The Housemaid

How it reads

The Housemaid is thriller (domestic psychological thriller, specifically), and its dominant mood is tense. The suspense is the kind you feel in your shoulders. It moves fast: plot-driven and hard to put down, the kind of book that carries you along even when you're tired.

It's set in a big city setting, in the present day, told in the first person by several narrators. Its central concerns are secrets, class and society and identity. In weight it's light and escapist — easy to fall into.

It opens a series. The ending resolves happily. At 338 pages it's an ordinary novel's length. It's a mega-bestseller — the book everyone seems to have read.