The Turn of the Key, published in 2019, is a psychological crime thriller by best-selling author Ruth Ware. As the title suggests, the novel takes inspiration from Henry James’s 1898 classic The Turn of the Screw, and follows a nanny hired to care for three young children in the Scottish Highlands. At first, Rowan thinks the job is too good to be true; the Elincourts live in a gorgeous house nestled in the countryside with every amenity known to man—a fridge that orders food for you, showers set precisely to your desired temperature, curtains that open by voice command—and she has access to all of it as their live-in nanny. Not to mention, the salary is wildly generous. However, as she spends more time with the children, the very things that made the job posting so desirable now seem menacing. The “smart house” technology trips up Rowan at every opportunity, the remote location feels isolated rather than bucolic, and the children who seemed so sweet at first keep hinting at the presence of ghosts, testing her patience and fraying her nerves. She knows better than to believe in children’s stories, but the more sleep she loses, the harder it becomes to separate fact from fiction… and when Mr. and Mrs. Elincourt leave her alone with the children for a week, Rowan’s common sense is the only thing that can keep them all safe.
A thriller-savvy friend recommended The Turn of the Key to me, and I immediately sought it out because it sounded like the perfect book for Halloween season. I was searching for something a little spooky, a little creepy, but nothing too gruesome, and this novel definitely delivered. From the start, I was hooked; the novel begins with a letter from Rowan (no spoilers, I promise!) asking a lawyer to represent her in court for a murder she swears she didn’t commit. As she goes back to the beginning to lay out her story in full, I kept flashing back to this knowledge, constantly on edge about whether or not I could trust her as a narrator. But, because Rowan’s voice has that relatable, chatty Britishness, I found myself wanting to spend time with her despite her murderous potential. The smart house adds a deliciously insidious touch, with its bodiless control of the lights and sounds, and its cameras that see everything. And the combination of current technology with old ghost stories made for an inventive, surprising plot line. The Turn of the Key is a chilling read—highly recommend.
I’d recommend this book to…
- Anyone looking for a creepy mansion, even creepier kids, and an unexplained murder… it’s similar in theme to Crooked Houseby Agatha Christie
- Anyone who loves an unreliable narrator and lots of surprising twists… it’s similar in style to The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides
- Anyone who wants a dark, thought-provoking book… it’s similar in tone to Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
