Coming back from Albania, I always make the same stop:
The only major bookstore in Tirana where you can browse independently. I always head straight to my favourite corner: thrillers, mysteries, occult, and conspiracy.
I choose different categories for different occasions. For example, I would choose a complex one for silent readings at home, and a “fast-food” read for flights and trains. Something gripping enough to distract me from time, turbulence, and existential thoughts at 30,000 feet.
This time I went trendy. I picked up The Housemaid. I’ll be honest: I didn’t even realise there were multiple books in the same universe by the same author. After a quick chat with the very kind bookstore assistant, she suggested I start here.
Fair enough! 300-something pages, thriller, psychology, and cliffhanging chapters. Promising cover. Perfect flight material. I got a cappuccino, some nice treats and set the book on the tiny table in front of the seat. Let’s go!
It starts a little slow, but it does keep you turning pages.
However, I noticed something almost immediately: there’s only one main storyline. (Probably Dan Brown’s fault for ruining me with multiple plotlines, but that’s another conversation.)
The blurb says it’s unpredictable, but let me tell you, if you’re new to thrillers, maybe. But if you read this genre often, you can predict the direction pretty early… and even orchestrate about 101 alternative scenarios that could’ve been more interesting. Perhaps, because there were only a few characters. Not sure.
Okay, deep breathe! SPOILER ALERT!
The setup leans heavily into very familiar thriller tropes: rich couple, wife hiring a mysterious housemaid, sexual tension, manipulation, cheating husband. There are two POVs (the wife’s and the housemaids’). Then comes the “twist”:
The wife orchestrated everything, knowing the housemaid is a murderer, and that her husband is… let’s say, deeply disturbed, so the housemaid can get rid of him. 🙄 Really?
I mean, what in the Mexican telenovelas is going on here? I felt a bit silly when I kept reading it. BUT I KEPT READING IT.
So, I believe, at the end of the day, the author has her own merits for keeping us all hooked. She knew what she was doing. The writing style is good and catchy, but the scenario could’ve been a lot richer and more interesting (considering the author’s background).
Would I have liked a richer psychological exploration? Yes. More complexity?
Absolutely.
But as a travel read, something to keep your brain occupied between boarding announcements, it does its job very well.
Would I read another book by her? Hmm, probably not, but never say never. Airports have a way of lowering standards. Although she made me laugh at the very end, though. A proper WTF-but-now-it-makes-sense kind of ending that suddenly explains a lot about the effed up husband’s behaviour.
So, no. It didn’t blow my mind, and I’ll probably forget about it in about 2-3 years. But it did keep me company on a long journey. And sometimes, that’s exactly what a book is meant to do.
The way you described the novel, I probably wouldn’t have finished reading it.
When you can predict what’s going to happen at the beginning of a thriller, I think the pleasure of reading disappears and creative thinking is neglected. It is preferable when a reader gets a chance to see clues, figure out what will happen after each “cliffhanger”, and figure out who the “murderer” or “thief” is before reaching the last page. And thus take in the text, put yourself in the characters’ shoes, and think creatively. Which is good for your brain 😉✨🖤 But as you shared, if you need a distraction during a trip or wait for a longer period of time, that’s not wrong.