The Woman In Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware -340 pages
Book Blurb:
In this tightly wound story, Lo Blacklock, a journalist who writes for a travel magazine, has just been given the assignment of a lifetime: a week on a luxury cruise with only a handful of cabins. At first, Lo’s stay is nothing but pleasant: the cabins are plush, the dinner parties are sparkling, and the guests are elegant. But as the week wears on, frigid winds whip the deck, gray skies fall, and Lo witnesses what she can only describe as a nightmare: a woman being thrown overboard. The problem? All passengers remain accounted for—and so, the ship sails on as if nothing has happened, despite Lo’s desperate attempts to convey that something (or someone) has gone terribly, terribly wrong…
My Review: 3 stars
The Woman in Cabin 10 was the mystery/thriller I’d been craving and had patiently waited for its arrival from my local library. I’d heard very mixed reviews about this one, so by the time I got it, I was somewhat wary. Was it a mystery? Yes, in the sense that we didn’t know who committed the crime that the books protagonist, Lo Blacklock, witnessed. Was it a thriller? Not exactly. Exciting things would happen over the span over a few pages, and the reader would be bogged down in chapter after chapter describing the aftermath.
Lo gets burglarized in her own her own home, which is riveting for the reader, but then pages were spent dealing with her emotional trauma. It was too much and was begging the reader to find her as an unreliable character. After she witnesses the possible murder of another guest on the luxury ship she is on, we are dragged down again with more pages of Lo trying to figure out what happened and who she can trust.
This book had great potential, and isn’t a bad read, but it fell flat on execution. With the over abundance of psychological thrillers and mysteries being so on trend right now, they all start to blur together in plot and circumstance. This one seemed right in line with Girl On The Train, substitute cruise ship for train and anxiety for alcoholism, so for me, it was another wannabe hit in that genre.
Quotes I liked:
We all have demons inside us, voices that whisper we’re no good, that if we don’t make this promotion or ace that exam we’ll reveal to the world exactly what kind of worthless sacks of skin and sinew we really are.”
-“Apparently the majority of ball gowns were designed by five-year-old girls armed with glitter guns, but at least this one didn’t look entirely like an explosion in a Barbie factory.”
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Same here, Lauren! Definite letdown! Here’s my review: “Pretty fair mystery for its type. I found a few plot holes (spoiler alert: were both robberies related?) and could not figure out if any of the crew was involved in the disappearance. But I did like that the protagonist suffered from anxiety, which made her more interesting.”
Great minds think alike Eileen!!
Happy Holidays!