This was an entertaining, suspenseful thriller that kept me wondering what the heck was going on with the house. It was fun at times but also a bit dull.

I never really connected with any of the characters in this one. I kept waiting to figure out how the two leads were connected and the answer just kind of made me shrug. On the bright side, the story is fast-paced and self-contained. It just didn't completely click for me.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

Nina's father is her world. After her mother died, it was just the two of them and he did his best to teach her everything he could, involving her in his puzzles and work. When he dies, Nina is lost. He was all she had, and now she has nothing. After all is said and done, she receives an odd letter stating that her father owns a home in the British Virgin Islands. When she speaks with the lawyer on the island, he states that he will organize her transportation so she can come visit her new home. While her father was well-off financially, he was not incredibly wealthy. So how on earth can he own this house? Curious, and at loose ends as all the funeral events have completed, she hops a plane to BVI.

Maria is a nanny for the über rich. After a year of med school, she dropped out because she was making so much money as a nanny. Why not wait to finish med school when she could afford to pay for it? But her new assignment is odd. She's positioned in a house on an island...with no kids to watch. Her contact keeps promising her they are coming, but where are they? Then there is the weird room in the basement that she has been explicitly told not to enter...

It's unusual that I read a book that I can't figure out, but for a large part of the book I could not see how Nina's and Maria's stories converged. But don't worry, fellow readers, we find our answers. And boy, are they surprising!

Every book I've read by Steadman has been a wild ride, and this was no exception!

Steadman is my queen of smart suspense. "Look in the Mirror," is loaded with tension and page turning intensity. Told by two narrators at two different times, the story takes place somewhere in the British Virgin Islands. When Nina's father dies, she finds to her astonishment, that he left her a home on the BVI. She sets off to learn more about both the house and her father. The second narrator, Marie a woman looking for fast cash, accepts a temporary job at the same house. Nothing is as it seems for Nina and Marie. What starts as a slow burn, quickly turns roller coaster. Avoiding spoilers here, enough to say that "Look in the Mirror," was a page turner for me. I did not predict the ending and was releaved to come to finish the book so I can catch my breath.

This was my favorite Catherine Steadman book so far. A father left his daughter a mysterious house on a secluded island. A nanny shows up for work at a home and the clients never come home. The house comes alive and starts creating puzzles to solve. Couldn't wait to find out what happened and it kept me on the edge of my seat. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

I was a fan of Catherine Steadman’s The Family Game so I was excited to get into her new release. I was hooked in to the first 30% but then the pacing started to feel off to me and I lost steam. Not my favorite but I think many readers will enjoy!

This was an exciting thriller. The main character, Nina inherits a high-tech house in the BVI from her deceased father which starts the mystery. From there the story is told from different points of view of the other characters that are part of the house in one way or another. This book definitely keeps you on the edge of your seat. Thank you to Netgalley, Random House, Ballantine Books, and the Author, Catherine Steadman for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I love that Catherine Steadman is veering off into the more Horror-adjacent end of the Thriller genre. This is incredibly fun and propulsive and scary and tense without ever tipping over into anything icky.

The Family Game was a better book in terms of quality, mostly because the “why” of it all was far more interesting there. Here the lack of a real “why” makes the ending a bit of a letdown, but it’s still a tremendously fun ride getting there.

I don’t know that escape room, but for real is a wholly original concept, but Steadman did a terrific job if employing it, and the pacing of this is so, so good. It’s very hard to stop reading because the suspense and intensity never flags once it gets going. I hope Steadman sticks with this particular breed of Thriller, as she’s quite good at it.

This book was fast moving and captured my interest from the start. This is the first book by this author and I really enjoyed it. There was enough thrill and mystery to keep me guessing and keep me wanting to read.

This is a new to me author, but I will definitely be looking for more of her works This was a very intense story, had you on the edge of your seat and wondering what’s gonna come around the next corner? I would recommend this story to anyone who enjoys being pulled in at the very beginning and never let go until the very end.


I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley. This is my honest and voluntary review.

I really enjoyed Catherine Steadmans other books and this one was just as good. I loved the house in the book and thought it enhanced the whole mystery. I thought Nina and Maria were both interesting characters and wanted to spend time with them.

Catherine Steadman is back with another suspense win! I was a big fan of Something in the Water, mostly because it was so unique from other books I had read. Look in the Mirror fits the same bill with a dystopian vibe!

As she is grieving the loss of her recently buried father, a well respected Cambridge professor, Nina is contacted by a law firm in the USVI leading her into a world of secrets and an unimaginable double life that her father supposedly led. She is now the sole owner of a villa in Virgin Gorda. All she has to do is name the date she is ready to travel, and she will be whisked down there first class to view her inheritance for the first time. When she arrives, she quickly discovers that this home puts the idea of a modern smart home to shame. All commands are voice activated and the home seems to take on a power of its own, controlling who can and cannot enter the property seemingly at whim. Just as she begins to wonder about the mysterious locked door on the lower level that isn’t included on any of the architectural plans of the home, she receives the first note: You need to leave. Now.

Enter Maria, a nanny for the super rich who has been given a 2 week fill in assignment for a new family. When the family never shows, she is left to luxuriate in the stunning panoramic views of the Caribbean Sea from the private secluded beach and stunning infinity pool. She just has to lay back, relax, and collect her massive payout in just 14 days. That is if she can follow the one house rule: Do not go in the locked room in the basement. As the house loses power one night, the room is suddenly unlocked. Will she be able to resist the temptation?

Someone is always watching…but at what price?

I went into this book completely blind. Catherine Steadman’s new novel Look in the Mirror was my selection for the 52 Book Club’s 2024 Reading Challenge prompt “Picked Without Reading the Blurb.” Catherine Steadman is always a five star read for me, so I figured her latest novel would be a safe choice for me to go into without any preconceived notions.

Wow, I could not have picked a better book for this prompt! I had no idea where it was going, and found it to be so completely strange and out of left field. At first I thought that it was because I had no background knowledge on the plot, but I soon realized that no, the storyline is just completely unexpected and surprising. It worked perfectly as a blind pick, and I 100% enjoyed the wild ride through this harrowing story!

Because I want others to have a similar experience to mine, I will not be detailing the plot of this story. Rather, I’ll share that despite a slow burn start, this novel quickly picks up the pace, quite literally putting me on the edge of my seat. I couldn’t believe my eyes as I read this story, not wanting to trust my instincts that what I suspected was happening was actually happening. This novel is tense and gripping, and not for the faint of heart. Catherine Steadman has delivered again, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we see this cinematic novel adapted for the big screen!

Another wild ride by Catherine Steadman! Nina’s father has passed away and she finds out that he has left her a house in the British Virgin Islands. This is a huge surprise to Nina. She arrives at the house and is told not to go in the basement. Curiosity gets the better of Nina and she begins to question everything she thought she knew about her father.
The action and suspense in this book reminded me of Steadman’s previous novel, The Family Game, which I really enjoyed! This book is fast-paced and I couldn’t put it down. I really enjoyed Nina’s character and, in certain ways, found her relatable. I was rooting for her and hoping she could solve the mystery of the house and determine who her father really was. I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys an action-packed thriller! Thank you NetGalley and Random House for this ARC!

I absolutely devoured this book at the speed of light. It turned out to be an edge of the seat, page turner for me. The tropes were brand new to me so I was positively surprised and invested in the story. I have read books from the author before and I liked this one the best. I did not see the twist and turns coming!

It would have been a full 4 stars for me if not for the writing being in third person POV which is fine but the author shifts between thoughts from two different people and it is not clear who is thinking what.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC ebook. When you look in the mirror, one's reflection is what we see. What if there are others watching your every move from behind that mirror and time was of the essence. Playing with others' lives is a thrill only money can buy, but what if it's to their death? Can anyone beat the clock? Check this book out and see.

This book was literally nothing like I thought it would be, in the very best way. Thank you so much to Catherine Steadman and Random House for my copy of this book. It was about Nina, a woman who has just lost her father. Still grieving, she finds out that she has inherited a house in the British Virgin Islands that she had no idea existed. Nina has so many questions about how her father had money for this property and what the purpose of it really was.

Then there's Maria, a nanny to the super rich. She takes a job that will have a huge payout, but the family never shows. Maria starts to enjoy herself, waiting for the family and enjoying their beautiful house. There is just one rule- don’t go into the basement. But why? And how long can she really stay away?

It takes a lot to surprise me these days because I’ve read A LOT of thrillers, but this one had me hanging by the edge of my seat and I couldn’t look away. I won’t say much about the plot because I feel like this is the kind of book that you need to go into blind.

This is one of those perfect summer thrillers. You have a tropical paradise, two curious women, secrets galore, twists all over and of course, dead bodies. This story is told from multiple points of view and the overall story slowly unrolls itself. After Nina’s father has passed, she finds out that she has inherited a tropical mansion in the British Virgin Islands that she never knew existed. She decides to visit the house before selling hoping to get to know her father better and to find out what other kinds of secrets he was keeping from her. Maria is a former medical student who works as an au pair to make money to be able to afford a return to her studies. Her new gig has her staying in a state-of-the-art island house with only one rule, don’t go in the basement. Will curiosity be the downfall of them both? The tension is high, so you want to keep turning the pages, but I was still able to set the book down to get a decent night’s rest (well, for the most part). The characters are amazing, smart and both are reliable narrators worth rooting for. The setting is what sells this book. The tropical island’s isolation and amazing views hide the darkness that drives the overall story perfectly. Thriller fans should definitely pick up a copy of this book, but I also think this will be a hit with horror fans.

Look In the Mirror is a story that revolves around two seemingly unrelated women. Nina, a 34-year-old Cambridge professor who unexpectedly inherits a mysterious house in the British Virgin Islands following her father's passing. The house is a modern marvel, shrouded in mystery and secrets that kept me guessing with each turn of the page. We also meet Maria, a medical student working as a nanny with ambitions and a fondness for adventure, who finds herself embroiled in this situation, when her latest gig takes an unexpected turn.

This book has a complexity of multiple narrators and timelines, leaving me utterly enthralled. Just when I thought I had it all figured out, there was another twist that left me gasping for breath. The house itself that is a state of the art “Smart Home” was a creepy character in its self. However, I couldn't help but feel that some of the plot points relied a bit too heavily on implausible backstories, but I dove into it and let the fiction take me away.

Look in the mirror is a fast-paced thriller filled with an intriguing game of cat and mouse. The secrets, lies and the distorted lines between illusion and their reality is intense. I completely recommend this book.

I. LOVED. THIS. BOOK.

Y'all. Catherine Steadman is THE SHIT. I love her books and she is quite possibly one of my most anticipated authors of the year. And boy did this one not disappoint.

Nina and Maria. One has just lost her beloved father and is feeling adrift. The other has just accepted a very lucrative gig as a live-in nanny for the super-rich for 2 weeks. Two very different woman, with one thing in common. Keep reading to find out what that thing is.

This was like nothing I've read before and I stayed up late into the night, turning pages until I finally hit the ending. And it was good. Ohhhhhh it was good. Bravo, Ms. Steadman. Keep up the fantastic work.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

In the aftermath of her father’s death Nina is surprised with an inheritance. A house in BVI. After spending her entire life closely knit with his, she is determined to understand how he kept this secret from her. Believing the house will reveal his secret to her, she finds more than she bargained for.
Fraught with tension and fear and mysterious reasoning this was a great read.