I enjoyed the mystery and the locked room feel. It was also very atmospheric. I had a hard time following the characters and the point of views. I got the characters mixed up and didn't see much of a voice difference between them all. Overall it was still a fun read.

I loved this book. It was good and twisty and just what I look for in a thriller. The character development was there, and the storyline had enough different pieces to keep me intrigued.

For all the suspense and thriller fans!

Darcy and her three best friends take a trip to visit her wealthy grandmother at her chateau in France. When a murder happens, secrets from the past as well as the present start to turn everyone against each other.

I truly enjoyed this book! There are seven POVs (I know!) but honestly it didn’t feel like too much. I loved seeing the story play out from everyone perspective.

Pub date is 5/23/23!

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Thank you to Atria Books for letting me read this one early. THE CHATEAU hits shelves on May 23.

This is a thrilling tale with a rich atmosphere and a storyline that keeps your guessing! I had a great time with this one. The story flowed really well and featured well thought out and developed characters. This will be a big summer read for sure, so get your preorders and library holds ready.

A strong four out of four stars for me - this was a wonderful detour in my life to France. I read this in one sitting and will share the clear plotline, clever ideas, and trustworthy character development that made this book impossible to put down to all of my patrons! Thank you to Atria books via NetGalley for this arc. I read it voluntarily and all opinions are my own.

A thriller set at a chateau in the south of France, sign me up!

The story centers around 4 friends who go to visit the chateau of one of their Grandmother’s. Upon arrival, they find out the grandmother, Séraphine, has news she must share with them. Before Séraphine can share her news, she is murdered!

While I usually hate books that bounce character to character, these characters were written well enough I was never confused so it did not bother me. My only negative critic of the book is I found parts of the plot predictable, but not predictable enough to not want to finish the story, I also thought the characters were unlikeable, and really wished I had one to root for. I think this was a creative choice though!

My favorite parts of the book were the setting, and references to Van Gogh. I actually found myself going down a research rabbit hole about Van Gogh after I finished this story. So thank you to the author for including his painting.

Overall, I enjoyed the vacation to France I took in my head, and left feeling satisfied with the ending. Thank you to Atria Books & NetGalley for allowing me to read this book

3.5 stars rounded up

I liked this catty story. The relationship between the girls was full of drama. I caught on to who the really problematic person was early on, but there were so many plot lines that the story kept me engaged. Every one of the girls in the group has a different backstory and reason why she is invested in the chateau.

This was a fun thriller to read.

A huge thank you to the author and the publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy of this book!

Wow, wow, wow! I can't say enough great things about Jaclyn Goldis' latest. The Chateau is absolutely thrilling in that intoxicating way that Agatha Christie's works unfold. The story is at once feverishly heightened and simmering with pulsating drama that's ready to burst. Multiple points of view make excellent use of 'cliffhangers' at the ends of chapters. I haven't read a locked-room mystery that was this complex and extremely sharp in a long time. The characters are vibrant and full of life, which means they are flawed and quite dumb sometimes. The timeliness of the issues raises this work up from simply a repeat of Christie's frameworks, which is refreshing and heartbreaking all at once. I want the audiobook so I can relive this work through a different medium, and then I want to reread it again for all the clues and breadcrumbs left in my wake. Truly well done!

This was such a great read! I really enjoyed how the story flowed & the characters. Things got a little confusing at one point with the familial connections, but it didn’t really detract from the story. Absolutely would recommend this!

Thank you for the arc of this thriller...I loved the setting an old chateau in the wine country of France, a girls trip gone wrong, when a group of girls reconnect back at the old chaateau they were all at 20 years ago. The setting and the suspense are the best parts of this thriller. Its a good ride!

Thank you to NetGalley, Atria Books and Jaclyn Goldis for an Advanced Reader Copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. I really enjoyed The Chateau. It is your tried and true "closed room" girls weekend gone wrong thriller and then some!I really appreciated the Jewish representation in this, I think it was the first thriller I've read that included conversations about the Shoah.
It took a minute to adjust to the many points of view that changed every chapter, but the characters were different enough and held up on their own for me to not be confused.Sometimes when a thriller is about a friend group, each woman has only one attribute that is discussed, or they all seem the same- that is not the case in The Chateau. Every character was well developed and had a driving force, it was easy to tell the apart, they felt like real people. The atmosphere was great, I wanted to be in the French countryside until suddenly the circumstances happening happening to the characters made me grateful I was not visiting The Chateau. There are many twists and turns, I was able to figure out a few of the twists, but I'm holding that against Goldis because I tend to be intuitive and notice these things, but that did not take away from the experience for me. It was gripping and held my attention, I encourage you to pick it up when it's released on May 23, it is a fast summer read.
4.5 stars

This was a good book, but I literally had to make notes while reading to keep track of all of the characters. It was distracting a bit! Good book, but not my favorite mystery.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Chateau was gripping and held my attention, but in the end it was just okay. We go into this novel knowing that a murder occurs, but getting to that point in the novel took too long in my opinion, as the motives and "secrets" were not truly revealed until that point.

I didn't find Darcy to be a very likeable character, which I think was intended.

I'm surprised that the ties to WWII were not mentioned in the synopsis as I think that added a significant element to the story.

Overall, I liked this one, there were just some missing pieces and the combination of each character's past overcomplicated the story for me.

A locked-room mystery set in France; The Chateau doesn’t use cheap thrills but careful character development. Each chapter is told by one of the women involved in the crimes, and no one is what they seem. A strict grandmother who may have been a Nazi collaborationist, a kindly housekeeper that has lived with her for a long time, and four forty-somethings who are more or less successful. The groundskeeper doesn’t seem to know what he’s doing so he may be hiding something too. I didn’t see the baddie coming but it involves a trick that has been done to death, from Agatha Christie to Columbo, so I had dismissed it. Other than that, which is a personal pet peeve, the story kept my attention. I wasn’t only worried about whodunit but also concerned about these women. I’m not normally a reader who looks for that, so I was surprised at how involved I got in the characters’ feelings. The writing is atmospheric and it’s not hard to picture the places where the story is set. I really liked how well-researched the historical background is (the Van Gogh stories I know are true). Five stars for this!
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, #NetGalley/#Atria Books, Atria/Emily Bestler Books!

3.5, rounded up

The Chateau is a book I’ve been looking forward to for months, though it’s not quite what I expected it would be. It follows four women—Darcy, Jade, Vix, and Arabelle—as they return to Provence for their first reunion there in 20 years. Three of them met in a study abroad program in Avignon and quickly became friends, often spending time at Darcy’s grandmother’s chateau. Arabelle, the daughter of a maid there and two years their senior, was already close to Darcy and became part of the friend group, too. Now, Darcy’s grandmother Séraphine has invited the four women back to her chateau, ominously warning them that she has something important to tell them. Unfortunately, Séraphine is murdered before she has a chance to reveal her secrets.

Each chapter is told from a different point of view, mainly from the four women, but also occasionally from Séraphine, her maid Sylvie, or her groundskeeper Raph. While I generally enjoy multiple POV characters and don’t have a hard time differentiating them, in The Chateau, I found the characters’ voices were rather too similar. Not confusing, and their characters were different enough, but their voices weren’t as distinct as they could have been.

The first half is quite slow, even after the murder happens (earlier than I’d expected!). So much of it is the four women making petty observations about others or ruminating on something from their past. It kind of reads more like women’s fiction, and the characters haven’t yet realized they’re in a thriller. Weren’t they all acting too normal after Séraphine was murdered? Shouldn’t they all have been more affected than that?

Despite the above issues, The Chateau does pick up in the second half, and it starts to weave together interesting themes. There are so many secrets between the different characters! So many possible motives for murder! The book highlights money troubles and big inheritances, infidelity and plans for revenge, decades-old trauma and twisting family secrets. Even these women, who profess to be best friends, have some conflicts between each other.

The Chateau has some great diversity, with queer characters and relationships as well as Jewish characters. It also incorporates the atrocities of the Holocaust and how that history still impacts people (including some characters here) to this day. These themes work their way into the mystery at hand, but it’s a bit more complicated than you might expect!

Although it’s not a long book, The Chateau could have benefited from paring down some of the characters’ trivial observations in the first half. Or perhaps made them more compelling and focused early on? None of the characters were particularly likable, though I did warm up to most of them by the end. It was only as the action ramped up to the climax that the story and characters really came together.

By the end, the book seems to set itself up for a sequel. Could there be more in store for these women? We shall see.

The Chateau is an interesting book with several compelling themes and shocking secrets. It’s rather uneven, but if you can get through the slower first half, the second half pays off. While the characters aren’t the easiest to root for, the beautiful French setting and mystery make it worth the read.

First off thanks to netgalley for providing me an ARC!

Vix, Arabelle, Darcy and Jade have been friends for over 20 years since they did a study abroad program in college. They all would visit Darcy's grandmother at her Chateau.
20 years later, Grandmother invited them all back to tell them something. But she is being very cryptic and delayed it multiple times.
2 days in, Grandmother is brutally murdered. And many truths come out about these "friends". As the web of lies, secrets and family drama unfolds, the killer is revealed.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book! It was a bit of a slow start for me, but the end picks up and I couldn't put it down. It does leave you on a cliffhanger..

I loved the atmosphere of this one. The author nailed that aspect. A French Chateau? Yes! Sign me up! I also tend to really like murder mystery. However the writing style of the story itself wasn’t my personal taste and the characters all had a superficial quality to them. I think those who like mystery and don’t need tons of depth and character building may enjoy this one!

I had such high hopes for this book. It has a compelling cover and premise and while I did enjoy it - it was just missing that 5 star quality. Great writing! and a good read.

Such a great little find. A little mystery, a lot of edge of your seat. I’ve never read this author before but can’t wait to read others by them after enjoying this one and plowing through in a day

I can confidently say that the Château reignited my love of thrillers. I brought this ARC with me on a recent vacation & couldn’t put it down - fully of twisty secrets and told from multiple POVs, this book is a riveting read.

I loved everyday detail of the french chateau & found myself lost in the environmental descriptions.

Each character was well defined and well depicted. I found myself very fond of one of the women but the rest seemed lackluster. That being said, all characters played a nice role to wrap the story up with a plot twist I wasn’t expecting. Solid 4.5 stars!