Jane is a dogwalker for a neighborhood of exclusive estates in Alabama. She imagines what it would be like to live in a house like these someday, but never imagines it would actually happen until she meets Eddie Rochester. They begin a whirlwind romance, yet Jane feels like an outsider with the rich ladies of the neighborhood. Eddie had lost his wife Bea and her best friend Blanche in a tragic accident the year before. Bea was the founder of Southern Manors, a sophisticated and cultured lady that everyone strove to be like, while Jane is just the hired help. After Eddie proposes and Jane moves in, rumors begin to fly about the night that the B's disappeared. Jane becomes wary of Eddie, especially when she begins hearing strange thumping noises from upstairs.
I loved this twisty thriller and I didn't guess what was actually happening until the very end. I couldn't put this book down!
Thank you to Rachel Hawkins and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read this book. I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. The views and opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

So this is supposed to be a retelling of Jane Eyre which I have never read. Since I have never read it I had no idea how this book would end. Let me first say that I disliked all the characters in the book. Jane grew on me and by the time I finished the book I liked her a bit more.
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Jane is a dog walker in a wealthy community where she meets Eddie. He is a widower whose wife died in a tragic boat accident along with her best friend, Blanche. Jane slowly devises a plan to catch Eddies attention and ends moving in with him and becomes his fiancé. However, his previous wife, Bea, seems to still be a big part of his life. It is also discovered that Blanche didn’t just drown but that she was hit on the head. So many secrets and manipulation in the book. Nothing is as it seems. It did have me a guessing at times but in the end I could see where the story was going.
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All the characters in the book were very unreliable which I can get behind depending on the book. I did like the different POV’s and the open ended ending we got, but it just wasn’t love for me. Maybe one day I’ll read the original Jane Eyre since that seems to be well loved.

I'm hooked! If you've ever wondered if Jane Eyre would have made the same choices if she lived in the modern world, this is your chance to find out. But Jane is not the innocent, old orphan of the old. Yes, she grew up in the foster system, but she knows how to look out for herself and how to manipulate people to get things to go her way. Mr. Rochester is not a sad, lonely widowe and John Rivers is more creepy than you thought he could be. But Bea or Bertha takes the star - after all, she is the wife upstairs. Now I've got to go and get all of Rachel Hawkins's books.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc.

The Wife Upstairs is a clever, exciting retelling of Jane Eyre set in the modern world. There was a lot of tension and an overwhelming sense of urgency while reading that made the book quite thrilling. None of the characters are particularly likable, including Jane, which was very interesting and honestly made me rethink a lot of the original plot and characterization of Jane Eyre. With The Wife Upstairs being a retelling of a classic novel, it's obvious there is going to be some degree of predictability within the plot, however, I thought the "twists" were too easy to predict and the book started to loose some of it's steam towards the end. I also found the ending to be somewhat anti-climatic, which was really unfortunate because it had such a great buildup!

My Thoughts
This book has had some major marketing! One cannot scroll through WordPress or Instagram without seeing something about this book. I tend to avoid a lot of overly hyped books, but the comparison of this one to Jane Eyre piqued my interest so I had to read it. Here are my pros and cons for The Wife Upstairs:

Pros

1. This Jane is definitely not Jane Eyre! She is cunning, conniving, independent, and full of secrets – the polar opposite of Jane Eyre actually! I liked the differences.
2. I think I loved and hated every character in this book in equal measure. Jane, Bea, Blanche, Eddie, Tripp, John, the snobby ladies in the neighborhood… all of them were either horrible or likeable for various reasons. I actually liked this because the emotional roller coaster of being annoyed or mad at a character and then liking or rooting for that same character keeps me involved in the story.
3. The book is an easy read. The plot isn’t complicated, the pacing is fantastic, and I plowed right through it.
4. I like the past and present narrative. It worked well to flesh out the story and was easy to follow.
5. I thought the characterizations were solid. I don’t think I would have loved/hated the characters if they weren’t.
6. It was an interesting study of how people in certain demographics/categories (i.e., class, wealth, past histories, address) relate to each other and how people in some of those categories believe they have special rights, privileges, or even control over others.
7. The twist is pretty good. I started to suspect some things, but I didn’t fully see it coming. Kudos for that.
8. While perhaps a little convenient and abrupt, the ending was good.

Cons

1. Ultimately, the Jane Eyre comparison is weak in my opinion. Besides a couple of names, a wife upstairs, and a girl with no parents, the similarities between the two stories are slim.
2. The love affair between Jane and Eddie was too fast and unrealistic, but understandably necessary for the plot to work.
3. I wanted more about Jane’s past. We got some backstory and some resolutions to certain situations, but I still felt like something was missing there.
4. Serious overuse of the F-word. I just don’t think that is necessary and other words do exist that can be used instead.
5. There was a hateful and divisive comment in the book about a character’s political affiliation. There is already enough hate in this world regarding politics, so I didn’t like seeing it in a book I was enjoying.

Summary
I’m not sure I completely agree with the hype over this book. But I do think it was a good, but mild, thriller with a decent twist, and I am glad I read it. For me this was a 3.5 star book, but I always round up… so 4 stars from me.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for providing an ebook, which I have reviewed honestly and voluntarily.

I would recommend this to friends and family members. Great story. I enjoyed the book. Great characters.

Jane is a down on her luck, dog walker in the gated community of Thornfield estates. She enjoys walking the dogs there and imagining what it might be like to live there. Her luck changes when she meets Eddie Rochester, a man whose wife, Bea drowned in a boating accident along with her best friend Blanche. When they fall for each other, Jane no longer must imagine what it might be like to live there. To have a nice home and not a dingy apartment. As her life begins to improve, she attempts to fit in with the women who once hired her to walk their dogs. Plain Jane tries to look right, dress right, eat right, etc. The women include her in their many committees and meetings but all the while letting her know she is not Bea, that they knew Bea first and perhaps know more about Eddie than she does.

I was expecting this book to be more like a Jane Eyre retelling and less like a poorly told thriller. Plot was hard to believe and every single character was impossible to like. I ended up not even caring what the resolution was because it didn’t matter to me.

This is the first book I've read from this author and I really enjoyed it. I've never read Jane Eyre so this was a fresh read for me. The characters were great and I enjoyed the dual point of view. This book will hook you from the start so happy reading. I really want to read other books from this author. Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book and this is my honest review.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3762605071

Having never read Jane Eyre nor Rebecca, I can't speak to the similarities that other reviewers are mentioning. I can say that this was a page turner. I read this incredibly fast because I really needed to know where this was all going. So I enjoyed reading this book although I did have some complaints. The biggest being, that not much in this book is actually believable. The way that some (most) of the characters were acting gave big clues to where the book was headed before it even got there. I wasn't all that surprised as things were revealed along the way. I was hoping for a shocking plot twist in the end and was slightly disappointed. The execution on this one just didn't work for me but I did have fun reading it.

I enjoy re-tellings and modern remakes of classics. It's fun to see how a modern writer takes a familiar plot and makes it their own. The Wife Upstairs is Rachel Hawkins' new vision of Jane Eyre. Jane is a dog-walker in a posh Birmingham, AL neighborhood, Thornfield Estates. Then she meets Eddie Rochester, a widower. Eddie's wife and her best friend drowned in a boating accident. Jane is hiding some secrets, but then again....so is Eddie.

I found this story interesting because there wasn't a single character that I liked. Everyone is a liar, self-absorbed or sneaky. But, really, doesn't every human being have an agenda? I don't want to give anything away.... All I'm going to say is that I got sucked right into this story because I literally disliked every character. But...I pretty much felt the same way about Jane Eyre. Edward is hiding his crazy wife and taking advantage. Jane is too Mary Sue. The servants are all gossips. Edward's rich friends are all classist bigots. The characters in this modern version are still very flawed, but in ways that are bit more recognizable. And a bit more evil.

This tale had a few surprises along the way. It definitely kept my attention from start to finish. It isn't just an update of the plot we all know. There are marked similarities, but enough is different to make this a real update.

This is the first book by Rachel Hawkins that I've read. I will definitely read more of her books. I like her writing style!

I had both an ebook and audio book version of this new release. The audio is just over 8 hours long. Narrated by Emily Shaffer, Kirby Heyborne and Lauren Fortgang, the audio is very well done!

Excellent twisty tale! I enjoyed it!

**I voluntarily read a review copy of this book. All opinions expressed are entirely my own**

This was such a fun page turner! I read it in one day and loved the ending! The big reveal wasn't all that shocking, but I still thoroughly enjoyed this thriller and will definitely be recommending it to everyone I know. Fun read!

I liked the Jane Eyre basis for this book. The book kept my interest from start to finish, but I felt some parts were far-fetched and although I kept wanting to find out the new twists and turns they were often a little disappointing.

Modernized spins on the classics aren’t a new thing. If “The Wife Upstairs” doesn’t give itself away with its title, you’ll figure it out as soon as Jane, plain and small, a dog-walker in a hoity-toity neighborhood, meets widower “Eddie” Rochester, living alone in a mansion. He doesn’t even have a dog. But the predictability isn’t complete, and chances are you’ll fly through “The Wife Upstairs” both because you’re intrigued by the unfolding story itself and because you’re putting together all the nods to its inspiration, Charlotte Bronte’s “Jane Eyre.” The setting here is not England but Birmingham, Ala. Eddie’s wife, Bea, started a wildly successful home decor company called Southern Manors, and then died in a boating accident with her best friend, Blanche. Or did she? Did they? After Blanche’s body is found, police begin looking into the possibility of murder. Meanwhile, Jane has been swept off her feet by Eddie. She has everything she’s ever wanted. Or does she? This Jane is no demure Victorian lass. Her history involves apparent dark deeds, and the police may be looking for her. Her real name isn’t even Jane! “The Wife Upstairs” doesn’t try to hide where it’s going. Not many pages in, author Hawkins reveals what might have been a shock if saved for the end. Alternating voices and flashbacks ensue. Despite a structure that feels disjointed at times, “The Wife Upstairs” speeds to an exciting and satisfying conclusion, with an eyebrow-raising postscript. But maybe the best thing about the book is that it may inspire you to read “Jane Eyre” again.

A solid thriller, told in multiple POV's, which I'm always a fan of. I really enjoyed the setting of the rich south and the privileged women living there. Jane's story was paced perfectly, keeping me guessing with each page what was really happening. There were lots of twists and turns, with a very clever ending. I thoroughly enjoyed this one and can see why so many are raving about it! I've heard that it is loosely based around the story of Jane Eyre (which I've never read, sorry) so I don't have much to compare it to.

A fun twisty thriller that I will definitely recommend!
4 stars

Five Stars! This novel is an absolute page turner from beginning to end and it is destined to be a huge hit, especially with book clubs. I highly recommend it and I’m not saying that just because I’m from Birmingham. But I will admit that is part of the reason that I initially wanted to read the novel. Rachel Hawkins weaves an incredible fast paced storyline with intriguing two-faced characters with huge secrets and an unforgettable ending.

Picture a large uber wealthy subdivision in Birmingham, Alabama with super-sized McMansions, perfectly sculpted “stepford” like women with gorgeous husbands, a merry-go-round of charitable functions and the constant buzz of gossip and under the guise of bless her heart.

Jane, a dog walker who recently moved to the area from Arizona considers herself to be plain especially compared to these women. She tries to be helpful, pliable and useful so she can stick around. No one seems to notice the few items she pilfers here and there. She is always listening and would love to become one of these women. As a former foster kid, she knows how to become whatever she needs to be in any given situation. Her real name isn’t even Jane.

She meets Eddie, the gorgeous man with the biggest mansion in Thornfield Estates and he’s a widow. Eddie seems genuine and is slowly coping with the drowning death of his beloved wife. Over time the two fall in love. Jane is acclimating to this new lifestyle but the memory of Bea seems to be a constant third wheel. How can Jane measure up? It’s hard to compete with a dead woman. How will she ever truly fit in with these neighborhood women who were Bea’s friends? There is a huge secret that threatens everything and Jane knows time is running out.

I received an advance copy of this novel; all opinions are my own.

We all know I picked up The Wife Upstairs because I love Rachel Hawkins with all my bookish heart. It's a good 'Adult' thriller. Especially if that's one of your favorite types of stories. I personally prefer her YA writing but I'm happy I got an opportunity to check out her venture into Adult books. I'm not sure if audiobooks of Wife exist, but I'm off to search because I think I would enjoy it even more in that format. 🎧📚🤗

This was darkly funny and had a great pace. I tore through it. There were two separate stories that were woven into one and I enjoyed this read a lot. Free copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

I loved this modern retelling of Jane Eyre. Jane and Eddie fall into a very fast relationship and she quickly moves in with him. She clearly wants his money and to live a lifestyle she’s only dreamed of up until this point. She begins to fish for stories about Eddie’s late wife, who disappeared with her best friend. Both women are presumed dead.

We know Jane is an unreliable narrator. Up front, we know she has secrets and is lying about who she really is. I usually don’t care for books where I dislike the characters but Jane grew on me. I loved the twists in this book. You won’t know who to believe. This is a fast-paced, hard to put down book. Definitely recommend reading this one!

Many thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for this eARC!

This was a slow burn read, with each character harbouring a secret of their own. I both loved & hated the twist at the end (if that even makes sense), which by no means is a bad thing! It’s the sign of a good writer who knows how to get under your (my) skin! I just wanted a different turn of events and outcome for some of the characters.

I haven’t read Jane Eyre yet, but I do have a general idea of the story and liked the author’s use of the same names!

This was like Wysteria Lane (Desperate Housewives) meets The Usual Suspects. Lies, gossip and drama! There wasn’t one character I was rooting for, Jane included! Which didn’t bother me, cause if you know me by now, I actually kinda like the unlikeable characters 😜. They make for good stories!

Overall, I really enjoyed this one and found myself reading late into the night.