I loved this book from start to finish! As a teacher, this story really spoke to me. I could really feel for Rose’s struggle to connect the modern times to outdated modes of teaching. This story is full of strong female characters and I love how the author connects these women to famous women in Greek history and mythology.

If you've ever wondered if it's possible to write Victorian gothic fiction set in the 1990s, you need to check out Phoebe Wynne's relentlessly disturbing novel to see how she pulls it off. Rose is a newly hired teacher at a remote boarding school in Scotland. Cut off from the outside world, the school and its inhabitants grow ever more menacing as Rose begins to uncover secrets that everyone but her seems to be in on. Wynne propels the story briskly forward and develops an intriguing cast of characters who are all oddly subservient to anachronistic "traditions." Recommended for fans of psychological suspense and murky atmospheric settings.

Thanks to the @StMartinsPress and #NetGallley for providing an advance review copy.

2.5 stars

I was so excited to read this novel, but I mostly ended up becoming frustrated with it.

The reader is introduced to Rose Christie who has recently been hired to teach Latin at the prestigious and highly exclusive boarding school, Caldonbrae Hall in Scotland. Rose soon discovers that in addition to the school being extremely elitist, it is just as outdated and more nefarious than she ever could have anticipated. She finds out that female teachers are addressed as “Madam” and all male teachers are “Sir.” Rose also learns that the students practically have no academic ambitions simply because they are busy. Thrown into this strange environment, Rose slowly uncovers the repulsive truth behind the hailed walls of Caldonbrae Hall.

I studied Classical Languages at university, so I loved that aspect in this novel. I had fun translating the Latin passages and reading about women in the Roman Empire, both real and mythological. The Roman stories told preceded coming relevant scenes in the book, so I appreciated that part. I enjoyed the discussions Rose had with her students and how these stories made them confront their own views and indoctrination.

I question Rose’s claim that she’s a feminist based on her passivity throughout and on her highly problematic romantic interest. I also thought it was weird how Rose was so fixated on these young girls bodies almost as much as her male counterparts.

Even though I had issues with this book it was propulsive and while I predicted the ending, it did seem fitting.

Thanks Netgalley for a digital ARC in exchange for my honest opinions.

This was a DNF for me. The supernatural element of the story was something that I could not get behind.

I really enjoyed this book! It was a very quick, easy read (took less than a day to finish). I do wish we hadn't exactly known the ending at the beginning, but the journey to get there was worth it. It read very much like Rebecca in that way. No real twists or surprises, but it was a nice, light read that was fast-paced and engaging.

Heading off to boarding school? This one will make you think twice! A young teacher is recruited to come and teach at this elite school and gets way more than she bargained for! It’s a commitment to attend this school but you may also be committed to get out. Thanks to NetGalley for the early read.

*“Girls this age don’t need to have their own thoughts.”
*“The girls are the prize…their parents are, after all, the client, and we the service.”
*“(Rose) Please allow us to reeducate you.”

What is consent? Is it consent if: you didn’t know there existed other ways to see or do things, yet you do as you are told and see nothing wrong with your circumstances; you do as you are told knowing it is hurting yourself and others. Are you complicit if you keep your head down while doing your best to help others? These are central to the gothic mystery Madam by Phoebe Wynne.

Rose is a young, naïve teacher from London who becomes head of the classics department at Caldonbrae Hall, an all-girls boarding school set in a peninsula of Scotland. She sees herself as independent and intelligent, a product of her academic father and staunchly feminist mother. This position will give her the necessary means for her mother—who had Multiple Sclerosis—to receive proper care. She is both grateful and troubled by this, because the school has taken total control of her mother, and she is not consulted. Rose is not sure she is prepared for this, often wondering why they chose her, a public- school classics teacher of only six years. However, a fellow teacher assures her that she shouldn’t pass this up. This is a flaw in her character: she is susceptible to the opinions and directions of others. She wants to please and not cause waves. However, her ideals—influenced by the Greek and Roman poems and plays she teaches—cause her to question what she sees at the school, and change the way she has lived her life so far.

Caldonbrae Hall—also known as Hope Hall, the last name of the man whose estate became this school—is not what Rose expects (is it ever?). The boarding houses are named after his daughters, who, in turn, are named after virtues: Temperance, Verity, Clemency, Chastity, Honor, and Prudence. In these houses, the female offspring of the rich and titled white families come to learn and practice the “Three main threads to the system”: Discipline, Study, and Value. However, the girls put little thought towards their studies because, as they are taught, their Value is of utmost importance. Rose finds that the inbred misogyny is not limited to the male faculty but also the female teachers and students. Soon, Rose finds herself isolated in her desire to teach and in the locked gates of the school.

I found the author’s use of the stories of Lucrecia, Agrippina, Daphne, Media, Boudicca (my personal favorite historic woman), and Medusa both enjoyable and educational. Rose would present these to her class, and try to open up discussions about why these stories are important, and how they are just as relevant today. I knew nothing about many of these heroines of ancient Greece and Rome, and I now want to explore this genre. Each story brought an aspect of consent and dealing with adversity. For example, Agrippina is a lesson in getting ahead, and living/dying on your own terms; and Lucrecia teaches us about speaking up and taking control of one’s destiny.

I highly recommend this book.
*All quotes are from the book Madam by Phoebe Wynne
I would like to thank NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read and review this book.

“It was a dark and stormy night...”, well, it didn’t exactly start this way, but this Gothic thriller of a book has plenty of darkness and its fair share of storms. It follows the struggles, and horrors of a young new teacher to a prestigious boarding school for girls. Everything is not quite the way that it’s portrayed to the outside in their brochures and public image. Rose quickly begins to see, little by little, that all is not right in this world of young impressionable, malleable girls and what they’re being taught. She struggles with how to make an impact and how to get things changed and suffers greatly because of it. This book is full of suspense, tensions, and questions that are slowly answered and does well at pulling you in and keeping you there. It contains a few scenes that are a bit too graphic for me, but thankfully does not linger there. Thank you to NetGalley for the advance read copy.

Phoebe Wynne’s “Madam” is a deeply engrossing gothic tale set during the 1990s at a Scottish all girls’ boarding school. Wynne’s début functions as a mystery/thriller hybrid peppered with Greek mythological vignettes. Although I found the premise interesting, the novel could have benefited from some trimming; Wynne struggles with pacing and keeping readers engaged after “the reveal.”

For 150 years, Caldonbrae Hall A well known all girls boarding school steeped in old fashioned tradition, and promises to prepare their girls to serve society.

For the first time in many years, a teacher with no previous school affiliation, Rose, is brought in to take over as head of the classics department.

Between my love of the classics and the comparison to The Secret History this book seemed irresistible. Unfortunately it did not live up to the reputation to it's comparisons.

The plot was flat, and readers spend a lot of time in the classroom with Rose, both being forced to read texts that she is trying to teach and become privy to the juvenile discussions and behavior of her students, neither of which were written well enough to do anything other than make me feel as if I were back in middle school, wishing the bell would ring.

The premise of this book is very interesting, but far too many flaws in writing style, detail, and mystery (the story is easy to predict from the start) make this a book that is unlikely to gain a following.

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for the chance to give my honest review.

I made the decision to put this book down at the 33% mark. I love the setting. Schools are among my favorite locals, fictional or factual. And boarding schools are even more fun to observe because of the altered dynamic. I also love the very Gothic tone. What I didn't love, and finally decided I couldn't stomach any more of, was the melodrama. When someone drinking from your glass or bumping your tray in the cafeteria is cause for wailing distress, that's a bit much. When you're a teacher and those things being done to you by a student set you off so wildly, that's completely over the top. I'd love to know how the story ends, but not enough to push myself through another 200+ pages of boarding school soap opera antics. No thank you. Though this is billed as adult fiction, I think it would appeal more to a YA crowd. However, I can't vouch for the content of the remaining 2/3s of the novel.

Because I did not finish this title, I will not be posting my review anywhere outside of NetGalley.

This book had me in its grip from start to finish. I went to an all girls' school in England, but it was nothing like this school. I also took a year of Latin and hated it. Although the whole story was definitely fiction, could never happen in this day and age, it was so darkly terrifying I could not put it down. I enjoyed the mythology that was quoted throughout the story. I kept wondering how it would end, and it turned into a very dramatic ending.

“‘If you tell the girls that enough times, they will believe it. But a woman does not exist for the pleasure of a man.’” Rose

Set in 1992-1993, Rose, a public school teacher is invited to teach at Caldonbrae, an elite all-girls boarding school in Scotland. Once she arrives, she finds out that the place is not what it seems and that there is mystery surrounding her predecessor’s departure. The entire school seems to be stuck in the 1800s. Along the way, a large cast of faculty and students do their best to keep Rose at Caldonbrae.

I would give this book a 3.5 rating. It was unique, it was engrossing and disturbing in a way only a Gothic type novel can be. Parts of the novel discuss young teenagers views of the British royal family and I couldn’t help thinking how timely those conversations are to today. Since Rose is a Classics teacher, different Greek stories were woven into the novel, which I loved! As a reader, I enjoyed trying to figure out how the different women studied (Dido, Medea, etc.) would tie into the plot.

There were a few things with the novel that I didn’t feel “ring true”. I am an educator. I worked in a low-performing public school and have seen my share of ridiculous teenage behaviors. For Rose to have been selected to teach at such an elite boarding school seemed a little far fetched, unless (and I’m reading between the lines here) the colleague who recommended Rose thought she would be pliable to Caldonbrae’s system. Some of her interactions with the students were painful to read and she, quite frankly, acted as if she had never entered a classroom before. She also balked at being observed and having to turn in lesson plans, which is a very normal request, at least in the States. Those are small points, however. Moments of her teaching were wonderful, especially with the Fourths.

I had trouble keeping track of who everyone was. Overall, I think the story would have flowed better with fewer cast members and fewer issues/ themes. Towards the end of the book, more and more warning bells start ringing for Rose, yet they are only briefly discussed in the book. The author should be commended for bringing up so many issues at Caldonbrae, but for a novel, it might have been better to focus on a few and delve into those with more detail. I felt a bit let down about some of the story lines, including Bethany and Dulcie. I wanted more closure.

Rose was an interesting main character. Her mother is a staunch feminist and I was surprised that she would have approved of Rose teaching at a private boarding school. With such a background, I don’t understand why it took Rose so long to stand up to the powers and even then, and even though her hands were tied, she doesn’t seem to fight in a way I wanted her to. At one point Emma points out to Rose that the mission of Caldonbrae is doing the same thing that many cultures and religions do and Rose replies, “’it isn’t the same. It’s all wrong [what’s going on at Caldonbrae].’” Yet Rose never says why it’s wrong. Just like she doesn’t articulate to any authority about the immoral activities of the staff, the disgusting classes she witnessed, and the eventual discovery of what actually happened to Jane. These issues should have been unpacked.

Overall, the writing was good! I couldn’t put the book down because I had to know what happened next! The ending was incredible! Loved it! The setting was moody and Gothic. At times, Madam felt reminiscent of Rebecca and Jane Eyre.

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this novel!

Thanks to St Martin’s Press and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review. I enjoy a good boarding school mystery and love the concept of being a cross between The Secret History and Dead Poet’s Society. Overall, I enjoyed it especially considering that this is the author's first book. I would read more by her in the future!

Madam is the story of a young woman named Rose who moves to Scotland in the 90s to teach at a boarding school that turns out to be way more than she bargained for. As she learns more and more about the mysterious "Hope" school, Rose realizes that she must make some difficult decisions with potentially life-altering consequences.

This book reminded me so much of Dead Poet's Society, Abroad, The Handmaid's Tale, and Mexican Gothic. It's dark and twisty without being a thriller. At times it felt like the pacing was a little rushed or some characters were not really receiving full development, but overall the writing was engaging and the story was hard to put down. While the "twist" was somewhat predictable (at least to someone who has read many a thriller) it was intense and didn't deter me from the quick page-turning.

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I had a bit of a tough time with this book. It centers on Rose, a 26-year old teacher who gets invited to teach Classics at an exclusive boarding school for girls in the early 1990s. As she gets into the job, she finds out the school is not what it seems and they are harboring secrets about their overall mission as well as the fate of other students and teachers, including Rose's predecessor.

The novel was atmospheric and I could visualize the creepiness of the old buildings perched on a Scottish cliff. However, the storyline really didn't do it for me, nor did Rose herself as a character. Once the truth comes out, I didn't find it all that hard to believe, and while I appreciated Rose's stance on the subject, she was frequently disruptive and insubordinate and I couldn't help wondering if she couldn't have found a better way to deal with her concerns.

There were a lot of details on Greek tragedies involving female heroines throughout the book, which Rose tied into her teaching. I didn't think I would enjoy this, as that is definitely not my genre, but found that I did enjoy it after all (even was able to answer a Jeopardy question on one of the stories shortly after!).

Overall, I am sure there is an audience for this book, but I don't think that I am it. It was an interesting storyline but the telling of the story, and Rose herself, just didn't do it for me. I'd give it 2.5 stars. Thanks to Netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was creepy AF and definitely gives you the chills while reading. I do not think I would have liked being a student at this school. Rose is the new hire as a classics literature teacher. She is happy to earn a coveted position at the school. She wants to teach her students to be strong but the higher ups at the school have another agenda. Rose was a strong character in some parts of the book but constant outbursts to assert some sense of authority and her sense of right became annoying as hell and made her look like a weak dishrag.

Overall, I think this is the best gothic fiction book I have read for awhile. I think it was a blend of The Secret History by Donna Tartt and The Gifted School by Bruce Holsinger, two books I enjoyed. This is much better than Mexican Gothic which was so hyped up and undeserving of all the praise, it was not scary at all and was kind of predictable. This book was not predictable at all, which I appreciated and the creepy cover is a hell yes!

Recommended!

Thanks to Netgalley, Phobe Wynne and St Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 5/18/21

I really liked this setting! It feels pretty isolated, and you can definitely tell that something is off about this school. However, I do wish that this felt a bit more gothic and that it leaned more into mysteries at this school. The pacing was decent, but there were certainly some slower bits. I did find it pretty obvious to guess what was going on here, so that removed some of the suspense for me.

There are definitely some unlikeable people at this school. Some characters think that women only have value as wives, so that was tough to read about. There is also some racism at this school in regards to the Japanese students. Rose was alright - she waffled back and forth more than I cared for about what to do once she learns what's really happening at this school. I'm not sure that I really connected with her (or anyone else for that matter). In terms of character development, this was much more present with some of the students taking charge of their own lives.

On a positive note, I really liked how there are bits of mythology/classics at the end of some chapters. It's cool to see how these stories and themes are incorporated into the lessons and the actions of some of the characters.

I received a copy of this for review from the publisher via NetGalley - thank you! All opinions are my own.

My video review can be seen on my channel (around minutes 3:20-5:51 of this video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-aHB0ijVWM

This book was described as a "brooding boarding school in Scotland, a teacher who left under circumstances no one seems willing to discuss and students who know more than they are letting on." According to the publisher, this novel contains “shades of The Secret History, The Stepford Wives and a dash of Circe.”Yea, that sounds intriguing. I had to request it. As far as the claims, Well, yes and no. There is a small group of students studying the classics at an elite school. So, there’s that but the teacher is in over her head, the students are less than willing scholars and the only dash of Circe is that the stories of Agrippina, Dido, Antigone, Medusa etc. are taught. Since Rose is at Caldonbrae to take up the post of Head of Classics, the reference to a labyrinth, such as the one in which the Minotaur roamed, seems appropriate.

The book also opens with a prologue that does exactly what a prologue should do: it raises all sorts of questions that linger in your mind as you read the rest of the book and be something you feel compelled to return to and read again once you’ve finished the book.

In Caldonbrae Hall, the author has created a creepy setting for a story. If I was Rose I would've turned around at the first glimpse of its exterior, and certainly once I’d seen its labyrinthine interior. Things really picked up for me in the last half of the book. Truths about the school are slowly revealed, and Rose starts to connect with those around her. She becomes personally invested in the lives of the girls and her friends, and she finds Caldonbrae tightening its clutches, so she wonders if she will ever be free. I thought that the story became creepy and disturbing on many levels, and I was hooked, waiting to see how it all played out. I also enjoyed the classic stories. and even felt some "Mona Lisa Smiles" vibes, as Rose gets her students to engage in their work, and think for themselves. One group of students are quick to see that Rose is showing them the stories from the ancient women's point of view, and the sacrifices they made to make a difference on the world. I loved the book and also the ending. while shocking, I thought it was powerful and believable.

First thank you to NetGalley, the author and St. Martins Press for an e-ARC in exchange for my honest opinion of the book.

I liked the book and found it easy to read and unlike some other reviews I truly did enjoy the Greek mythology stories entwined within as Rose is teaching to her students. I found myself comparing this book to The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. One of my favorite books as a young girl. This, however, is much different and what kept me from really loving the book was that for a school that has existed for 150 years I found it hard to accept that to keep the school's tradition, they would bring in a young, feminist teacher and expect her to just fall in line.

I also felt that the author didn't develop Rose enough for the reader to really get to know who she was as a person so I was just frustrated by her actions throughout. Same with the other "main" characters, her three students. Not enough background on them so you couldn't really feel for them.

Overall I do think it was a good read because despite the above it did keep my attention throughout.