The Wife Upstairs was a delicious thriller! It was a very similar (vanilla version) of A Simple Favor and Verity (Colleen Hoover.). I especially liked the setting - a ritzy neighborhood of Mountain Brook, in Birmingham, Alabama - as an Auburn graduate I am familiar with this areas and some of the the stereotypes from the book. I found the concept very interesting and fast paced, an appreciated that all of the main characters were fighters trying to survive or make a name for themselves. I do wish there was a little more of Jane’s back story, I found it very interesting and did find the ending to run kind of flat. Overall, a fun and exciting read!

I'll have to say that this is my very first read by Rachel Hawkins and I was not disappointed! I had a little snafu where I think my audiobook was skipping around, so I re-started it and started enjoying it that much more the second time around!

There were some very interesting characters, and a very diverse set of characters which made me want to follow their stories. I feel like I was rooting on the people that I shouldn't have been, and disliked the people that I should have, but I think that's what made the story great!

The actual story was killer...all puns intended! HAHA! But seriously, it's not your every day cookie cutter mystery or domestic thriller. It took you in a couple of different directions throughout, with the ending totally out in left field, wondering how in the world you go there! I LOVED IT!!!!

The Wife Upstairs was narrated by a trio of excellent narrators: Emily Shaffer, Kirby Heyborne, and Lauren Fortang. I have loved listening to Kirby Heyborne, but I must admit, most of the books I've listened him in before were either soft romance, or even maybe like a Christian genre, so to listen to him in this book took him to a new level to me that honestly I wondered if he was capable of...HE IS! I always LOVE when books have multiple narrators because it helps you identify characters and stick with their story easier and this book was no exception! Sometimes I will listen to a book solely on the who the narrator is because I truly believe that a narrator(s) can make or break a book! These guys definitely helps make this book!

Overall, the story was thrilling and entertaining, and took me to places I never thought it would, and never saw coming! It had a great element of surprise, with a great stack of characters and narrators, that just totally make The Wife Upstairs an absolute 5-star read for me, for sure!

I would like to take a moment to thank the author, Rachel Hawkins, the publisher, Macmillan Audio and Netgalley for providing me a copy of this book in return for an honest and unbiased review!

I’ve seen some mixed reviews on this one, but I really enjoyed it! Highlighted as a modern twist on Jane Eyre, the story line was suspenseful, but not too intense. It definitely kept me wanting to know what was going to happen next! I did find the character of Jane to be a little over the top pessimistic and dramatic in the beginning of the story but as the story unfolded, I couldn’t help but be drawn in! I love stories with unreliable narrators too!
I listened to the audiobook and it was well done- I appreciated the multiple narrators to differentiate among the different points of view in the story. I think this book translates well to an audiobook. If you’re looking for an interesting, suspenseful quick read, I definitely recommend The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins!

Thank you to Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for gifting me the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

As I finished this book I had many emotions. If there hadn't been a reference to a rewriting of Jane Eyre I may have enjoyed it more. The locations and names are the same or similar, and a few poorly linked relationships, but beyond that this book is more an attempted who done it, or a Real Housewives of Birmingham. I believe it's hard to enjoy a book when you don't really like any of the characters. Jane was plotting to score the big fish, who she thought was Eddie, turns out he might not be the nicest of people. Bea, the dearly departed wife gave Jane a lot to live up to. Typical unreliable narrator, but this book didn't live up to the hype.

I really enjoyed the parallel to "the other Jane book".

I do feel like there were maybe some gaps in this book. I enjoyed this book, but I'm feeling a little flat at the end. Expecting/wanting just one more twist.

Thank you to NetGalley and the Author/Rachel Hawkins for the opportunity to review this Advance Read Copy in exchange for an honest review.

The first 3/4 of the book was very enjoyable ... quick and light reading But, the last part of the book disappointed me. I alternated between reading the ebook and listening to the audiobook provided to me by NetGalley.

I received an AOC of the audiobook from NetGalley. It was a great read/listen. Solid 4 stairs. Suspenseful, interesting, and fast paced. My only issue is with the voices of the characters on the audiobook. There are many characters, and their southern drawl is awful and made me cringe every time! Other then that I fully enjoyed the book.

Jane, our dog-walking protagonist, is working in an upscale neighborhood when she accepts a new client: Eddie Rochester -- rich, hot and widowed. The pair quickly fall in love and she adopts Eddie's widow's life of charity and status. But questions linger about Eddie's wife. How did she die? And why was her body never recovered? Jane is slowly drawn into the mystery -- and so will be the readers of this book. The twists were excellent and kept you wanting more. I recommend this book for people who liked "Gone Girl," "The Silent Patient," and "The Couple Next Door."

I liked this retelling of Jane Eyre, it's been a long while since I'd read the original so I treated this as a new to me story even though I remembered the basics of the original. I enjoyed the storytelling and I thought it was interesting that Jane wasn't very likable. The narration really added to my enjoyment. The southern accents were well done and not over the top.
I highly recommend.

I received an arc of this book from the [publisher in exchange for an honest review. A must read for anyone who loves suspense and fast paced drama...this was jaw dropping!

Maybe it was the amount of F-bombs dropped, maybe it was the rich people behaving badly that I couldn’t care less about, I don’t know, but this book was not for me.

I can appreciate that it is a modern retelling of Jane Eyre, but I just didn’t care about any of the very unlikeable characters and the thriller aspects weren’t that surprising to me.

I read some of the physical copy and listened to the audiobook. The narrators were great and if this is a book for you, the narration was well done. There were multiple narrators - one for each perspective we get in the book and they all did a great job.

Thank you to Net Galley for the advanced listening copy. All opinions are my own.

Looking for a new read with twists and turns aplenty? Then, you may want to pick up The Wife Upstairs, by Rachel Hawkins. The Wife Upstairs has been described as a modern Jane Eyre retelling. However, I went into this without reading the classic, and now have moved that up on my TBR list. I listened to the audiobook version and enjoyed hearing this told in the voices of the main characters. (Could have done without all the *f words, though!). The main character is aptly named Jane and narrates most of the novel. What took me by surprise is how much I disliked the characters, but still wanted to keep hearing the story! The main characters are cold and calculating liars, who have each remade themselves into the persona of who they want the outside world to believe they are. They do not have a conscience, believing their terrible actions are justifiable. Just when you start to believe, or feel sorry for one of them, Hawkins turns their story upside down and you realize everything you just heard was a lie. A less vague final ending would have left me feeling a bit more satisfied, but I did not subtract that from my rating. Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for gifting me this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed the twists in this book but felt like the Jane Eyre retelling part was unnecessary. That could have been one of the surprises. The audio was well done.

This is a great book, despite my sardonic remarks below, I enjoyed the plot and the narration, and I am grateful to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for an audible ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Poor girl manages to get rich, handsome young widower to fall in love with her. Six months earlier, widower lost his wife in what was presumed to be a boating accident. She and her best friend were having a ladies’ night out, but they never returned. Widower inherits wife’s successful company and the rest of her assets…he seems to have a few assets of his own besides his good looks. Six months later in a meet cute, he runs over dogwalker girl as she stands in his driveway drooling and gawking at his magnificent house. He apologizes and invites her into his castle (er, house) for coffee. They have a totally banal conversation over nothing and fall in love.

I didn’t find this to be really twisty, but rather a nicely paced disclosure of all the characters’ deliciously dirty little secrets. I’m also not sure I agree with the Jane Eyre comparison. The only things this book seemed to have in common with the classic was that there was a wife hidden away, a bereaved “widower”, and a convenient young, impoverished (, petty thief, dogwalker) love interest. In Jane Eyre, the isolation and slim pickings may account for the romance between Nanny and Master but there was absolutely no accounting for Eddie falling in love with Jane (ohhhhh, now I get it! Jane and Edward Rochester, Thornfield,….a house just fell on me!).

Jane (not really her name, by the way) was an unlikeable, unsympathetic gold-digging character. I have to ask; do all poor young women spend most of their time scheming at how to snare a rich husband? – Don’t answer that. Excuse my naïveté, it must be true because the theme is so popular in novels.

Jane and Eddie fall madly in love and become engaged – Jane with Eddie’s house and money, Eddie with … I still haven’t figured that one out. Jane now has everything she wants, including an accepted place in the society of the filthy rich women in the classy, gated neighborhood, she so enviously despised earlier in the novel. Both Jane and Eddie have hidden skeletons in their closets, the nature of which are revealed by the end of the novel. There is murder, intrigue, and blackmail. What more could a mystery suspense reader ask for?

I felt that Jane did absolutely nothing to deserve the author’s generosity in the epilogue. I would have preferred a less gratuitous ending, but others will celebrate Jane’s good fortune, earned or not.

I am an outlier, as this book was a 3.5 star for me. As much as I enjoyed the reveals I can’t quite bring myself to give this 4 stars.

Why is it, do you think, that authors write books where there isn't ONE likable person in the story? Don't they know we need at least someone to cheer for? I hate to go into plot on a review but, basically it's this:
Jane is a dog walker in a affluent community and is all full of entitlement. She is jealous of the folks who live there and wants what they have. I couldn't even figure this part out. Why would anyone want the kind of lifestyle they scoff at? All she did was make it known (to the reader) how much she loathed the women in the neighborhood, but fought like anything to get "in" with them.

She meets Eddie whose wife, Bea disappeared from their lake home along with her best friend Blanche. Well, Eddie has all the things Jane wants. After all, she lives in a crappy apartment so why shouldn't she have those nice things and lavish lifestyle that she didn't work for (insert eye roll)?

So things move along pretty fast between Jane and Eddie and all of a sudden they're engaged. Jane tries to find out more about Bea but it's difficult. And, really it's not for the reader because it's in the title. The story goes on and more is learned about the fateful night that Bea and Blanche went out on Bea and Eddie's boat at the lake. Who else was actually there? What actually happened? Also in the mix is Jane's "secret." I say that lightly. I found it pretty underwhelming.

Well, I am not going to spoil it but suffice to say, I figured out what the "twist" was and I am usually not good at that. It was so hard for me to enjoy this book because everyone, and I mean, EVERYONE was obnoxious. Also not helping matters was that I listened to the audiobook and almost every time someone said something there was a self deprecating, I can't really say laugh, because it wasn't. It was more or less an exhale of air supposed to sound like a heh heh, silly me! Furthermore, entitled, poor Jane sure liked the F word a lot. She needed a good punch.

The more I discuss this book I feel more rating stars dropping. The other thing that turns me off of a story is when the reader knows what's going on before the characters. We should ALL be surprised at once. By the time the character finds out what the reader already knows, it's no surprise. I am sure this book will do very well. This genre is on fire and it should be, if it's a good story. But, I hope my next book has SOMEONE I like. Oh wait, there were dogs in here. I liked them.

Thanks to Macmillan Audio and to Netgalley. I am always appreciative of the opportunity.

I don't know what it is about Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre , my least loved of her novels and yet one I am drawn to again and again, like a moth to a flame. Sometimes, as in the case of a novel like Jean Rhys's [The Wide Sargasso Sea] or Daphne DuMaurier's Rebecca I've loved the tie-in, but other times, such as with Tracy Chavalier's Reader, I Married Him I'm left feeling aloof. So I went into Rachel Hawkins's The Wife Upstairs with curiosity and a small amount of trepidation. A modern take on Jane Eyre? Hmmm. It was engrossing!

In a novel that reads like Jane Eyre meets Gone Girl , Hawkins gives us a grifter Jane (not her real name, more on that later, haha) who has lived through hard times coming from the foster care system out West. Jane is now sort of hiding out in Alabama, getting by as a dog walker, living with a very creepy John Rivers (who sort of knew her back when), and trying to find her way among the ladies who lunch in Thornfield Estates when she catches the eye of Eddie, a widower who hires her to walk his dog, Adele. Eddie's wife Bea supposedly died along with her friend Blanche. How and why remains something of a mystery. Eddie has inherited his wife's business and is trying to manage it along with his own construction planning business. An quiet Jane seems just the tonic for him. He recognizes something in Jane. Only it's not what you think.

I found this a surprisingly enjoyable twist on the original gothic "Jane Eyre" story. (Longtime blog readers will recall I can never forgive Jane for marrying Rochester.) In fact, there are a number of twists, and though I started to get ideas about what was really going on about halfway through the book, Hawkins's careful plotting made it quite enjoyable to see how things played out. This is a suspenseful novel deliciously full of villains and anti-heroes. You'll find yourself disliking so many characters but eagerly trying to figure out exactly what happened, to whom, and why.

I listened to the audiobook, beautifully narrated by Emily Shaffer, Kirby Heyborne, and Lauren Forgang.

I received a digital audio review copy of this novel from Macmillan Audio in exchange for an honest review.

Hey Hey Rachel Hawkins! Wow- I'll give you 5 out of 5 birds for the Wife Upstairs. I mean I'd probably even hide some birds in the attic for this one. I was given this audiobook for free from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review. I couldn't stop listening. I downed this hours at a time while do a Harry Potter puzzle. I was hooked from page one until the end. I read Jane Eyre last year too, so loved that this was a retelling. Even though I knew the basic storyline- I wanted to keep going to see what was gong to happen. I'd recommend this as a mystery/thriller. I will say for some of my followers- it had a lot of F bombs in it so either listen with headphones or post kids bed time. I was super pleased with the character development, setting, and build up. I'd say go ahead and read this one.

This is my second time enjoying this book. I switched between the digital and paperback arc of this title and now I have listened to the audio. While I already loved the story, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the audiobook narration provided another level of enjoyment.

The narration of Emily Shaffer was perfection, while I felt that Eddie would have been better voiced by a deeper voice than Kirby Heyborne. With that being said, I still did really enjoy his narration. But it was the narration of Lauren Fortgang that made this for me. I loved her southern twang. she had a great voice and the perfect amount of attitude.

This was just as fun the second time… the story is just as rich and twisty, just as layered and indulgent. It was fantastic.

*Thank you to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for allowing me listen to this book in exchange for a honest review.

I love a good Jane Eyre retelling and this book did not disappoint. Being from Alabama, it was interesting to read about places I know so well and I can say this, the cattiness was on point.

Jane's character wasn't my favorite, but I can see why she stole from others and wanted someone else's life. The other character's chapters were interesting to read from as well.

The murder/mystery twists and turns were really good! I thought I had it figured out a few times but then I got proven wrong. Loved it!

All of the characters in this book are unlikable and have major issues, but I think that's what made this book so good to me! I love twisty reads and this one didn't disappoint.

I love an unreliable narrator, and a community full of unreliable people who want to keep their secrets hidden makes for such a great story! There are so many mysteries to unravel throughout The Wife Upstairs that just when I thought I knew where it was going I was shocked all over again. The narrators were great and overall the story was told so well.

4/5 Stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for providing me with an e-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.