speak to the writing style, patterns or character development, but it found it very wordy and unnecessarily descriptive. I think this book just simply wasn't for me, as I could see why others may enjoy it. Maybe another time I will get through it. I am giving it two stars because the writing wasn't awful and the story had potential.

I’m going to be honest, I loved this book. It’s old-school gothic meets a touch (but not too much) of the supernatural: an easy-reading, commercial version of The Haunting of Hill House, mixed with The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, with just a touch of Jane Eyre.

The story vacillates between two women who live seventy years apart:

One is a young lady with a dark secret who is employed as a governess at Winterbourne Hall, a large mansion that sits on a bluff in the English countryside, just a few years after WWII. She falls in love with Captain Jonathan de Grey, the children’s father, who lost his wife under tragic circumstances.

The other is a present-day gallery curator from New York who discovers that she is a descendant of the de Greys and heir to Winterbourne. She travels to the old, neglected mansion in an attempt to learn more about her parents and lineage, which has been kept a secret from her since she was adopted as a baby.

Both of these women experience a feeling within Winterbourne — a sense that the house has a will of its own. That those who live there - in both the past and present - may be vulnerable to its own dark whims.

Bwa-ha-ha.

I thoroughly enjoyed this. Every moment of it. And the end was FANTASTIC.

If you love gothic thrillers (like me!) or anything supernatural, you MUST pick this one up.

An enormous thank you to Rebecca James for writing it, Minotaur Books/St. Martin’s for publishing it and Netgalley for getting me the ARC!

4.5 stars

By all accounts this book was practically guaranteed a five star review. It had all the things I love in a Gothic tale…..the wild Cornish coast with foggy/misty mornings, a broken hero, a dark secret, an innocent but curious heroine, and so much atmosphere.

It sounded like a modern Victoria Holt novel and I just couldn’t wait to crack it open! I have read only one other book by this author, Sweet Damages, but it was so long ago that I read it, that I can’t quite recall all the details but I remember that it was more of a modern Gothic tale.

This book mixes modern Gothic with classical Gothic in the duel storylines so I think it will appeal to a lot of readers, especially if you love the Gothic and ghosts!

Summary
For more than two centuries, Winterbourne Hall has stood atop a bluff overseeing the English countryside of Cornwall and the sea beyond.

In 1947, Londoner Alice Miller accepts a post as governess at Winterbourne, looking after Captain Jonathan de Grey’s twin children. Falling under the de Greys’ spell, Alice believes the family will heal her own past sorrows. But then the twins’ adoration becomes deceitful and taunting. Their father, ever distant, turns spiteful and cruel. The manor itself seems to lash out. Alice finds her surroundings subtly altered, her air slightly chilled. Something malicious resents her presence, something clouding her senses and threatening her very sanity.

In present day New York, art gallery curator Rachel Wright has learned she is a descendant of the de Greys and heir to Winterbourne. Adopted as an infant, she never knew her birth parents or her lineage. At long last, Rachel will find answers to questions about her identity that have haunted her entire life. But what she finds in Cornwall is a devastating tragic legacy that has afflicted generations of de Greys. A legacy borne from greed and deceit, twisted by madness, and suffused with unrequited love and unequivocal rage. (Summary from Goodreads)

Review
I should have read this book in a matter of days but instead I found myself slowly reading it rather than devouring it. At first that wasn’t intentional, as it started a little slow at first, but then as I started to really get into the meat of the story, I found that I wanted to pace myself rather than rush through it. This one is full of all the classic Gothic elements that readers will love, especially fans of Rebecca! It was layered with atmosphere as I was expecting and the ghost element was genuinely terrifying. I had to put down my book on occasion because I was freaked out about the ghost!

I liked how James really made this one so creepy and really highlighted the setting for atmosphere. I wasn’t really a fan of Alice or Rachel for most of the book though. At first I was kind of put out because I really hoped to feel a connection to at least one of them but I just couldn’t. But I supposed that’s the point of a true Gothic novel where you just don’t like anyone.

While I might not have loved the two main characters, as soon as the story got going, I found myself wanting to read so much later into the night, but I was so scared that I had to force myself to put it down and read something else or just go to bed while I still could! I loved how uneasy this one made me and I loved all the ghost parts so so much!

If you love classic Gothic novels like Rebecca or The Turn of the Screw you will love this more modern take. I loved this one and even if it started a bit slow, I thought it was engaging, chilling, and utterly thrilling to read!

Book Info and Rating
Hardcover, 368 pages
Expected publication: March 17th 2020 by Minotaur Books (first published 2018)
ISBN 1250230055 (ISBN13: 9781250230058)
Free review copy provided by publisher, Minotaur Books, in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own and in no way influenced.
Rating: 4.5 stars
Genre: Gothic fiction, mystery, horror

This book was fantastic and super creepy and I found myself really engrossed in the story. I loved the setting and the descriptions made me feel like I was really there. I enjoyed the time span change and really connected with the characters. The last page left me shook!!!


Highly recommend

------‐-------Book Review--------------
The Woman in the Mirror by Rebecca James
Sass-o-meter 5/5💜s - Ultimate SASS
Released Date: 3/17
#womaninthemirror #NetGalley #stmartinspress #minotaurbooks
--------------Quote----------------------
“They say I am the one to fear, but the fear is with them. Fear is in them. It has no need for me. Their fear will catch them at the final hour.”
--------------Description-------------------
Tag Line: Rebecca James unveils a chilling modern gothic novel of a family consumed by the shadows and secrets of its past in The Woman in the Mirror.

For more than two centuries, Winterbourne Hall has stood atop a bluff overseeing the English countryside of Cornwall and the sea beyond.

In 1947, Londoner Alice Miller accepts a post as governess at Winterbourne, looking after Captain Jonathan de Grey’s twin children. Falling under the de Greys’ spell, Alice believes the family will heal her own past sorrows. But then the twins’ adoration becomes deceitful and taunting. Their father, ever distant, turns spiteful and cruel. The manor itself seems to lash out. Alice finds her surroundings subtly altered, her air slightly chilled. Something malicious resents her presence, something clouding her senses and threatening her very sanity.

In present-day New York, art gallery curator Rachel Wright has learned she is a descendant of the de Greys and heir to Winterbourne. Adopted as an infant, she never knew her birth parents or her lineage. At long last, Rachel will find answers to questions about her identity that have haunted her entire life. But what she finds in Cornwall is a devastating tragic legacy that has afflicted generations of de Greys. A legacy borne from greed and deceit, twisted by madness, and suffused with unrequited love and unequivocal rage
------------Sassy Review---------------
Thank you @netgalley, @stmartinspress, and @minotaurbooks for the advanced copy to provide my own sassy opinions.

DUDEEEETTTEESSSS…. This book had me only reading during the daylight. Because of one chilling scene, I was up all night looking at every mirror and painting in my house.

This book was so good! I really enjoyed it. I want to SPOIL everything because there was so much good in the pages of this book! SOMEONE read this and DM me, please!

I do not want to ruin anything for you so I am going to compare it to my other favorite gothic novels: If you took Rebecca and mixed it with a splash of The Companions and topped it off with the movie The Haunting… this is what you can expect from this book.

----------Sassiest character ----------
Qotd: What scenes in books or movies keep you up at night?

When you picture a creepy haunted house on a hill, the description of Winterbourne fits perfectly. From the beginning this castle is a presence in the book, like its own character. Throughout the book is a malevolent influence only called "she". 1947: Alice Miller comes to Winterbourne to become governess to twins, Edmund and Constance de Grey. Their mother died after an incident that everyone is forbidden to discuss. Alice falls in love with the twins and the house, but can't deny that strange things start happening, things that she tries to put off to her own imagination.
Present day: Rachel, orphaned as a baby, and having given up on finding her birth family, receives notice that she has inherited an estate in Cornwall called Winterbourne from an aunt she never knew. She travels there to put the house in order to sell, and finds the home and history she always longed for. But strange passages and references to "she" in her aunt's diaries have Rachel jumping at shadows and trying to find the truth about her family's past.
I received a complimentary copy of this book through Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this book!

I expected a gothic style story to be set in the eighteenth or nineteenth century but this book vacillated between 1947 and the present. Alice in 1947 hoping for a better life, a better position, is hired as a governess at the very old, decrepit Winterbourne Hall, her new home. Her employer is as broken as his abode, his children damaged beyond definition. This book is an achingly long look at the descent into madness. It was overdone and overwrought and some tight editing could have helped sharpen the story.

The second, more recent timeline was kind of a ho hum way to move the story back and forth, create and define lineage while trying to resolve the mystery. Too many loose ends, unbelievable situations, in the nick of time rescues left me disbelieving and disappointed.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press / Minotaur Books for a copy.

I will be honest. I was not crazy about this book. I was hoping for more. The story was fine. It just took a really long time to get it told. The characters, particularly the staff, were confusing to me. The children were bad, but not as freaky as I thought they would be.

That being said, while it took me a long time to get it read, I did enjoy a good portion of it. The descriptions, some of the characters were very vivid to me. That kept me going when I wanted to stop. They kept telling me that there was more. And there was. All around good, but not great.

As always, thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press/Minotaur Books for the opportunity to read and provide my perspective on this book. It is always greatly appreciated.

I'm all for gothic ghost stories, and this one was a lovely mix of past and present with the slow burn reveal of deep, dark secrets.

I was very captured by this book for most of the story. Who can resist a mysteriously haunted house, flawed females and two children who seem touched by a bit of evil? The building creepiness and uncertainty in this was strong and pulled me right in.

I was also a sucker for the budding romance in the present timeline. Jack Wyatt was the brooding small town bloke that knows exactly how to speak to me. He actually reminded me a lot of Matthew Good’s character in Leap Year, I had a really hard time not thinking of that movie while reading these parts. But that’s okay, I liked it then and I like it now.

That said, I start to grow a little tired of Alice's swooning over her employer in the past timeline. He hardly says three words to her and she's already falling in love with him? I get the fascination and the allure, but love? That's one of my pet peeves and this book seemed so much better than that. I kept hoping that maybe this was all part of the darkness of the house somehow, but it didn’t really ease up and I felt like it was too caught in this about mid-read. It was really distracting for me and this was about the time that the story lost its grip on me.

This was a really strong start, but for me, it started to unravel a little more towards the end and fall into a predictable pattern, one that made the last portion of the book a little lukewarm and expected. There was a lot of potential and I would love to read more of the author at some point.

An engaging, thrilling mystery that marched readers down a slow descent into madness over several generations.
Authentically moody and creepy with an underlying ominous tone that didn't seem forced or manufactured. This was a ghost story, a forbidden romance, and a witch hunt all wrapped into one tragic tale. And oh! evil twins too!!!
A gripping read that I managed to consume in one sitting - a rarity for me. But it was so worth it!
*Many thanks to the author, NetGalley, and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read and review a free copy of this book.

Fans of the Gothic will relish this well done dual time line tale of Rachel and Alice and Winterbourne, the house that looms over both of them. Set in 1947 (with a periodic dip back a bit) and 2018, it unravels slowly but menacingly. Alice went to Winterbourne to serve as a governess to the twins Edmund and Constance. She found herself wrapped in and obsessed by both their dead mother Laura and their living father Jonathan. Rachel is shocked to discover she's inherited Winterbourne- she knew she was adopted but nothing else about her history. What she finds is a trove of diaries written by Constance and a new life. Is there a curse? Who can she trust? While there are some occasional blips (mostly wrt to Rachel, especially when she first arrives at Winterbourne), this is one heck of a read. THere's also one heck of a twist near the end (no spoilers) which I have to admit did very much come out of nowhere, Governesses, Cornwall, creepy kids, mean housekeepers, brooding men- this one has it all. Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. I had a wonderful time with this one.

London - 1947

Alice Miller works as a solicitor’s secretary. She has applied for and been offered the position of governess to the twin 8-year-old children, of Captain Jonathan De Grey, named Edmund and Constance, at Winterbourne in Cornwall. The estate sits atop an isolated bluff next a sheer drop off. Alice is the third governess to be hired in a few weeks time. The home is very old, dark, crumbling, and with very few servants. The Captain had been injured and walks with a cane. Alice fits right in and loves the children. She is also very intrigued by the Captain.

Present Day - New York

Rachel Wright is the Founder and Director of the Square Peg Gallery. She has worked very hard for months to prepare for the opening and is thrilled. She has been secretly seeing Aaron Grewal, a multi-millionaire. When she receives a letter from a solicitor in England, she is intrigued. It appears that her Aunt Constance has died leaving her the sole heir to Winterbourne. Rachel was adopted and has always longed to learn about her birth parents and thus, she packs up and heads to England.

At Winterbourne, Rachel finds a huge home filled with secrets. Not one to run from things, she immediately starts investigating old letters and other papers in the house. With the help of a local, she learns more about the history of the place and the frightening tales about it. It appears that the women who have inhabited Winterbourne over the years have been very strong, but have they also have been cursed? Was there truly a witch?

This is a spooky tale that will also pull at your heartstrings as you read the stories of these doomed women. What a fascinating read! I just could not put it down. Loved it!

Copy provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

The Woman in the Mirror is a story that centers around two young women named Alice and Rachel and how they are tied together, even if they never knew each other.

Alice Miller has taken a job as a governess with a small family to be the caretaker of two small children which is a dream job during this era of time for a young woman. The master of the house Jonathon is a bit allusive but she feels adoration for him but she isn’t sure he feels anything for her. He is dismissive at time and stern and set in this thinking about about how things should be done from the children schooling to just bout everything, but the children seem to like her so she pushes on. The manor however doesn’t seem happy to have her there. Or at least that how it felt to Alice and it doesn’t take long for her to realize that this manor holds some secrets and the children aren’t that innocent either. Strange things start to happen and Alice start doubting her sanity.

Rachel Wright is a successful curator for an art gallery. She has always known that she was adopted as a baby but when she learns of inheriting a whole estate from someone in her biological family, she is intrigued. It might give her insight into her family and maybe why she given up for adoption. The more she learns about the family the more questions she has and she soon learns that this place hold secrets that the de Grey family never wanted to be known leading her down a dangerous path.

The story alternates between the 1940’s with Alice and the present with Rachel as the narrators. The dual timelines and perspectives worked so well with this dark and atmospheric gothic tale and the characters too. We get to know them, care for them and root for them as well. The setting of manor on the dreary bluff of the England country side was the perfect with just enough eeriness to keep me on my toes and the mystery of what happened all these years at Winterbourne slowly unfolds and tying the past to the present with Alice and Rachel and I just couldn’t get enough. All the things that transpired from the both the past and present come to a head in an ending that was suspenseful and with a few twists along the way too.

If you are looking for a hauntingly gothic mystery with a little bit of paranormalcy too, The Woman in the Mirror is a great one for sure.