Madeline Ashby's Glass Houses is a gripping dive into a world where technology and humanity intersect in unexpected ways. The story follows a future society where a powerful AI system shapes and influences daily life, exploring themes of identity, privacy, and control.

The novel centers on the protagonist, who navigates a world of digital surveillance and artificial intelligence while unraveling a mystery that could upend everything she knows. Ashby masterfully blends elements of science fiction with sharp social commentary, creating a narrative that is both thought-provoking and intensely engaging.

With its well-crafted plot, complex characters, and an intriguing exploration of futuristic concepts, Glass Houses offers a fresh perspective on the relationship between humans and technology. It’s a compelling read for anyone interested in how emerging technologies might impact our lives and our sense of self.

This book is set in the near future with advanced technologies and AI systems.

What a unique mix of sci-fi and mystery thriller genres. The setting on the deserted island with the mysterious house gave me the vibe of the TV shows LOST and Black Mirror.

It was very interesting that despite all the advanced technology in the future, social issues and gender issues remain unsolved. Like domestic violence or female work inequality for example. It even felt like everything went a little bit backward socially and felt like The Handmaid’s Tale.

It’s sad that women and marginalized groups still felt insecure and not safe in the advanced future.

I liked this quote:
𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝙨𝙝𝙚 𝙝𝙖𝙨 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙞𝙣𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙘𝙩𝙨. 𝙃𝙚𝙧 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙨. 𝙃𝙚𝙧 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚𝙨. “𝙁𝙚𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙚 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙪𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣,” 𝙤𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙬𝙞𝙨𝙚 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬𝙣 𝙖𝙨 “𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙖𝙘𝙘𝙪𝙢𝙪𝙡𝙖𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙬𝙞𝙨𝙙𝙤𝙢 𝙤𝙛 𝙖 𝙡𝙞𝙛𝙚𝙩𝙞𝙢𝙚 𝙨𝙥𝙚𝙣𝙩 𝙬𝙖𝙩𝙘𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙮𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙗𝙖𝙘𝙠.”

Thank you so much @torbooks @madashby for the gifted copy. Recommend this read for fans of Black Mirror, Lost and The white lotus.

This book was a case of interesting concept, so-so execution for me. Claustrophobic thrillers about a stranded group of people always appeal to me. Plus, the AI element sounded like it could really fun and timely.

The book just never really gelled for me, I guess. I never really felt connected to the characters or the plot while I was reading/skimming it. (It ended up being a skim read for me.) The story does move along quickly though and there are definitely some interesting ideas/themes, so I can see how it would appeal more to other people.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

I am not quite sure what I think of glass houses. The plot is usually one that works on me (remote island-people begin to die-closed circle). The pacing was good and the plot held my attention. I think the last 25% was what made the book uneven for me and it sort of fell apart then. The plot is a dual timeline and jumps back and forth in the past and present as Kristen’s secrets are slowly revealed. I loved the incorporation of the ai technology into the plot. The villain was truly villainous-there is a lot to like here! If something (I don’t want to say without giving away the plot) had been tweaked slightly in the ending to be less cringe inducing-this would have been a solid 4 star! I would give this a 3.5 solidly.

Thanks to the publisher for providing the arc via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Glass Houses by Madeline Ashby is a dark, near-future thriller packed with advanced tech. A start-up team, led by their billionaire CEO, crashes on a deserted island and finds an AI-driven mansion. As they struggle to survive, tensions rise.

I really enjoyed this book, what a page turner!

I was definitely hooked by Glass Houses from the start, which opens in the immediate aftermath of a plane crash onto a deserted island. That is certainly an intense way to start things, right? And we are thrown right into the action, with main character Kristen finding her dead colleague, and realizing she's injured herself. From that point, it turns into an all-out fight for survival, leading to a very interesting lone house in the middle of the island.

Clearly, secrets are abundant, and it's hard to tell if there is anyone who can be trusted. As the reader shakes out what is happening both in Kristen 's past and present, it becomes clear that nothing is quite as it seems. For me, I loved unfurling all the secrets of both the island and its inhabitants, but the wheels fell off a bit at the end for me. I didn't quite understand a lot of the characters' motivation behind certain decisions, and at the end I just wasn't sure what the point of certain things were. I don't know how to properly explain this without spoilers, so apologies for the vagueness.

That said, it was still quite entertaining! A lot of questionable decisions, intense action, drama, and survival made it easy to fly through the pages. While the payoff wasn't as great as I'd have liked, the journey was still enjoyable, so I can live with it.

Bottom Line: A very readable story that was lacking a bit in bringing it all together, Glass Houses was still more a win than not.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance reader copy of this book in exchange for my honest feedback. Glass Houses had an interesting story line, but the trapped with coworkers or friends and people start dying story has been written so many different ways and so often that I can no longer get behind this type of thriller.. Although, the book was well written, the story was just not original. 2.5 stars

After crashing and getting stranded on a mysterious island, a group of employees start to die, one by one. The horrific monstrousity glass house that only allows certain people to enter and exit, is high-tech and fully stocked, set in the middle of nowhere.

A billionaire CEO obsessed with Kristen, his chief of staff and right-hand woman. Kristen, a cunning woman with a disturbing past and dark secret, hell-bent on survival.

Who will survive in this futuristic thriller? Whose house is this? Why is everyone dying and who is responsible?

𝓜𝔂 𝓽𝓱𝓸𝓾𝓰𝓱𝓽𝓼: Spoiler Alert!
☁️☁️☁️
Told in one POV, witching from past to present, this sci-fi horror/thriller kept me at the edge of my seat! This read more like a horror and I LOVED it! It’s so SPOOKY and WEIRD! The revelation of Kristen’s past really surprised me! The ending was the ICING ON THE CAKE!

This one was a twisty, sci fi, thriller. At times I was put off by the bluntness of the writing but at other times I was completely sucked into the drama and mystery of it all. The characters were mostly ones that I loved to hate which is always fun.

This was one of my most anticipated released of this year. I was so excited for it, but now I wonder if my own internal hype was too much, because I ultimately didn't really love this story like I thought I would. The setting, characters and plot were all interesting, though. "But Alex," you might say, "What didn't you like then?" Let me tell you: the tech speak. Oh my god, I was so befuddled by it at times. I had to reread entire chunks of text just to figure out what we were talking about. Like, listen I'm sure some people breezed through it, but for me it was just so dense and really took me out of the story. To end on a positive note: the twists and turns in this book were immaculate, I was left spinning by each one. So, overall, I did like this, I just didn't like it as much as I thought I would which saddens me.

What a deliciously dark book! From the offset, Glass Houses won me over with its near-future speculative twists. From the two compelling timelines to the creepy, creepy setting, I was pulled deeply into this thought-provoking premise. But it was the Black Mirror vibe that was married cleverly with And Then There Were None that won me over hook, line, and sinker. After all, there’s nothing I love more than a well-written locked room murder mystery novel.

The characters were a mix of those I loved to hate and a protagonist who had me cheering her on from the sidelines. While some were decidedly more flat than others, they each furthered the plot so as to keep me thoroughly intrigued. But the twists were what kept my fingers firmly flying. Perhaps thanks to the finely layered storyline, I didn’t anticipate nary a one. And I don’t know about you, but I simply love when a dawning realization makes you utterly giddy.

There was one piece that didn’t quite work for me, though. Heavily peppered with dense tech speak which went well over my head, I found myself sometimes having to parse sentences in an effort to follow what was being said. Was it important? Or could I skim a description? Ultimately, it took longer to read as I seriously had to slow down in order to try and comprehend.

Nevertheless, I had a blast reading this intoxicating look at a future I pray we never encounter. From its scathing look at what it sometimes means to be a woman to the potential downsides of everything from AI to crypto, there was no end to the criticisms. At the same time, this was every bit a thriller. With a soaring pace and a hard-hitting, palpable fear, I was fully invested from the first page until the last. And while it might’ve been more sci-fi than I was expecting, it just didn’t matter as I gobbled this book up in just a matter of hours. So come one, come all… You need to read this book. Dark and twisted, it was simply sublime. Rating of 4.5 stars.

Thank you to Madeline Ashby, Tor Books, andNetGalley for my complimentary physical and digital copies. All opinions are my own.

Madeline Ashby’s Glass Houses is a gripping psychological thriller set in a technologically advanced near future and is a must-read for any woman working in STEM.

The novel opens with Kristen, Chief Emotional Manager for Wuv (an emotion-mapping-AI company), literally washing blood off of her hands. As she awakens to her surroundings, she realizes that the privately-chartered airplane she and her co-workers were on has crashed onto a seemingly-deserted island. Miraculously, Kristen and the survivors discover a luxurious, technologically-advanced mansion, complete with every amenity—except a connection to the outside world. The opulent house, it turns out, was meticulously constructed for a darker purpose.

As the narrative unfolds, readers are drawn into Kristen's complex past, revealing a woman who has developed a unique set of skills as she fulfills emotional labor in a surveillance society. Interweaving the tense present on the island with flashbacks to Kristen's rise in the industry, Ashby creates a portrait of a woman fueled by past trauma and desperate to control her future.

The ending took some unexpected turns that didn't fully add up for me, but I loved the ride so much that this was still a five-star read. I'm going to be talking obsessively about this book for a while, especially any time anyone mentions feminine rage.

This review will be posted to Goodreads on August 19, 2024 and to Instagram (@goodquietkitty) on August 22, 2024.

How fascinating! Feeling a little tv show Yellowjackets meets Lost, a little Black Mirror episode; and even feeling like I started in the middle of the story, I didn’t feel confused. I felt wanting more.

A look into AI, follow Kristen Howard in dual timelines; in the present time, on a corporate retreat, their plane has crashed on an island. And in flashbacks, the reader is following how we got there. Kristen is clever, interesting, and a fun main character to follow. A plot focused story, leaves you wondering what is this island and is it all just a company retreat. The story really conveys the downside of technology and the abuse of power that comes with, even with little moments.

Overall, the pacing moved faster at times and the story telling could give you whiplash. There were good moments of feminine rage and the story reminded me of a script of a tv show. But if you find yourself asking for something different in a book, this might be for you. I liked this. If the story had flowed a little smoother and the ending hadn’t halfway been an overall cop out from the journey, I probably would have said 5 stars

Sometimes there is nothing more delightful than reading a thriller about horrible people getting what's coming to them. Even if it is at the hand of an unreliable or questionable narrator. Glass Houses gives everything from corrupt tech, Survivor, and men being the worst. Thanks to Tor Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

In my non-blogging life I work with emotions and so I immediately had all kinds of red flags going up when Kristen's company wanted to use a algorithm to turn emotions into a form of currency. I felt positively repulsed at the idea that it would erase any kind of veil or wall we could put between ourselves and the world. Conversely, I love it when novels like Glass Houses pick up on disturbing trends in tech and rage against it with all their might. While Glass Houses falls more solidly on the thrilling side, rather than purely social commentary, the two come together very nicely for most of Glass Houses. The novel also plays with a delightful kind of twisted pleasure at watching people willing to exploit others get what they deserve. While the ending of the novel, in redirecting its focus, kind of undermines some of it, it remains a guilty pleasure.

Kristen wakes up in the plane, surrounded by the corpses of her colleagues, not sure how or where they crash landed. As she and her fellow survivors, and colleagues, gather, they gain access to a black cube of a house, fully-stocked with food and secrets. When it turns out safety is still not guaranteed, Kristen wants to figure out what is going on. Glass Houses flashes back and forth between Kristen on the island and Kristen's past. While the present time line is full of Survivor-esque tension, which becomes ever more tech dystopia, Kristen's past time line is equally messy and fascinating and hints at a dark, seedy underbelly full of secrets that led to the crash. Truly, a lot goes on in Glass Houses. It feels like an indictment against modern tech and its obsession with quantifying humanity and making it something you can buy, sell, and exploit. It is also dystopian, in that something bad has clearly happened to the world, in part because of all that tech. We also get commentary on social media, discussions of self harm and suicide, potential space exploration, bloody fights, and more. Truly, I never had a boring moment with Glass Houses.

This is my first novel by Madeline Ashby and, like I said above, I had a great time with it. I got to experience the delightful twist of "these people are the worst, but they're dying rather horribly too". Kristen is an intriguing protagonist, quite unreliable and detached, and yet clearly brimming with emotions. There is also a lot happening in this novel, little hints to an utterly changed world, and all kinds of side narratives. One of these, arguably the B-plot, involved a liaison in Kristen's past, which resolved in a way I wasn't entirely pleased with, although it added a nice few twists. There is also a delightful female rage that simmers throughout Glass Houses, a kind of rage about what has been done and is being done to the world, to people, to women. I enjoyed this aspect of the novel immensely and I cannot wait to read more by Madeline Ashby in the future.

Glass Houses is a thrilling ride of plane crashes, mysterious houses and deaths, horrible tech, worse men, and a heroine who remains a mystery for much of the book. You're in for a great and twisted ride with this novel.

**2.5-stars rounded up**

I've been putting off reviewing this for a while. I needed to cool my jets a bit before I tore off on some salty rant review, going up one side of this and down the other. That helps no one. So, let's take a deep breath, and get into it.

The synopsis for Glass Houses had me anticipating a gripping, freaky, intense, near-future Mystery-Thriller involving a palatial house on a deserted island. Instead what I got was a slow-moving character study of messed up people. Sure, a small portion is set on an island, but that certainly didn't feel like the focus.

The very start was giving the first scene from the first season of Lost. I thought to myself, 'this is exciting, this is intriguing'. Then as it began to play out further, I thought, 'wait a minute is...'

I won't fill in that blank, but that happened by page 19, and I was correct. There was another thing later 'revealed' that I knew early on as well. I wasn't trying to figure anything out. I never do that, but these things were just so glaringly obvious, I wonder were they supposed to feel like reveals?

Then in other ways, where I wish it could have been expanded upon, we were kept in the dark. We did get little tidbits of the greater world here and there, but it was never clear enough to understand, or provide a sense of place. I feel like a nice mixed media element scattered throughout, that could've let us know how the world got to this point would've been fun. I mean obviously it's the near future, but why is everything soooo different?

By the middle, it had really slowed down. We weren't seeing as much of everyone running around like chickens with their heads cut off, which I guess could've been entertaining if we didn't have these huge sections from the past taking us right out of that present feeling of chaos.

At the end of the day, NGL, I didn't enjoy this. Some of the concepts involving future tech and AI were interesting, but I hated the way the story was told. There was too much focus on the backstory of Kristin and not enough on the present setting of the deserted island. I feel like I was sold something that I didn't end up getting. I wasn't given suspense, nor intrigue, AND was barely given any time on the deserted island that I was promised. I am rounding up to 3-stars to be nice.

With this being said, just because this didn't work for me, does not mean it won't work for you. I wouldn't really go by the synopsis though to judge whether or not you would enjoy it, as personally, I feel it's a bit mismarketed. I think this would work best for Literary Fiction fans, who enjoy dark stories with light SF-elements. Character-driven Readers may also have success with this.

Thank you to the publisher, Tor, for providing me with a copy to read and review. I'm not sure if I will read from this author again, probably not, but I'm glad I gave this one a shot, even if it wasn't necessarily my cup of tea.

We've been getting a lot more stories with AI and smart devices and I am loving exploring what it means and how it can change our lives.

but be warned, this one has a very slow start. It took me almost 50%, when we learned about the chicken dance and the cabinets, for it to really suck me in. This one also has interesting current day lingo that I enjoyed.

Once the story got going, I really was intrigued by our main character and how this would all play out. The reveal was shocking, not what I had expected at all, and I loved the shock value of all the smart technology that's in here. But the story did get a bit bogged down in the past and less on the present and I wish we'd had just a little more explanation on some of the technology.

All in all, a fascinating read, one that I really did like, once the story hooked me!

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

Surviving the plane crash was the easy part.

At a point in time some years into the future, an autonomously flown private plane carrying the CEO and employees of his start-up tech firm which just sold for a lot of money crashes onto an abandoned island. Several of the co-workers die in the crash, and the others are slowly banding together and figuring out how they will survive with little food and water and no shelter. Sumter Williams, the boyish billionaire CEO turns as he always does to his Chief Emotional Manager Kristen Howard to get the survivors organized and come up with plans of action. Kristen’s role in the company is part Human Resources, part therapist, and part emotional support creature for Sumter (and quite likely the person on whom Sumter is crushing). They find a building on the island which is huge, seemingly abandoned and inaccessible. Turns out that some people can open the door to enter….just not women. Same holds true of the cabinets holding food and other essentials….they can be accessed as well, but only by the men. That seems odd, but easy to work around. But then people start disappearing. Dying. And the remaining survivors start asking a lot of questions. Was the plane crash an accident, or deliberate? If its wasn’t an accident, was the force behind it from outside or inside the company? Some don’t trust Sumter, others are sure that Kristen has something to do with what has happened. Or what about Mason, the CFO? Finding the answers to those and other questions will determine who, if anyone, will survive long enough to be rescued.
I was drawn to this book initially by its striking cover (clichéd, but true), and was expecting a pure thriller. Instead I discovered a novel that has as many elements of science fiction as it does whodunnit….not a bad thing, just different from my initial expectations. The main protagonist is Kristen, whose backstory is every bit as unusual as her current company role and which may factor in to what is currently at play. An only child raised by parents in a remote Canadian town, one whose life and the myriad daily choices within it were streamed to the world in order for the family to monetize each decision. Want to vote on what Kristen would have for dinner? What she should wear? Pay and you’d get to vote. When the smart house in which they lived caught fire (too much crypto coin mining in the basement), Kristen ran inside when she returned from school in a futile attempt to save her parents who were inside, barely surviving herself and carrying many scars (most though not all physical) for life. What her true role is within the company, how she feels about its new product (an AI-aided algorithm that can allow people using wearable technology to accurately read the feelings of people around them), and what her relationship is with Sumter, is left open to the reader’s imagination for much of the book. The Elon Musk/Jack Dorsey-esque Sumter is similarly a conundrum….is he brilliant or manic? Who has the power in the relationship between him and Kristen? Who is Anton, the mysterious lover who pops into and out of Kristen’s life (and bed)? In a world where the deteriorating climate has wrought hard changes, where crossing borders between countries and even states is subject to high levels of scrutiny, where surveillance of all aspects of one’s life is standard (and generally monetized) there is much to digest here. Not possessing a lot of cutting edge techno knowledge, some parts of the story were a bit over my head (though not the fact that tech men in the future still tend to sexualize and objectify women, who continue to need to work twice as hard for acceptance). The mystery spools out, a bit Ten Little Indians, a dash of Knives Out, and a hint of Lord of the Flies. If you like your thriller laced with sci-fi, you should give Glass Houses a try, as should readers of authors like Katherine Wood, Sarah Pekkanen and Alex Michaelides. My thanks to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for allowing me early access to this interesting hybrid thriller.

Set in the near future with advanced technology, like a self-flying plane, and contacts that show the emotions of others we follow Kirsten who works as the Chief Emotional Manager for a tech billionaire. When the plane they are traveling in crashes on a remote island Keirsten and our group of survivors work to figure out how they are going to survive, and how they can make sure they are found.

Kirsten is smart and savvy and knows how to take charge, make people listen, and manipulate them to get what she wants. She really is the perfect person to be stuck on an island with, as she can think logically while dealing with something crazy. We get this story from dual timelines, the present where Kirsten and her coworkers are on the island, and the past starting when she was hired as a WUV, which lets us in on her background info as to how she turned out the way she is.

I was hooked from the first page with Kirsten crawling out of the belly of the plane after the crash. As the story unfolded I tried my best to clock every inconsistency and put the clues together as to what was happening. Some things I figured out, but others were definitely a surprise. From the beginning to the end I was fascinated and couldn't put it down.
This is the first book I've read by Madeline Ashby and I will absolutely be checking out her other books.

Do you know books that have a banger of a premise are absolute catnip to me and this book falls into that category. Love so much about it.

And, in many many ways, this book lived up to the promise of its premise.

This book is totally paged turning. Especially the first 65%. The author, who is a futurist, which I find interesting, does a great job of building up that low level feeling of dread. In the first half of this book I finally found myself thinking a lot of that movie the menu. Where things are pretty straightforward but then the author or the filmmaker will drop in one or two little things that the acute observer will notice and realize mean things are Actually not at all what they seem. This happened in the first half of this book and I loved it.

I loved the near future setting of this book, too. I like how we were dropped into a future with different tech and different history and she didn’t go into detail on any of these things, just threw them in, sprinkled them in, like readers of that time which just take for granted all of those things. There was something very cheeky about that and I enjoyed it. But, the last third of this book was less satisfying for me. There were some plot points that I felt were given way more time and attention than they deserved and there were some plot points that I felt got way less. It was just a little bit balanced and messy and that last 30% of the book and so I’m going to end up probably only giving this book a 3.75 star rating.

3.5 stars

A group of startup coworkers crash on a (seemingly) deserted island after celebrating being acquired. They've already lost a few of their team members from the crash, and after coming upon a weird monolith house on the island, it seems they're getting picked off one by one.

What a weird little book! An absurd sci-fi thriller, but I honestly couldn't put it down. I kind of wish the house that they find was explored a little more as an idea (creepy AI house??), but the horror in this book is really around people. And isn't that just the realest thing. Also, the thought of an emotional currency is terrifying in its own right.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.