Book Review: The Wife Upstairs

Broke, running from a traumatic past she would like to forget, and newly moved to Birmingham, Alabama, Jane gets by walking dogs in the gated, upscale community of Thornfield Estates, when she meets Eddie Rochester, whose wife Bea supposedly drowned in a boating accident with her best friend Blanche. Sensing an opportunity in the rich and handsome widower, Jane — ever ambitious and desperate to climb out of her financial hole — strategically makes her move to win his heart, only to realise she may have ended up with more than what she had bargained for. Billed as a 21st century rework of Jane Eyre into a twisted tale of domestic suspense, The Wife Upstairs doesn't flip the script so much as cleverly breathe fresh life into a familiar setting, constructing a house of cards that's ultimately dismantled to reveal the darkness beneath it. A zippy, fast-paced thriller that will have readers feverishly turning the pages.