Whatever the audio equivalent of a page-turner is, this is one of them! I was hooked from chapter one of this whodunnit (or did someone even do it?). Narrator Laura Benanti's reading was well-paced and well-performed. I was completely swept up in the mystery of who, if anyone, killed 9-year-old Rose's nanny, as well as what happened to main character Stella's mother years ago. Author Sarah Pekkanen had me completely in her narrative clutches as I tried to solve the cases alongside Stella. Just when I thought I had it all figured out, BAM! Here come the twists. I found the ending to the mysteries and the extended epilogue very satisfying and would heartily recommend this novel to thriller fans!

It was my first time reading Sarah Pekkanen. A twisted family with secrets, I found House of Glass a dark and twisted story, well-paced, chilling, creepy, full of taut, suspense-filled, riveting moments and had me on the edge of my seat. l liked how the author let us see the insightful thoughts of a 9-year-old girl with secrets and uncontrollable dark impulses that are downright creepy and terrifying. I paired my e-ARC with ALC, which Laura Benanti narrated. It was my first time listening to her. She did a fantastic job narrating, bringing a distinctive voice to the main and supporting characters.
I look forward to reading more of Sarah Pekkanen's books. I highly recommend you grab a copy; you won’t be disappointed. The author's prose was so vividly descriptive that I felt like I was right there as an observer watching the twisted story unfold. I had difficulty putting it down— I stayed up all night listening spellbound.

I want to thank St. Martin’s Press, Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for allowing an e-ARC and ALC of House of Glass by Sarah Pekkanen in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Thank you, Macmillan Audio for this advance copy in exchange for my review.

Sarah Pekkanen never disappoints.

I love a book about a possible psychopathic child, and the is she or isn’t she throughout House of Glass had me gripped.

I really enjoyed the dynamics of the Barclay family. Stella’s quest to figure out little Rose and solve who murdered Tina was filled with twists and turns I did not expect.

The side plot of Stella’s own family history tied the story together perfectly.

The parallel between Rose and Stella’s selective mutism was something I’ve never seen done before and I thought that was so interesting.

4.5 ⭐️

🎧📖 note: Laura Benanti did a fantastic job with all of the characters and bringing House of Glass to life with her narration.

Stella Hudson is the attorney who has been assigned to 9 year old Rose Barclay’s case to determine the custody agreement during her parent’s divorce. This, of course, is after the unsolved murder of her nanny and resultant traumatic mutism.

“House of Glass” is a fast paced twisty thriller. The primary character is well developed and her own back story weaves through the plot helping you understand her drive. The secondary characters are only developed as far as the Pekkanen wanted to you know to keep the suspense high. The mystery was solved to my satisfaction, but the ending felt a little too buttoned up. Overall a binge worthy listen for a couple of days.

I really enjoyed this audiobook version of House of Glass. This was a perfect domestic thriller read. A whodunit murder mystery, this book kept me guessing until the very end. I also really enjoyed the dual timelines, and interconnected storylines. I would recommend this book to any lover of mystery, thriller, and suspense books. Excellent narration.

I'm a huge fan of Sarah Pekkanen. The first time I read one of her books was Anonymous Girl which she wrote with Greer Hendricks who I also love. I have yet to find a miss from here, and this book is no different. It started out a little more like a detective novel, and I'll be honest that I was hesitant if this one was going to be another hit, but not even a quarter of the way through I realized how wrong I was, and it's not another detective novel. Stella is a children's attorney and man is she a badass. Growing up her life was no cake walk, but she came out of it a reasonably unbroken person for everything she struggles with. Rose, the child, is such a conundrum, and you unwrap her layers chapter after chapter, and I truly couldn't put this book down. If you're a thriller fan and haven't started reading Pekkanen's books yet, you're missing out. I highly recommend this one!

The audiobook is also incredible. With so many details, I didn't have any problem keeping up with where the story was going or with the difference characters or anything. The narrator is the incredible Laura Benanti Tony award winning actress and singer so I would expect nothing than the best from her anyways. Definitely check out her other audiobooks as well!

3.5🌟
Stella Hudson is an attorney assigned to nine year old Rose. Rose's parents are going through a bitter divorce, both demanding sole custody of their beloved daughter. Stella has the most difficult task of determining what’s in Rose’s best interest.

Just to complicate things further, there is an additional issue.
The family’s nanny recently fell out of a second-floor window with dear Rose looking on. And she hasn’t spoken a word since.

As Stella digs deeper into Rose’s life she realizes this is a family harboring a host of secrets and she needs to tread carefully as she continues uncovering more lies!

I’ve been a huge fan of this author but this latest just failed to capture my interest. Was it the storyline? The characters? Though I had both digital and audio copy I chose the audio for the majority of the book. I wasn’t overly impressed with the narrator's performance and perhaps that distracted me from the book itself.🤷🏻‍♀️

Since I’m such a dedicated fan of this author I will be watching for her next offering. Maybe I’ll just stick with a digital copy!

A buddy 🎧 with Susanne

Thank you to St Martin’s Press and Macmillan Audio (less)

Wow! What a wild ride! This book makes you doubt your own thoughts. I loved this one. The psyche of children as well as adults is so complex, that what you see may not be at all.

The story was ok-it dragged a bit at parts. I disliked the narrator and that may have impacted my view of the story.

Thank you #parter @macmillan.audio for the #gifted ALC to read and review.

Talk about bingable! This book was a wild ride with twists that took me way too long to see coming 👀 I absolutely loved it!

This was my first book by Sarah Pekkanen and I was pleasantly surprised by just how quickly I was invested in the characters. Enough to stop and send a message to my friend and tell her that I felt like I’d been punched in the gut at 4% 😅

Expect —> psychological thriller, childhood trauma (past and present), Twisty, Complex Characters, child advocacy

Stella’s job is to observe a child in their environment and recommend best solutions to the court when there are custody disagreements. Her current clients are a puzzle that grow increasingly dangerous. While Stella tries to figure out the what Rose needs, she discovers carefully crafted lies and that everyone is a suspect.

I loved how this book was written. The current storyline with small glimpses into the past. I’m a huge fan of advocating for those without a voice so Stella’s whole job is pretty incredible. This story kept me on my toes and I suspected… everyone. Every single person 😆😆 It was a fabulous ride that I couldn’t put down (turn off). The narrator did an incredible job keeping me hooked.

Thank you Netgalley, Sarah Pekkanen and MacMillan Audio! This book was everything I want in a thrilling mystery. I changed my mind a million times about what was going on and I was wrong most of the time which was refreshing and fun. I felt so connected to the characters in this book and couldn't stop listening to find out how everything would turn out.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this audiobook ARC. Your heart goes out to the MC right out of the gate her life is a hot mess and she gets thrown into this case with a family that is just so bone chilling and creepy. Everyone is so shady but I don’t understand why all this falls on a child lawyer and not the police. Why is this investigation on one person. I had no idea where this was going so I give the author credit for that! My complaint is Squirrel rehab is questionable and a weird sympathy inducing source. Another forced choice seemed like the unnecessary ending romantic interest Finally,The final plot twist was a little overkill at that point in the story. Overall it was pretty good but it needed probably a little more plotting out timing wise so it wasn’t so much info dumping at the end.

I have always enjoyed Sarah Pekkanen books but I think that this one was definitely my favorite! Wow I didn't want to stop listening to this! It was sooo good! I will be recommending this to everyone I know to read this! It pulled at my heart with this poor little and everything that she'd been through. I enjoyed the main character, Stella, development was great in that what she was going through with Rose helped her to dig into her past and discover new things about herself.
I don't want to give away any spoilers but 10/10 read this! Wouldn't change a thing!

3.5 stars, rounded upwards.

Author Sarah Pekkanen is known for writing psychological thrillers, and her newest novel, House of Glass, is a real page turner. My thanks go to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the invitation to read and review. This book will be available to the public August 6, 2024.

Our protagonist is Stella Hudson, and she works as guardian ad litem, which is a professional whose job it is to represent the best interests of a child when he or she is the subject, or an important participant in, a court case. Stella’s father figure and mentor is a judge, and a case has come up that he feels Stella is uniquely qualified for. It’s a divorce case, two wealthy individuals squabbling over a child. The child, Rose Barclay, has experienced a great trauma that has left her mute. She saw her nanny fall (be pushed?) out of the attic window and die, and she hasn’t spoken since. By convenient coincidence, Stella also experienced the same condition after a childhood trauma of her own; this is why Charles, her mentor, has asked her to serve.

I’ll tell you right now, I am not terribly impressed with this book. A protagonist who’s been traumatized in ways related to her task at hand is fast becoming a trope, and I’m ready to be done with it. Rose is a prodigy, brilliant in every way, which is also overused, and very convenient for an author that doesn’t want to deal with developmental stages even though the child is a major character. Also, Stella’s job does not require her to solve the nanny’s murder, that’s the job of the cops. Yet the book leads us to believe that this is part of a guardian ad litem’s work.

But the most annoying facet of this mystery is that I had it solved before the 20% mark. That’s just straight up ridiculous. If I had solved it because I am so darned clever, that would be one thing, but I feel as if my cat could probably have done the same. First, a suspect that’s identified very early in the story is almost never the killer, and then of course, the person least suspected by the other characters is often the one that did it. And so at first I waited hopefully for some new spin or plot twist that would make me change my mind, but it never damn happened.

Consequently, I was prepared to give this book a rating of 3 stars, which is lower than my average, but one thing stopped me. I noticed that, however cranky I felt about this transparently obvious mystery, I didn’t want to stop reading it. I could have quit at the halfway mark, skimmed the ending to be certain I was right, and then written my review, yet even though I knew exactly how it would shake out, I still wanted to see/hear the rest of the story.

I was fortunate in having both the digital review copy and the audiobook, and the narrator, Laura Benanti, does a first rate job. That’s worth something, too.

Because of the fact that Pekkanen’s mysteries are beginning to feel formulaic, I am probably finished with this author, but I also think there are a great many readers that will like it. Nevertheless, my recommendation to you is to get it free or cheap, rather than to pay full cover price.

Thank you to NetGalley and MacMillan Audio for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion. The story starts with a nanny plunging to her death and 9 year old Rose may have been a witness to this horrible tragedy but no one knows for sure because Rose is so traumatised that she refuses to speak. Stella is appointed to act on behalf of Rose which she is not too happy about as she never takes on clients under 13 yrs old as it reminds her of her own tragic past. Stella reluctantly agrees as it is her mentor who is requesting this of her.

Stella notices that this case is quite strange and so are the members of this family. The parents are going through a divorce and everything in the house is plastic. There is not one piece of glass anywhere and no sharp objects

As Stella tries to get Rose to open up and trust her, strange things begin to happen and she wonders if Rose is the reason that the nanny fell to her death and now she feels her own life may be in jeopardy as well. This was a great read and Sarah Pekkanen did it again!!!! Enjoy!!!

Sarah Pekkanen never disappoints! This is another winner from this author, and it it my new favorite!

Stella Hudson is a BIA - a Best Interest Attorney. A judge, Stella’s mentor, asks her to take a case of a young girl whose parents are divorcing and who has also witnessed a traumatic event. Her name is Rose, and the trauma has taken her voice. This is something that Stella has personal experience with. Stella enters the world of the Barclay Family where she has to make decisions that are in the best interest of Rose. She also has to spend time in the Barclay home, and the home itself has its own secrets.

Everyone in this story has secrets. This is one of the most character-driven stories I have read in a long time, and it made the story even better! You get to know everyone, and that really helps to challenge the perceptions the reader makes about the mystery at the heart of the story. I really liked Stella a lot. She has her flaws, but she gets up every day to fight for her clients. Rose is also a fascinating character. She has secrets of her own, but you really feel for her and her struggles.

Stella unravels this mystery methodically. I was glued to the book when I wasn’t listening to the audiobook. Laura Benanti does a phenomenal job with the narration of this one! There are so many twists and turns throughout the story, and there were chapters where I swear I had to remind myself to take a breath. I loved the ending of this book - it was perfect!

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Macmillan Audio for the opportunity to read and listen to this marvelous book! It releases on August 6th - preorder it now! I highly recommend this one - it is the mystery/thriller you are looking for, and you won’t be disappointed!

House of Glass was a gripping thriller/mystery about Stella, an attorney assigned to represent the interests of a young girl, Rose, as the court determines custody in her parents’ divorce. As an added complication, the girls’ nanny recently fell to her death at the house with no explanation. As Stella gets closer to the family, she finds reasons to suspect every family member had involvement in the crime, even Rose, who hasn’t said a word since the incident.

I was captivated during this entire book and read it over just two days. The red herrings really kept my guessing and the ending was so satisfying. I also really enjoyed the narrator for this book and thought it was a perfect choice for a quick summer listen.

I received an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest feedback.

I really enjoyed this book! Sarah Pekkanen never disappoints keeping the listener engaged and wondering what in the world is going on. The narration was spot on and this is a title that I will be purchasing for my library in many different formats. Thank you.

House of Glass has a very intriguing premise, that unfortunately had a few extra plot lines that really derailed the story. Stella Hudson is a best interest attorney who has recently been hired to evaluate which parent Rose Barclay should live with after her parent's divorce. Beth and Ian are going through a divorce after Ian's affair with Roses' nanny was exposed which happened at the same time she fell to her death out of an attic window at the Barclay's home. Rose witnessed this tragic event and has been experiencing traumatic muteness ever since. Stella can relate deeply to Rose as she also went through the same thing after she experience a tragedy as a child. I enjoyed the main plot and the narrator did a great job adding to the drama of the book with her voice work. The parts about Stella's past, her personal divorce, and her mysterious father figure Charles were the plot Iines I felt really took me out of the story and could have done without. 3/5 for plot and 5/5 for propulsive and entertaining read!

House of Glass has a promising start with the "was it an accident or murder and is the little girl involved" locked-room storyline and all the creepy people living in the creepy old house that keeps you guessing. Unfortunately, the story bogged down for me every time the death of Stella's mother came up since it threw the focus off the mystery that I was there for and didn't really add to anything once we got past the fact that Stella had faced a similar trauma as Rose that led each to stop speaking for a time. The level of description in this book was also a lot, and not in a good way a. lot, more like a fill up space way. I truly loved Pekkanen's last book and am sorry that this one just didn't do it for me. Thank you to Macmillan Audio, St. Martin's Press, and NetGalley for the early listen in exchange for my honest opinion. Rounding up 2.5 to 3 stars.