So, of course, I had to read this book before the movie comes out. I have read a Freida McFadden book before (The Boyfriend) and honestly wasn’t that impressed, so I wasn’t going into The Housemaid with high hopes. I will say, though, that this book was SO MUCH better than the last book I read by this author. The main difference, I think, is that the characters and storyline were developed so better with more depth than the characters in The Boyfriend. 

The things that I liked: the setup, the characters, and the mystery as a whole. The things I disliked? The ending and the predictability of “the twist “. 

With the setup, you’re hearing Millie’s side of the story as she tries to stay afloat after getting out of prison. When she is offered a job by Nina Winchester, she takes it immediately. Nina, though, becomes bipolar, forgetful, and downright mentally abusive at times. Andrew, Nina’s husband, though, seems to be the only sane one in the household (and the one Millie secretly has a crush on). Even Nina’s daughter (who isn’t Andrew’s biological child) is abhorrent at times. I personally loved hearing Millie’s side of the story as everything unfolds (but also seeing her make a series of really bad choices). Millie only wanted a blank slate, and you could tell that by a lot of the things she did or didn’t do. 

This leads me into the characters. You get a few horrible rich housewives sprinkled throughout the novel, but mostly you hear from Millie, Nina, and Andrew. There is a gardener, but his scenes are few and far between. Nina seemed complex and horrible at times. Millie had a secret from her past that you don’t find out until the end. Andrew was… more of a mystery. Each of these characters held depth that I hadn’t seen in the characters from this author that I had seen previously in another novel. I really enjoyed getting to know each of them.

With the mystery as a whole, I really enjoyed it and how everything was beginning to tie together except for the ending. Not only was the twist towards the end predictable, but the ending was, what’s a good word for this, picturesque? It was WAY too good to be true for a thriller of this magnitude. 

Spoilers ahead. 

So, Nina set Millie up to make her psycho husband let her leave. This was beyond predictable to me simply because there wasn’t a darn thing that Millie found about Andrew to be bad. That’s a HUGE red flag to me. A character without flaws? Yeah, that’s a villain in disguise for sure. Not to mention, Nina was just too dang bad in my opinion. I get that rich housewives are supposed to be “intolerable”, but this was next level. Andrew basically tortured Nina until Nina hired Millie and got Andrew interested in her. I saw it coming from a mile away but maybe that’s just me?

ALSO, the ending being too picturesque? Bro. Millie kills Andrew (inadvertently, but still), so this dude has missing teeth, bruised balls, and is malnourished as heck and somehow Nina decides to take the blame only to run into an officer who is oddly okay with letting Andrew’s death slide only because of how he thinks Andrew treated his daughter…. NOT ONLY THAT but at the freaking funeral, Andrew’s own mother lets it slide. Granted, she was obviously insane in her own way (makes you wonder how poor Andrew was treated as a small child), but still. I found that to be so odd that she wouldn’t do… anything to punish Nina. Makes no sense with how horrible she had been. 

Overall, I did really enjoy this mystery/thriller despite my reservations with the predictable twist and the too-easy ending. I thought these characters were fun to get to know and had depth that brought them to life. Will I be watching the movie? Absolutely. Will I read other Freida McFadden books? Probably not. 

Source: Audiobook from Libby Public Library

(P.S. You can read this book for free by signing up for a free trial of Audible, which gives you two free audiobooks of your choice!)