The Woman in the Window
Ratings366
Average rating3.6
A solid 4/5, in my opinion
Ok, I'm going to kind of break this review down into two mini-reviews because one the one hand, I absolutely COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN. I finished it in one day and loved every second of it. The suspense was REAL and I was so frustrated (and scared) at times! There were a lot of twists and turns (some pretty obvious and some that completely got me out of nowhere) that kept me on the edge of my seat. I enjoyed the different characters... I definitely wouldn't say they were the most BELIEVABLE, but then again, most thrillers have to have some odd events/characters or else they wouldn't be all that thrilling. BUT on the other hand, something I definitely didn't like about this one was how it took the “untrustworthy female protagonist spies something she shouldn't and nobody believes her” trope to the EXTREME. Like other books that fall in this genre (Gone Girl, Girl on a Train), the protagonist, Anna, has alcohol and drug abuse problems, leading to (what the police believe) to be an untrustworthy witness. But like, Anna was COMPLETELY SANE in every scene before the murder; in fact, she regularly plays chess and has a doctorate??? Like yes, she is dealing with her own trauma and PTSD from past events (no spoiler), but still, it's absolutely ridiculous for the police not even to CONSIDER her testimony. Anyway, I could go on for days about my qualms with the portrayal of female protagonists in modern fiction but this review is getting a bit long. Overall though, definitely recommend this one!
DNF at page 165
The Woman in the Window is basically a rip off of the 1960s movie Rear Window. Don't bother reading the 400 something page book, just watch the movie.
I hated this book. Anna, the main character is an agoraphobic alcoholic. She was annoying, whingy, and I just really didn't like her at all. By the time the story actually got started (around page 150), I just didn't care enough to want to continue reading.
There are so many great reviews for this book, and I can see why. The concept is great (although unoriginal), but with execution. The writing was terrible. Sentences and paragraphs just rambled about nothing.
If you are a thriller reader, then I don't recommend this one. If you are new to the thriller genre, go for it.
Empece a leerlo, no me llamaba mucho la atención, pero para ver de que se trataba. En la página 30 lo dejo y lo pongo a un lado.
I can't believe I'm going to say this, but I think this will be a better movie than book. I think the “surprise” to the story will have more of an impact in the movie theater. The book was all over the place.
A good story, I was engrossed till the end, but the ending seemed a tiny bit of a let down.
This book is the longest I have ever taken to complete a thriller book. Although it was an enjoyable read, I have few problems with this book. Here's about the book and why this doesn't make into my ‘mystery-thriller recs' list.
Anna is a psychoanalyst who lives alone, all by herself. While being separated from her husband and her daughter, she also deals with agoraphobia - a condition due to which she cannot step out of the house. She is The Woman in the Window, the one who spies on the neighbors as a way to pass her time. One day, the Russells move into her neighborhood and mistakes them for a regular family. One night, she hears a scream from the Russells and sees something she shouldn't have. However, she is not taken seriously because of her medications and she is left to ask herself, ‘Has it really happened or is she crazy?'
On paper, this book has an interesting premise. However, the biggest setback for me is the pace of the book. When I pick up a thriller book, I expect it to be fast-paced, if not fast-paced, I would like to see the story to progress. However, the author takes about 40% of the book to setup the characters. I mean, I understood the dynamics and their stories in the first 20% maybe. (Yeah, I read it on Kindle. Thats why the %'s). Apart from that, I think it has everything that a thriller should have-except the pace.
If you like a slow burner, I would definitely recommend this to you. But if you are someone like, who pick up thriller to have more of a quick read, I would not recommend this to you. I had to push myself to read this book until the actual plot started and once the plot took off, there were no complaints!
4.5 ⭐️ : Holly suspense!!
This was one of my favorite reads so far this year! I was absolutely gripped from almost page one and could not get through the pages fast enough! The strong suspense I felt a few times throughout the book was parallel to some scary movies I've watched where I'm quite literally at the edge of my seat, trying to sprint through the pages to find relief in the unfolding of events.
There were a few twists and turns that made the narrator quite unreliable, and had me second guessing so many of my theories throughout this read. There were moments I thought I had it nailed down (I didn't) and others where I felt it could literally be anyone and anything.
4.5 stars only because the middle of the book slowed down quite a bit before picking back up again and because the truth was divulged by a character to the main character at the end, she didn't figure anything out it was just told to her which was a bit anticlimactic.
Either way RUN to this book, such an enjoyable read!!
This was an all-around bad book. Most of the story elements were pilfered from the abundance of old films mentioned here, e. g. “Rear Window”, “Witness To Murder”, and large parts from more recent films like “Copycat”.It also reminded me a lot of an old song by Tom Lehrer: Lobachevsky.It has basically no redeeming qualities. If you want more details, read on, but be warned: Spoilers ahead!The protagonist, Anna Fox, is an ex-psychologist who suffers from agoraphobia after both her husband and her child died after an accident. She drove the car and was the sole survivor. She still talks to both of them and pretends they're alive but live separately. Anna is on strong medication but takes those with lots and lots of wine which she's getting delivered in bulk. She doesn't quite see dead people yet but suffers from lots of side effects.One day Anna witnesses a murder and nobody believes her. As a reader, I didn't give a rat's ass: Anna is almost criminally stupid and very unlikeable. Just like I didn't care about any other member of the cast - the father who is supposed to be protective but acts like a violent lunatic; the wife who's just plain hostile; the “good cop” who tries to understand Anna but doesn't really do anything to help; his “bad cop” partner whose character seems to solely consist of being annoyed... They're all shallowly depicted caricatures.All the characters, especially our drunken heroine, make the worst possible choices all the time. Anna herself is also weirdly written in that she's supposed to be 38 but reads like she's beyond 60. I saw every single twist coming and was solely surprised by how cheap and primitive Finn resolves them. Apparently, he lacks any sense of subtlety and suspense building.One star out of five.Blog Facebook Twitter Mastodon Instagram Pinterest Medium Matrix TumblrCeterum censeo Putin esse delendam
Just wow. This was an impeccably crafted twisty story, I had no idea what was going to happen. I'm very impressed with all the twists. Anna was fantastically written - as a therapist, there is nothing I hate more in a book than a poorly written MHP, and Anna was SPOT ON. Such a good book, such engaging characters, so well written.
An addictive read even though it's not the most unpredictable book I've ever read. I liked the psychology of it as well as the film noir mentions even if they did coincide conveniently with the events of the book which didn't help with any twists. Enjoyable nonetheless!
4.5* loses half a star for the incredibly slow start but mannn plot twists i never saw coming!! I devoured the second half of this book in a few hours!
One of the most underwhelming books for the year:( I didn't get what I was expecting.And I didn't like the twist. It so not what I was expecting. One thing though the mc in this book who is an unreliable narrator isn't like any of the other unreliable narrators I have read(Rachel from [b:The Girl on the Train 22557272 The Girl on the Train Paula Hawkins https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1574805682l/22557272.SX50.jpg 41107568], Camille from [b:Sharp Objects 18045891 Sharp Objects Gillian Flynn https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1475695315l/18045891.SY75.jpg 3801], etc) Anna was actually likable most of the time. Even though it is slow paced the chapters are very short so it was very easy to get through:) I don't like that a child was the 'twist' I hate when books do that, ik irl there are ppl like this but I didn't like the idea of him being the big twist behind the entire book:( Also the part about ed and Olivia being dead that was so sad. But I guess in a way it was Anna's fault for cheating when I read this she became a bit unlikable.
Did not need to be 400 pages. Guessed the killer midway but then said “no, that's stupid.” SPOILER: guessed the family was dead 100 pages in and Anna was “talking to them” as a way to cope. Ummm what else is there to say? It would've been better if written by a women/ also made the story a commentary on how society never really believes women / how young boys don't necessarily see women as human due to societal stances and such.
I enjoyed being in Anna's mind during this. I didn't feel entirely disgusted by the portrayal of a ‘drunk'
I like to try to read books that have movies or shows coming out soon, so when I saw that Netflix was making this with Amy Adams in the lead role I grabbed the audiobook from the library.
This was okay. It's an unabashedly Hitchcockian and pulpy thriller, and it does a pretty good job of it. There are twists and turns, and thrilling moments, but there wasn't anything overly inventive or memorable about it. Also the ending was stupid.
I think it'll make for a pretty schlocky movie, but there's enough talent involved that I hope it's a fun thriller at least.
A final note about the audiobook: After it was over there was a segment where the narrator did a Q&A with the writer. I wish more audiobooks did stuff like that.
I wanted to read this before the movie comes to Netflix on May 14. I remember first seeing the trailer for this movie over a year ago and thinking it looked really good. Well the book was great. Reading this in a week is fairly fast for me. Some really nice twists. It'll be fun to see how the movie does it.
Torn between 3 and 4 stars, but going with 4 because I did binge-read this and would recommend it to someone else in search of a juicy binge-read.
My main qualm with this book is that it's just one of many recent thrillers that hinges on the (female) protagonist being an alcoholic. I feel like there are more creative ways to create an unreliable narrator/lead, and frankly, it makes the twists frustratingly predictable.
3.5 - listened to the audio book and some chapters felt dragged out (probably due to the character driven writing or the narrator not sure), the suspense wasn't really till the end and the psychological aspects were interesting but not that impactful.
هي قصة آنا .. امرأة تعاني من رهاب الأماكن المفتوحة , تفضل البقاء في بيتها , تشاهد أفلاماً كلاسيكية وتراقب الجيران من نافذة غرفتها, إلى أن يحدث و ترى شيئاً كان يجب عليها ألا تراه.. ومن هنا تبدأ القصة .
رواية مشوقة جدا, لن تستطيع تركها بمجرد البدأ فيها.
قرأتها مع رفيقة القراءة رزان و أظن أنها من نوع الكتب الذي يجب أن يقرأ بمشاركة شخص أو مجموعة قراءة حتى , لمشاركة الأحداث الصادمة التي تحصل في فصول الرواية.
Although the book has too many tropes there is an unexpected twist or two.