I received a copy of this novel from net galley in exchange for an honest review.
This novel had me from page one... and it stayed that way until about half way through the book when I lost interest in the story. It wasn’t that it was poorly written or that the characters and the story were not interesting, it just seemed to me like it lost something about half way through. I stayed with it and I finished it, and I would recommend it to others even if it lost me about half way in (who knows maybe I’m the only one who seemed to just loose their way during it). I can not fault the writing, or the editing... or basically anything other than my own brain. I will be recommending this to others, and maybe someone will change my mind about getting lost in the middle.

A dark, haunting thriller like The Nesting is not my usual go-to genre. I can easily and surprisingly say that I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Lexi assumes Sophie’s identity and becomes a nanny to Gaia and Coco in a very remote area of Norway. The girls’ mother, Aurelia, recently died in mysterious circumstances. Also mysterious are all the other people who live in Granhus.

Tom, the girls’ father, is knee deep in building dream houses for his family. Yes, houses, plural. The first dream house, ‘Basecamp’, was destroyed when the river Tom had diverted meandered back to its original course and washed that house away.

Many problems arise as work takes place on the second, ‘Aurelia’s Nest’. Don’t mess with Mother Nature was a recurrent theme. The author includes interesting supporting characters and Norse folklore in this goose-bump rendering tale. There were a few areas that had me suspending my ‘logical’ standard, but the story was good anyway.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review The Nesting. I enjoyed it very much.

I did not love the beginning of this book at all. I was confused for a large portion of the book because I felt like I didn't have any opening plot that let me know what situation was at hand.

The Nesting: A Novel (September 2020)
By C. J. Cooke
Berkley/Penguin, 368 pages
★★★

Folklore is tricky. Why do we tell fanciful stories? For instance, are monsters real or imagined? Metaphors? Jungian archetypes? Psychological projection? What about pantheistic religion. Are there nature spirits? Is nature sentient? Can it seek revenge?

These questions come into play in C. J. Cooke’s The Nesting. Its protagonist is down-on-her-luck Alexi Ellis, whose addict mother stuffled her daughter in various foster homes, each one increasingly worse. At one point, Alexi tried to kill herself. Now 28, she’s still a mess–especially after she’s left homeless when her boyfriend has had enough. Opportunity comes in an unexpected fashion. On a train, she overhears a phone call in which a woman tells a friend she’s abandoning a potential nanny job in Norway. Moments after hanging up, she asks Alexi if she will watch her laptop for a moment. Just enough time for Alexi to look at the job for which she is withdrawing and to scan her resumé. In a unique twist on identity theft, Alexi becomes Sophie Hallerton and applies for the job.

When you’ve been exposed to manipulative people, you learn some tricks. Alexi-as-Sophie has impressive credentials and aces her phone interview. Can she cook vegan? Of course! Can she teach using Montessori methods? She’s all about Montessori. She hasn’t the faintest idea about either, but, hey, that’s what the internet is for. In her ten years of nannying she’s handled it all. Her future employer Tom Faraday, an English architect, is impressed; Sophie makes her way to London and is then on to Norway to care for Coco, a toddler, and her precocious sister Gaia. There’s serious healing in need, as their mother Aurelia has recently committed suicide. Tom is drowning his grief in work. He is obsessed with building the dream house he and Aurelia planned on a clifftop piece land overlooking a fjord where she died. Tom is joined by his business partner Clive and his interior designer girlfriend Derry, but the only other resident is housekeeper Maren, who never seems to do any domestic tasks.

Sophie/Alexi gets on with the children so that they crack her pouty, angry exterior, but the situation is more than weird. She learns that the first house was near completion but washed away. The old house on the property where they temporarily live is one in which things goes bump in the night; Gaia reports seeing elk tracks and “the Sad Lady” in the house on occasion and Sophie also imagines seeing a terrifying figure. Outside, strange phenomena take place outside.

Cooke’s novel is arranged in “then” chapters in which Aurelia is the narrator, and “now” in which Sophie, the children, Tom, Clive, Derry, Maren, and several supporting characters interact. It appears as if things began to go wrong when Tom diverted a river and, as Aurelia saw it, nature fought back. Much of the work crew from Tom’s money-hemorrhaging project quit because they are creeped out. There is talk of a vengeful nøkk, a legendary shapeshifting water sprite. In folklore, a nøkk–also called a neck, nix, or nokken–is usually just mischievous, but sometimes turns deadly and preys on pregnant women and unbaptized children. Is a nøkk seeking to punish Tom, who allegedly desires to build and live in absolute harmony with nature, for cutting down a tree and tampering with an ancient river? Or are we reading about people losing their minds in a place too far from civilization for comfort? Is this a thriller dressed in bunad or a tale of the supernatural? Or perhaps a story in which one deception is piled upon other deceptions?

The Nesting draws us in, which is a good thing as it’s a bit clunky at first and, to be honest, I nearly bailed. It eventually becomes an unsettling page-turner, in good and bad ways. Cooke does a nice job with questions of identity. (Sophie/Alexi isn’t the only person who isn’t quite who she pretends to be.) She also deftly plays off of various meanings of the book title and makes you ponder which is the nesting. On the other hand, there are definite plot holes, including a rather large one that goes nowhere involving a find in the cliff. Cooke builds suspense well, but not entirely believably, and her slow simmer stands in marked contrast to resolution that comes so fast that it seems forced. On a personal note, I think she treads onto essentialist turf when she asks us to believe that someone of Alexi’s background is instantly transformed by proxy parenthood. The Nesting is certainly worth reading, but be forewarned that parts of it fail to fledge.


Rob Weir

I think this book had a lot of promising ideas, maybe too many. Was The Nesting supposed to be a mystery or horror story? I honestly couldn't tell. Implausible storylines (the identity theft arc was incredibly weak) intersected with some poor writing (unnecessary alternating viewpoints, dangling plots, red herrings, etc.) made this book a tedious read.

Lexi Ellils, a young woman with no place left to go and no one left to turn to, impulsively steals another young woman's resume and applies for a job as a nanny. She'll be living in an isolated house in Norway, taking care of a widower's two daughters while he builds a high concept house hanging from a steep cliff. She knows that what she is doing is a bad idea, but she's immediately drawn to the two little girls who recently lost their mother.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. Haunted houses always appeal to me and there are some chilling scenes with muddy animals prints in the house and an apparition one of the girls describes as "the sad lady."It includes an intriguing mix of environmentalism and folklore, along with the fact that Lexi is trying to determine whether what she sees is supernatural or a hallucination brought on by her mental illness. She's a likable character who took the job out of desperation and is doing her best to be a good nanny to the children. I did have a hard time accepting the author's description of the young children and the rigid academic schedule they're supposed to be keeping, to the point that I had to stop and look up whether 9 month olds can drink almond milk. (It's not recommended.)

A desperate woman takes a job as a nanny for two children in Norway where a man is trying to build his dead wife's dream house. The story alternatives been the first try of building the house when the wife was still alive and the present attempt. Meanwhile, the "nanny" has a whole other story line going on. I enjoyed this book very much. It was an Interesting mix of thriller, folk tale and the supernatural.

A desperate young woman pretends to be a nanny so she can have a place to live after her boyfriend and best friend hook up and kick her out of their lives. Dealing with mental illness, Lexi just came off a suicide attempt when her boyfriend dropped the bombshell on her. She overhears a woman talking about a job opportunity to be a nanny for two kids going to Norway, so she pretends to be the nanny and gets the job. Once there, Lexi discovers something happened to the girls' mother, Aurelia, and while everyone says it is suicide, it may not have been. The family seems lovely and the two family friends welcoming, but underneath it all, lurks darkness. Just like the basement Lexi has been warned not to go into. And who is the Sad Lady the oldest daughter keeps talking about? There is gothic scares, Nordic folktales and even a vicious Mother Nature at play here. There were some plot holes and a few missteps that stuck out to me, but might not to others.

Ghosts? Check. Gothic? Check. Scandinavian? Check. Mystery? Check! This was a fun, if somewhat creepy, read, not that I have a problem with creepy! This was a haunting thriller of a novel. Lexi, under a false identity, escapes to Norway to be a nanny to two young girls, Gaia and Coco, after their mother, Aurelia's, supposed suicide. Husband Tom is determine to build a special home in her memory, calling it The Nest. Everything that could go wrong does, and Lexi begins to wonder what she is doing there, but cannot just leave her two young charges to the craziness. Enjoy! ~ Diane

If you like stories with a strong sense of place, this book will fit the bill. Aurelia has drowned in a Norwegian fjord, and now her widower is building the house he had promised her, an architectural masterpiece attached to a cliff overlooking the fjord. He hires Lexi to care for his two small children, but she is not who she claims to be. Neither are most of the other characters we meet.

This is a complex novel with environmental messages combined with Norwegian lore to add a sense of foreboding. How did Aurelia really die, and why? Seeking the answer kept me engaged even when I found some parts of the storytelling slow.

Review #21, THE NESTING by CJ Cooke and reviewing for Netgalley. A dark haunting fairy tale thriller. When your life is bad and you are homeless what do you do? Assume someone else's life! Set in the dark forest of Norway with lots of secrets. A new author for me that I will be returning to see what else they have in store. ★ ★ ★ ★ Four stars.

2.5 stars--somewhere between "it was OK" and "I liked it."

This book opens with a truly gothic scenario, which of course I love. (I'm always up for women in their nightgowns running through the forest!) I enjoyed the creepy folklore elements and remote setting of the book. A few times it was actually quite chilling.

However, I thought the characterization was muddled, and there were some plot holes that I couldn't forgive. If this book lost 30 pages or so, I think it could be a tight thriller. But as it stands, it's a bit bloated and jumbled.

I received this review copy from the publisher on NetGalley. Thanks for the opportunity to read and review; I appreciate it!

We were supposed to go to Norway this summer. For oblivious reasons, our trip was canceled. This book was a great alternative. I fell in love with with I Know My Name and really wanted to get my hands on this one.

Lexi has nothing left and is on the brink of the end. When she overhears and opportunity to start fresh, she changes her plan, name, and destination to masquerade as someone else. As the nanny for a widower who is hell bent on still building his wife's dream house, Lexi/Sophie soon wonders if all the tales she learns about are really true.

Very atmospheric, tense, and at times heart breaking. I only wish the ending was a bit more realistic. (You'll understand what I mean if you read it, so no spoilers here)! 4.5 rounded up!

It looks like this won’t be an entirely popular opinion, but this book didn’t really work for me. I love mysteries; atmospheric, brooding landscapes; interspersed folkloric elements to give a creepy vibe - I like all of that stuff, and so I assumed this book would tick all those boxes. However, it just really didn’t make a whole lot of sense. The book opens and goes on for quite a while building the background of Lexi and telling her story and her mental health, all to get us to the ultimate lie she tells to become the nanny in Norway. Great. However, that huge (looong) build up is essentially entirely abandoned for the Norway segment and all the craziness of that whole situation. Her character is nothing like the whole introduction - she’s just a totally different person! Sure, there are moments of, “Gosh, I hope they haven’t found out,” but they’re really flimsy insertions to the plot line. And the wrap-up with that was just rushed and nonsensical. And the rest of the book was just really dragging for something supposed to be building forward momentum for this murder mystery/identity fake discovery. The folklore was awkwardly placed and didn’t add to the whole. I think that part would have been much more effective with a faster pace and more of the dragging exposition shaved off. I just don’t get why we needed to be there for SO MUCH of Tom’s architectural issues. Mauren was just such a rich opportunity of a character whose storylines fell utterly flat.

This book was ultimately a chore to read rather than that urgent mystery-drive to finish.

A total “fast read, skim through, just get it over with” book for me. I did not enjoy and didn’t care about characters or plot.

Thanks to NetGalley for opportunity to read and review.

Thank you so much to net galley for sending me a copy of this book. I didn’t know what to expect when I started this book but I ended up falling in love with it

What a page turner! The setting of Norway was wonderful and some folklore sprinkled throughout was really cool. Each of the characters was well written and I liked how many of them were a bit ominous in their own way to keep you wondering what REALLY happened the night Aurelia died. It was all wrapped up rather nicely although I do wish Tom had done right by the body that was found. This was a phenomenal book and I highly recommend it.

This story was a good idea but just not well executed. The writing is mediocre and the plot grinds to a halt about 40% in. The story is centered on Lexi who is a depressed, suicidal woman who fakes her way into a nanny role in rural Norway. Creepy things start happening but then the story just fizzles and goes nowhere. I didn't know what I was continuing to read for.

Oh. My. Stars. I loved this book! I started out thinking it would be a standard Norwegian domestic thriller and as the story grew darker and creepier, my heart soared. The pacing is fantastic and I loved the back and forth of the dueling POVs. I really kept me guessing. Gaia and Coco were so wonderfully sweet and eeeee! I will be shouting about this from the rooftops!

I regret to say I tried reading this and was unable to finish it. I just was not at all drawn into the story which is strange because I grew up reading gothics and thought this would be a good read. Gaia and her sister are cute characters, but I am just done with the unreliable female narrator.