Ruth Ware proves she can write a thriller that doesn't fit the mold of what we're seeing on the shelves, with the smart, fast-paced Zero Days. Jack and her husband are gifted hackers and security experts, they spend their time helping companies find the holes in their security. On one such evening, a pen-test goes awry and when Jack finally makes it home she finds her beloved husband murdered. It's either a known enemy or a spouse and with no other leads, the spotlight shines on Jack. She knows she can find the truth, so she takes the risk and goes on the run from the police.

I loved that this was not at all what I expected, I truly did go into this, despite the blurb, thinking it would be a classic Ware thriller. From page one, it's different. The introduction is fun, light, and leaves you unprepared for what happens next. We often read thrillers prior to police involvement or with police on the victims side, but it was fun to be in the head of the main suspect. Jack takes on a desperate journey that never slows down. Unfortunately, Jack is a difficult character to follow, she's presented as incredibly bright and athletic, but when she takes off on the run she suddenly becomes quite naive. Maybe it's the thriller reader in me, but she made every mistake you're told not to when you come across a crime and have to spend time with the authorities. It's believable, because we've seen stories like this on the news and know people make mistakes. However, Jack is presented as brilliant, an evader, who cannot seem to evade anything.

More like a fun spy thriller than a murder mystery, Zero Days is a departure from the usual for Ware and while I enjoyed it, I wanted something more.

Interesting read with lots of action. I thought that the premise of the story was good but I found myself skipping through lots of the text to get to the next thing. It was also pretty predictable i’m my opinion but I enjoyed it none the less. Thanks for sending the ARC Net Galley!

Zero Days by Ruth Ware is a very highly recommended thriller in a race against time format.

Jack (Jacintha) cross and her husband are penetration (pen) specialists who test out security systems for companies. Jack does the physical, on the ground work, while her husband Gabe directs their operations and handles the cybersecurity tests. When Jack is picked up by the police after a job one night, Gabe doesn't pick up the phone to have their client vouch for her and their work for him. After she is finally released, Jack makes her way home, exhausted, and discovers why Gabe didn't answer her call. He was murdered.

Jack is in shock, back at the police station, now being questioned by police about the murder of her husbands. The next day it becomes clear that Jack is the main suspect in Gabe murder. If she wants to find out who killed Gabe and clear her name, she needs to go on the run. With very few people she can trust and a count down before she will eventually get caught, the tension rises with each page.

Jack is a fully realized character and readers will be anxiously wishing her success in finding answers. She is experiencing physical difficulties and grieving Gabe's death, even as she searches for information about who was responsible for his murder all while evading the police and trying to survive.

Zero Days is an un-put-downable, compelling thriller. The fast-paced novel counts down the days as Jack is on the run. This means tension and suspense rise along with every action Jack takes and every twist in the plot. This would make an excellent movie.
Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of Gallery/Scout Press via NetGalley.
The review will be published on Barnes & Noble, Google Books, Edelweiss, and Amazon

What a fun ride this was! A fast paced thriller that reminded me of the movie “The Fugitive” this one has been optioned to the big screen. It will be an awesome movie. Hired by companies to break into buildings and hack security systems, Jack and her husband Gabe are the best in the business. But one night a routine assignment goes wrong, Jack arrives home to find her husband dead. It looks like a professional hit and Jack realizes quickly that she is being framed. She goes on the run to find the real killer and as she evades the police, the bad guys and basically takes on the world- you will find yourself cheering for this unlikely heroine.

Ruth Ware's Zero Days is a thoroughly entertaining summer beach read. I raced through it in one sitting. I particularly enjoyed the pen testing angle of this story and that the protagonist, a suspect in her husband's murder, uses her security savvy to track the guy responsible (whom I'd spotted the minute he hit the page, but, for me at least, knowing his complicity didn't spoil the suspense).

The description of “Mr and Mrs Smith meets the Fugitive “ is completely on point! Things aren't what you might assume in this fast paced thriller. It had me guessing until the end. The characters were so well developed and I loved that the lead was a smart, talented woman.

I love how the publisher describes ZERO DAYS by Ruth Ware as combining Mr. and Mrs. Smith with The Fugitive – there is plenty of danger, running, and hiding in this latest thriller from a premier mystery writer (author of The It Girl and many more titles). The main character, Jacintha Cross (called Jack), is a security penetration expert with her "hacktivist" husband, Gabe. He handles the digital side of their testing and she checks for physical weaknesses, finding ways to sneak through or around physical barriers, ID tag checks, etc. Those skills are essential when Jack runs from police after Gabe is killed and she becomes the prime suspect. As with Ware's earlier award-winning titles, there are numerous twists in this page-turning mystery. ZERO DAYS received well-deserved starred reviews from Booklist and Library Journal; plus it was a June 2023 LibraryReads Hall of Fame selection. Readers who enjoy suspenseful adventures should also look for Alias Emma by Ava Glass and Red Queen by Juan Gómez-Jurado.

I'm a fan of Ware's other novels, but I didn't care for this one. I wasn't surprised by the twists--at all. I found myself really disappointed after finishing the book.

LOVED this novel so much. By far one of my favorite Ruth Ware novels!

From the very first page, I could not put it down. The first 5 chapters are just shock factor after shock factor and really grips the reader:)

Brilliant novel, incredibly relevant to this day and age!

An intriguing read, but not my favorite from this author. The story line seemed to drag on at times but I did finish the book. Thank you Netgalley for the ARC.

The plot and characters were a fairly well balanced blend of compelling and horrifying. It’s Ware’s typical darkness, arguably turned up a few notches in some of the more harrowing moments. It’s a testament to her talent that she could write characters so well that I could hardly bear to read about their pain and heartbreak.

I pushed through this book, because of my book club. I have to say this book was disappointing. I am a fan of Ruth Ware , but this book seemed to be a bit not her style. I was not surprised by the ending, and getting to the end was a struggle. Thank you Netgalley and Scout Press for this ARC.

I don't think I've ever read a Ruth Ware book that I didn't like, and this one was no exception. I read it in a few hours because I couldn't put it down. It was exciting and interesting, and the pace was very good. I liked the characters, though I don't think I got to know any of them very well (which didn't matter too much for the story, I knew them enough to care). I also thought the tech element of this book was really cool, and different than most of the books that I've read. Thank you to NetGalley and Gallery Books for this ARC.

I was immediately sucked in to the book. Right from the get-go, Ware starts with a twist and things aren't what you might assume. The main character shows us a lot of cool "tricks of the trade" and is smart and determined. Ware writes an action-packed thriller just as skillfully as she does mystery. I'd recommend Harlan Coben fans pick this one up!

Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Ruth Ware has created another heart-stopping story that makes you want to stay up all night reading. I appreciate the unique backstory of the characters. The author is able to make every book fresh and new. Would recommend to mature teens and adults.

One of the author's best books. Full of tension as Jack trys to solve the reason for her husband's death. It does become quite technical when explaining about security links on the dark web. It was also an interesting tour of England, moving from London to the countryside and back.. Obviously a great deal of research went into this book. The pace never slowed down, so it kept me up late into the evening.

You know that feeling you get when you begin a book and you just know it’s going to be amazing? This is that book. This is a Ruth Ware as I’ve never seen her before, a Ware, 5.0 version if you will, launching this masterful author onto another level of greatness. Jack’s story starts with a bang and the nonstop action, surprises and revelations keep going through to the bitter end. I was intrigued, educated and invested with each and every chapter, and ended up yelling at Jack more than once as some of the situations she found herself in were heart stopping. Zero Days is Ware at her best, and her others are hard to top!

This was another Ruth Ware classic. She is a fantastic author who can write atmospheric books. BUT it is completely different from her usual fare - it's not a closed room mystery, it's not about emotional relationships, etc. This is a heist-y, Mission Impossible kind of book. I hope this was something new Ruth was trying out and decides to go back to her original writing. Still, I'd read any Ruth Ware book.

This feels like a huge outlier for Ruth Ware. It's not what I expected, and I didn't like what changed. All Jack did was run from the authorities, and a lot of the plot was very samey. I come to Ruth Ware for atmospheric mystery, and this isn't it.

What a page-turning, breathless, romp Zero Days is! Although I figured out fairly early who the villain was, I just kept reading and reading and reading until I could breathe again!

Jacintha, or Jack as she is known, certainly has the most unusual career I have ever read about. She is the partner, with her husband, Gabe, in a company that tests security systems. She does the dirty work in the middle of the night penetrating on site a company’s cybersecurity, while Gabe manages the computer work at his desk. After one very hazardous night where she is picked up by the police, she returns home to find Gabe dead with his throat slit.

Jack is absolutely grief stricken, but when she realizes that the police consider her the prime suspect, she uses her best skillset to escape from the police station. Injured and full of grief, with a phone that keeps alerting people to her whereabouts, Jack sets out to pursue her leads and to try to piece together her husband’s murder. The only person she trusts is her sister, Helena, but even Hel’s phone and house may be compromised by the police.

For eight days, Jack is on the run, and the reader is running right along with her. The Booklist reviewer calls her a “very original and very real protagonist.” I was fascinated by everything Jack knew how to do to get into and out of all the places she was exploring. She was seriously injured climbing out of one building, but she continues to persist. Using several burner phones and a variety of tools she continued to solve every problem that came her way. “Solve the next problem. And then the next one after that. Keep putting one foot in front of the other. Until you can’t walk any further.” And just when the reader thinks that she will finally be captured, she escapes yet again.

When I finally had some time to reflect on my feelings about the book, I had to be impressed in two ways. I loved the protagonist that Ware created. Although she is headstrong, she has an amazing will to succeed and persist. And frankly, she is incredibly smart. And so is the author Ruth Ware. I can only imagine how much research Ware had to put into the cyber-verse and cyber crime to be able to put this novel together.

Oh my gosh, I was looking up reviews of the book, and I discovered that Zero Days has a definition beyond the number of days Jack had to solve the crime that killed Gabe. According to the Kaspersky website, zero-day is a broad term that describes recently discovered security vulnerabilities that hackers can use to attack systems. The developer just has “zero days” to fix the system. Whoo! That gives the book’s title a much deeper meaning, and gives me even more to admire Ruth Ware for!
Don’t get too worried about not understanding the terminology in the book. The plot moves so quickly and Jack is so amazing, the reader is able to navigate the cyber terminology and run right along with Jack.

Loved this book!