[TW/CW: Drinking, cheating, toxic friendships, anxiety, sexual assault, smoking]

*****SPOILERS*****
About the book:
Anya is enjoying a relaxing bath when she hears a noise coming from the ceiling. Through the open bathroom door, she sees the attic hatch swing down, and a masked figure drops to the floor. Thirty seconds later, Anya is dead. You're not afraid of being alone in the dark. You're afraid you're not alone.Across town, Anya's old school friend, Julia, sees an online video of a masked figure climbing out of an attic. She suddenly realizes why the footage is eerily familiar: it was filmed inside her house in a luxury gated community, designed to keep intruders out. And now your worst fears are coming true. Why would a stranger target Julia? Unless of course, it's not a stranger at all.
Release Date: August 20th, 2024
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 368
Rating: ⭐ ⭐

What I Liked:
1. Writing was okay
2. Love the idea of phrogging

What I Didn't Like:
1. Too much happening

Final Thoughts:
Too many characters and too many things happening. Just when you think you know what's going on you are introduced to more characters and storylines.

Our main character is so completely obvious to anything happening and it drove me crazy. She has the money to move but she continues to stay in the house where videos are posted of a person creeping out of her attic. Her children are terrified but she continues to stay here. Illiterate tried to understand why she would do this but it makes no sense. She finally sends the kids away but in the house where the man is able to film her by herself rather than just leave the house. It doesn't make sense. I don't think I've been more frustrated with a character than I have with her.

I wanted to love this book because the idea of phrogging is terrifying. I've watched so much stuff on it and it's crazy to me that someone could live in your house and you would never know it. This book just missed the mark for me.

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Thanks to Netgalley and Pamela Dorman Books for this advanced copy of the book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

3.5 Stars

Anya is enjoying a relaxing bath when she hears a noise coming from the ceiling and is found dead. Supposedly drowned from her own doing.
Pan over to Julia, Anya's best friend who seems a video of someone climbing out of her attic...and the videos keep coming. Are the videos fake? Or is someone coming into her home when no one is home? Does her friend's death have anything to do with it?

The book started out great, but then it became extremely slow paced. There were too many "side-quests"/extra plots and backgrounds that did not matter in connection with the main plot of the book. It just wasn't that much a thriller for me, and the ending just threw in a whole bunch of "loose" ties. The idea of the book was fun, it just did not really end up making sense in the end. I could not figure out why adults could not adult. I did like that I would think I figured it out, and be completely wrong though.

Most annoying was Julia's (ex) husband. He was a crappy person and she excused his inability to parent, hold a job, or be an adult with things like paying bills with her own money. I would have kicked him out of my and my kids' lives so fast. All of the characters were pretty unlikable though. It was also strange that a problem in her daughter's school caused the whole family to move halfway across the world; but that is fine because everyone in the story has millions of dollars.

I would certainly try another title from Mara, but it would have to be a different theme for sure. Light reading/writing for those that like McFadden or Hoover I would say.

This is a really good thriller/suspense story! I included it in my October "spooky season" reading, and it didn't really fit for the mood I was going for... but I still enjoyed this a lot.

I was really excited to read this based on the description and the opening was quite creepy but it was very disappointing from there. I really think this book is being marketed to the wrong audience. This is being marketed as a thriller but it doesn't have that kind of propulsive, nerve-wracking excitement to it. It has a weird amount of sleuthing and following strange clues that makes me think it would be better marketed as a mystery title. Our MC is also weirdly nonchalant for like... way too long about the fact that someone is posting videos of the inside of her house online.

Newly returned to Dublin from the States after selling her LA-based business and fielding problems at school with her daughter, Julia struggles to resituate after all of the changes. She reconnects with her longtime friends just in time for one of them to die suddenly, causing the remaining two to spiral a little--as college students, the fourth of their group had stumbled away from a party and died tragically.

Then the videos start. Images from within Julia's new, uber-secure home. Just a social media trend, she's told (and is idiot enough to buy). But the videos continue. Soon, Julia begins to suspect everyone: neighbors, her ex-husband Gabe, the brother of their dead friend.

Despite all of this, it is ages before Julia actually investigates. She spends entirely too many of these pages complacently going on about her day instead of doing the obvious and easy things, like, say, checking out the attic.

Frustration. Unfortunately for Someone in the Attic, that was my biggest takeaway. I was soooo frustrated with Julia's response to the videos and her son's obvious terror, especially since in all other ways she was a bright, sympathetic character. I was frustrated by her idiot ex-husband and his secrets. And I am super frustrated that this would have been an excellent thriller without Julia's avoidance/passiveness/weaponized incompetence. So, if you can overlook that one glaring character flaw, you'll really enjoy this book. It WAS very readable, with easy-to-distinguish characters and fast pacing. I always felt like I had been set down into the scene itself. I just can't forgive the idiocy.

Oh this was such a creepy and fun read!!

This definitely will leave you on the edge of your seat and it has all the elements of a psychological thriller that you'll love!

I loved all the multiple layers of this story and I was anxious to see how it all unfolded!!

Thanks to netgalley for my copy!!

3.5/5 stars

I am absolutely obsessed with this book. I can't wait to recommend it for purchase through our adult fiction selector – I already know we have a ton of regulars who enjoy a good mystery/thriller who will love Someone in the Attic. For me, this story had fantastic layers that all worked together to build the big picture. The suspected phrogging (one of my favorite tropes at the moment), the backstory with Isla, the friendship issues between JADE – it all tied together beautifully to create a fast-paced and exciting read that kept me guessing the whole time.

A great book to start the Halloween season early! This is the first book I've read by this author and I thoroughly enjoyed it - great psychological thriller and character development. The only downside - I actually figured out who the culprit was halfway through - but I continued reading - great wrap-up at the end of "where the characters are now."

This book definitely would have been 3 stars if it wasn't for the short chapters and the parts that legitimately freaked me out. I wish it would have leaned more towards the thrilling aspect of "someone in the attic" instead of the big plot twist going the way it did, which wasn't very twisty. This is one of those thrillers that drops a lot of hints throughout and then something happens to make you second guess yourself only to find out your first guess was correct all along. (Sorry if that's a spoiler to anyone, trying to keep it vague). I didn't mind all of the family drama and the heavy use of social media to drive the plot and intrigue, in this case I understand why it was necessary. Overall not a terrible thriller that took me about 8 hours to read. I'll definitely be picking up more from this author.

Many thanks to Penguin Group Viking | Pamela Dorman Books for the gifted copy for my honest review!

Now listen to me, while reading this I kept thinking I had it all figured out like obviously this is what's gonna happen because it's so right in our face and then we get told nope, you're wrong it's not what you think and here's why and then AND THEN at the very end we get the reveal and it's like sike, you were right hahahahha.

I was mad but I also enjoyed the writing and there was one part or reveal where I was like ok you got me there haha.

I'm trying to be vague so as not to ruin anything but this reads very easily and is very entertaining!
Also, I'm so thankful to the author for not hurting the poor rabbit. No animal cruelty here!

Thank you to the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

Anya and Julia have been friends since their school days, and they plan to meet up soon after a long while apart, along with their mutual friend Eleanor. When Anya doesn’t show, the other ladies grow worried, and quickly find out that their friend has drowned in her bath at the hands of a stranger who’s been in Anya’s attic.

Soon Julia and Eleanor are entangled in a web of neighbors, a mystery person who has been taking videos from inside Julia’s house, and the family members of their late best friend Donna who lost her life back in high school.

This fast-paced mysterious thriller is not to be missed!

Oh my goodness! Someone in the Attic was such a good whodunit. Julia was the star of the book and she had three friends: Eleanor, Anya, and Donna. Julia had lived in San Diego, but moved to Dublin along with her ex-husband, Gabe, because of an altercation between her daughter, Isla, and a friend of hers. They live in a gated community with neighbors Shirin and Tony, and Drew. Another alleged neighbor was Alastair. The whole problem is that Isla keeps seeing Tik Tok videos of their home. Anya has been killed and there's a Tic Tok video of her home as well. The feeling is that there's someone in their attic who has been taking the videos. Julia has taken it upon herself to figure out who's responsible.

Present day, it was alleged that Anya drowned in her bathtub on her own. But she was actually killed. Many years ago, when the friends were in university, they went to a party. Of the four, Donna was very shy and didn't like to party. But she had a crush on Gabe and when she found out he was going to be attending the party she agreed to go along. She drank too much and went upstairs to the bathroom to vomit. The other three decided they wanted to leave and when they couldn't find her, Anya told Julia that she had seen Donna leave in a taxi, which, of course, wasn't true. Later on Anya recanted and said that she never said Donna left in a taxi, which was a lie. L
Actually, when Donna left the bathroom she went downstairs looking for her friends and couldn't find them. So she called her brother Andrew and asked him to pick her up. Andrew told her there was a bad connection on the phone, that he couldn't hear her. So Donna went to the roof to get better reception. But her brother had hung up. Gabe had given her his number and she took it out of her pocket to phone him for a ride. But when she took it out the wind blew it away and when she reached out to try to grab it she fell off the roof. Julia and Eleanor always believed it was their fault that she fell. As it turned out, her brother feigned an inability to hear her because he didn't want to leave the house to pick her up.

Anyway, back to the attic. Julia didn't believe anyone was in the attic and she went up there to check it out. She found no one. All she found was an earbud. Her son, Luca, swore there was someone in the attic. He said that he could see eyes looking at him through the grate near the ceiling. He also said that in the middle of the night he can feel someone in his room and he could also feel that person breathing on him. Unfortunately, Julia and Gabe didn't believe him. But they did know that someone had been in their home videotaping them. Because he knew so much about her, Julia believes that person was Alastair. And then she thinks it's Donna's brother Andrew. She thinks it's him because she thinks he held friend's Donna's friends responsible for her death. They have a neighbor named Drew and at first she thinks this particular person is Donna's brother, but learns later that wasn't the case.

Because he has professed to be a tech specialist, she had Alastair track Andrew down. And he finds him. At this point, Julia has Eleanor, Drew, and Alastair working on the video issue. So the four of them pay Andrew a visit. It doesn't take long for them to realize it wasn't him making the videos because his leg had been in a cast for over a month.

So on and on it went. I thought the author did a splendid job weaving this tale. At first it seemed apparent who the culprit was, but then it wasn't apparent. At one point Julia thought it might have been Shirin's husband Tony because he had put a camera in their house to spy on his wife's cheating on him with Hugo, the man who had lived in the house before Julia. But then Shirin kicked him out of the house for cheating on her, and Tony disappeared and the videos continued to appear.

The characters were very believable and well defined, and the storyline was well crafted. All in all, this was a book that I very much enjoyed. I could read it again and enjoy it every bit as much. I gave it five stars.

I enjoyed this and the writing style, and the story was compelling. I am very interested in reading this author’s future work and this was a very solid thriller. Would definitely recommend to others.

This one was a bummer for me. It started off so strong and creepy with the whole person in the attic and the tik tok videos showing a view of inside your house. But then it went a bit off the rails for me - I didn't love any of the characters and I figured out the "who dunnit" pretty early on so it started strong but then fell flat for me.

First off let me just say this is a great book, I enjoy a good mystery and this one was a page turner. Every time I thought I had figured something out another twist would come. If you are into mystery and thrills give this book a read.. this was my first book from this author and her name is now on my must read list of authors.

I would like to thank NetGalley and Penguin Group Viking for allowing me to read an ARC of this book.

This is the first book I've read from this author, and was intrigued by the premise of the book. I don't like being home alone, and I really hate attics; they're always creepy. This book certainly did not help my unease and dislike of them.

Someone in the Attic introduces us to Julia and her family -- ex-husband Gabe , who have just moved back from Ireland from San Diego. Julia's friend Anya is found dead. Then Julie sees videos online that were taken inside her home. Is someone targeting her? Julia is beginning to find out that no one is who they seem to be, everyone has secrets, danger can lurk around every corner (or in your own attic). The past always seems to have a way of creeping back to haunt you.

This book gets off to a bang, with the death of Anya, then simmers through the middle until the end. The writing is very edgy and fast-paced. well-developed and relatable while being troubled and secretive. And the plot is unnerving and suspenseful, playing off of fears and suspicions, obsessions, dependence on technology, vengeance, indiscretion, and murder. It is a moody and atmospheric thriller with plenty of twists and turns. You won't be able to put it down!

Anyone who loves a good thriller/whodunnit will enjoy this book, and I definitely recommend it as a read. Just maybe not if you live alone. Or at night. I can usually figure out the ending, but this one got me! So Good!

Oh boy.

I just spent a whole lot of time screaming internally at the main character, but it was all in good fun.

Someone in the Attic is a thriller with a lot of things going for it. It has an intriguing premise: a family starts seeing videos pop up online of a masked figure descending from their attic at night and prowling through their home while they sleep under the hashtag #TheLoft. The hashtag is for a TV show, but are these videos fake?

I enjoyed the twists and turns, and the increasing layers of complexity to the story as it progressed. I would say the story has medium pacing, but keeps tension and suspense up pretty well throughout. The tone is creepy, but honestly I overall just had a lot of fun reading this. I wouldn’t ever say it crossed over into a gory or horrifying kind of tone. It never got too dark.

Now, this is not necessarily a critique of the story, because I don’t need my characters to be likable, but I just have to say: the main character drove me nuts. Her actions and inactions rarely made sense to me. Thus the aforementioned screaming. But she was consistent, and she certainly drove the plot along.

My only critiques of the story itself were that at times I felt like the author was guiding the reader a little heavy-handedly to what she wanted you to be thinking at the time, where I maybe would have preferred her to let everything breathe on its own a bit more. I also think the ending was tied up very neatly, but I can kind of live with that. Honestly, neither of those were deal breakers or that noticeable.

Overall, I had a blast reading this, and I was even giving my husband a play by play with my theories as I was going along. I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a quick, creepy read heading into October!

*Thank you to NetGalley and Pamela Dorman Books for the eARC for the purpose of an honest review!*

This was such a disappointment. I had high hopes because it sounded terrifying and sinister and it has some incredibly high praise from other authors that I love. I didn't realize that the plot would be centered around a TikTok trend, and that just really turned me off from the story. I did not like the characters at all. Instead of feeling creepy and ominous, it really just felt silly and ridiculous to me.

The character's lacked dimension. They didn't behave like real people and were pretty boring. I got 10% of the way through the book and decided it wasn't for me.

Very scary thriller. As a woman I have a lot of inherent fears I wasn't even sure that I had until I read this book.
Nobody would be interested in hanging out in my unfinished attic but I still listened to every crack and creak at night expectantly.

A woman in her bathtub enjoying a glass of wine doesn't seem nefarious. Until she has another and gets a bit drowsy. Then someone comes out of her attic and murders her.
Julia, a friend of this woman, is returning to Ireland after an incident with her daughter. Is she next on the list? Does it have to do with their shared childhood? When strange TikTok videos depicting her house show up in her daughters stream, everyone gets worried. Because one thing is for sure, there is someone in the attic.

Loved it.