the housemaid by freida mcfadden

join us for our first shift at the winchester's mansion. this episode we put up a big, fat, "help wanted" sign and sent out a plea for books centred around the perspectives of maids, butlers, groundskeepers, governesses, and any all of the domestic service staff who keep the wheels turning and whose eyes see all... in this episode we discuss nina winchester's iconic morning routine, freida mcfadden's secret identity (it's a wig) and dish out some hot tips on red flags to look for when applying for a job (hint: if someone says "danger" it's a good idea to turn down the job). it's time to polish your earbuds and settle in as we discuss the housemaid by freida mcfadden. 

synopsis music by Nikita Kondrashev

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Transcript

Laura 0:00

Doo! Well, Bridget. Sorry, that just such a good intro though. Hello and welcome to Talk Lit Get Hit, a podcast where we read viral books the internet won't shut up about and rate them lit or shit.

Bridget 0:15

We're your hosts Bridget and Laura, lovers of sad girl fiction and tragic endings, fearers of smart, urban fantasy, and the Who Did This To You trope. Join us as we pick apart all the books the internet loves and embark on a journey to figure out why.

Laura 0:30

For the month of March, we wanted to explore stories centered around the perspectives of people who provide the perfect window into any story. Maids, butlers, groundsmen, and a multitude of other domestic service staff. We had many to choose from, but this month, as voted by you, we are reading The Housemaid by Frieda McMadden. Bridget, hello, hello.

Bridget 0:49

Hello, hello. How are you going? I'm good. I'm very excited to talk about The Housemaid by Frieda McMadden. Title Drop. Tick.

Laura 1:00

Me too. I mean, I know we sort of said it in the episode welcome, but it wasn't until I started thinking about this sort of theme that I started to become aware of just how many books there are from this perspective. Do you have a favorite sort of made-related form of media?

Bridget 1:18

I do, but it's not a book. It's a show. The nanny. I love the nanny.

Laura 1:24

I sort of had a feeling you might be leaning in that direction.

Bridget 1:28

Other than the nanny, when I was a kid, I really liked the movie Made in Manhattan, but I can't really remember what it's about. I just remember some sort of lush hotel room. And also when I was a kid, I had a book. It was Jane Eyre, but it was an abridged version of Jane Eyre for kids. It was very short. And I liked that more than the full book. Yeah, that makes sense.

Laura 1:51

As a kid, it would be a little bit of it to get through.

Bridget 1:54

But even now, it's I've it's great. It's dense. Sharp, quick to the point, tells a story.

Laura 2:00

Finished. How about you? Yeah, I had quite a few when I started to think about it as well. I think one that was really formative for me is not a book, but it was a movie called The Nanny Diaries. I mean, I think it is a book, but I only watched the movie. But I absolutely thrashed the movie and it had Scarlett Johansson in it and Laura Linney, I think that's her name, and like one of those guys who's just kind of gross and he's always playing like the same kind of character. I'm sure he's a lovely man. Was the DVD cover her like leaning over putting some shoes on? I think it might have been something to do with an umbrella.

Bridget 2:38

Okay, yes. Maybe like a bit Mary Poppins-esque.

Laura 2:41

Yes. Yes. It had a really kind of unexplored, whimsical element to it like that. Like there was, I sort of remember her floating around with an umbrella. Maybe it was a metaphor, but kind of went over my head and I've never thought about it again until now.

Bridget 2:55

It's funny because I just realized another one, Mary Poppins. Yes. When we start talking about it, I'm getting all these ones coming to my mind. There are so many.

Laura 3:04

Yeah, I could mainly think of movies, but some that were coming to mind were the menu, which is sort of, I guess, like a horror about like a really fancy restaurant, and some of the characters go there and it takes a sinister twist. But I view that as sort of maybe an adjacent genre, like sort of hospitality, revenge porn. And Triangle of Sadness, I think, is a similar kind of thing. It's like a luxury cruise ship or a luxury yacht. I'm not that like well-versed in boats, but yeah. Those are some of the favourites that were springing to mind.

Bridget 3:37

When we write our notes, we write them separately. And then Laura compiles our show notes, and then I come in and see what she's written. And her notes were saying, Do you have a favorite maid-related form of media? And what I was going to bring was, Do you have a favorite attic-related form of media? Because I feel like there's a lot of books that I read as a kid that attics featured heavily in them. And I'm thinking of The Little Princess. Okay. Amazing. There was another book where somebody's mother or grandmother set up a painting room in their attic. And I was always obsessed with attics. And I remember there was this house that someone my dad used to work with had an attic. And every time we drove past, I was like, oh, that could be my painting room.

Laura 4:18

Yeah. But you see the little window and you just you just know that there's a beautiful attic in there.

Bridget 4:24

I think another one for me is the Cinderella story when she lives in the attic and converts it into the coolest bedroom ever. Okay. Yeah. Two episodes in a row, we've got a Cinderella story mentioned. Incredible.

Laura 4:35

Wow, if only it were a book. Maybe we should do a bonus chapter on it.

Bridget 4:40

I would love that. Probably my favorite movie ever.

Laura 4:43

This year probably marks like a 10-year anniversary of you and I saying, Get me some salmon. So moist to each other.

Bridget 4:52

So moist. Pick up the dry gleaning and wash the jack.

Laura 5:00

Well, I think that has set the tone beautifully for our next expected section of the show, which is your initial thoughts, expectations, hopes, and dreams. Bridget, how are you feeling about reading The Housemaid by Frieda McFadden?

Bridget 5:15

I pretty much had zero thoughts other than terrible cover. And when I bought the book and then I was talking to my friend Maddie about it, I started reading the back and then I realized it was a thriller. Somehow that had escaped my knowledge or notice until that point. And I was like, oh, I don't want to be scared. Um, so then I was a bit about it. How about you?

Laura 5:38

Initially I thought I had read this book, but I have actually read a book called The Maid by Nita Prose. And I hated that book. I really hated that book, actually. And so there was a level of relief when I found out it wasn't that. And then I thought, oh, maybe it's like that Margaret Qually movie. No, it's not that either, by the way. And then I didn't really have many thoughts beyond that. I know my mum liked this book. She really likes Freedom McFadden books. I was quite excited to read it following The Spanish Love Deception, which was the book I read prior and our previous podcast episode slash my most hated book I've ever read. Um, so I was kind of hoping that it would cleanse me, and that's about it.

Bridget 6:22

I looked on Goodreads to see what the streets were saying, and 27 of my friends on Goodreads have read this book, and 19 of them have left reviews. Most of them five stars. There's not one lower than a three-star. Okay. So when I saw that, I was thinking, okay, here we go. Strap in.

Laura 6:43

That's unheard of.

Bridget 6:44

Yes. Some of the five-star ratings were from people that don't normally read this kind of genre as well. So I was a bit surprised to see people from all sort of different niches coming together to agree on their high ratings for this book.

Laura 7:00

I was curious. So I've looked now, and I have 12 friends who've read this book. Two have rated it five stars, two have rated it four stars, and the rest have rated it less.

Bridget 7:12

But not that much less. I think we might have talked a little bit about this in a few different episodes, but would you say you're much of a mystery slash thriller fan?

Laura 7:20

I'm still trying to figure this one out. I think I'm always searching for a good mystery slash thriller. I really love horror movies, and I really love um a feeling of suspense and I kind of like that underlying tension and stress. I can't quite explain what it is exactly that I enjoy about it. But I find that I never really get that same feeling when I'm reading books. And what I think it is with these sort of more commercial mysteries slash thrillers, like A Good Girl's Guide to Murder and some others, like the girl on the train, the woman in the window, or like whatever the heck it is, is I feel like they really lack atmosphere. I'm someone that is a little bit more like character-driven, a little bit more prose-focused than like plot and something that's like pacey and juicy. So I think that's probably where I'm normally let down by thrillers. As an example, I recently read The God of the Woods, and I loved that. I think I rated it four stars, and I thought about it for a long time afterwards, but I wouldn't say it was a particularly like action-packed or crazy book, but it was very atmospheric and it did invest time I felt in its characters. And so I saw a lot of reviews saying that it was rambling or slow-paced, but that's exactly what I liked about it. So yes and no is the answer. All that to say yes and no. How about you?

Bridget 8:51

When I was thinking about this question, I realized that when I was a kid, I really liked reading mysteries. Not really thrillers, but I read a lot of books like a series of unfortunate events. I was a big Nancy Drew fan, and I really liked this series by Emily Rodder called Teen Power Inc. And it was sort of like, I don't know, like the famous five or something. It was like five friends who would go around and somehow always find their way into some crime gang or something and had to solve the problem or find the murderer or whatever, in about 150 pages. So that was fantastic. And as I have gotten older, I don't really read any mysteries or thrillers. I liked the goldfinch, and that's about it, I think. There are a few other ones that I've read and I've sort of enjoyed, but I don't like feeling anxious about what's going to happen in a book. I don't like feeling scared. I also find that characters in these kinds of books do a lot of very cringy things, and I'm not interested in secondhand cringe.

Laura 9:53

Yeah.

Bridget 9:53

Do you have any other books that you would recommend?

Laura 9:56

Um, I guess alongside the God of the Woods ones like The Paper Palace, which I never shut up about, um, The Secret History, and another that's coming to mind is What I Loved by an author called Siri Hustford. And they're definitely. See, that's the thing. I can't I can't even articulate it. And I think they lean more towards mystery than thriller, and more literary than mystery. So I don't know if it's even a stretch to say that that's what they are, but that's what they are to me. That's all that matters.

Bridget 10:31

Although our days would be made if you listen to this episode, we will be spoiling the contents of The House Made by Frieda McFadden. If you'd like to avoid them, press pause on the show now and subscribe so that you can come back and find us when you're done reading.

Laura 10:45

In our episode this month, we may be discussing themes of fat phobia, violence, torture, abuse, and infidelity. Welcome to the family, Nina Winchester says as I shake her elegant, manicured hand. I smile politely gazing around the marble hallway. Working here is my last chance to start fresh. I can pretend to be whoever I like, but I'll soon learn that the Winchester's secrets are far more dangerous than my own.

Bridget 11:09

Every day I clean the Winchester's beautiful house top to bottom. I collect their daughter from school, and I cook a delicious meal for the whole family before heading up to eat alone in my tiny room on the top floor.

Laura 11:21

I try to ignore how Nina makes a mess just to watch me clean it up. How she tells me strange lies about her own daughter, and how her husband Andrew seems more broken every day. But as I look into Andrew's handsome brown eyes, so full of pain, it's hard not to imagine what it would be like to live Nina's life. The walk-in closet, the fancy car, the perfect husband. I only try on one of Nina's pristine white dresses once, just to see what it's like.

Bridget 11:48

But she soon finds out, and by the time I realise my attic bedroom door only locks from the outside, it's far too late. But I reassure myself, the Winchesters don't know who I really am. They don't know what I'm capable of.

Laura 12:03

Well, Bridget, I think seeing as I shared my thoughts first last episode, it's only fair that you share your post-reading thoughts first. So would you please let me know how you feel about the housemaid?

Bridget 12:16

I don't feel much about the housemaid. I was very, very bored until I got to part two. And then I was like, oh, right, okay, I get why she's so dumb. And it sort of made a bit more sense. I wouldn't say that I was enthralled by the book. I wouldn't say that I was disgusted by the book. I don't really understand all of the five-star ratings that I've been seeing, but it was a book. How about you?

Laura 12:44

Yeah, it's a little bit weird. Would I say I liked it? Probably not. Would I say I think the writing was good or the characters were interesting? No, not really. But did I enjoy it and did I kind of for some reason want to keep reading it? Yes. And I don't really know just yet how to make sense of all of that, but I'm sure we'll figure it out.

Bridget 13:08

Let's start, as we normally do, with talking about the author. So Frida McFadden. She's written a whopping 29 books that I can see. There might be more.

Laura 13:19

That's incredible.

Bridget 13:20

There wasn't too much to find out about Frida McFadden. She is a physician specializing in brain injury. She writes under a pen name. There are photos of her online.

Laura 13:30

Well, something that I thought was interesting when I was trying to create the little graphics that go on our Instagram was that there's not that many photos of her for how prolific she is and how big her books are. And another thing that struck me looking at the photos was like, wow, what a head of hair. And so like she's kind of got like really glossy, quite perfect hair, but it's like always like perfectly waved. Not to say that people can't just have nice hair, but she also has like glasses and it just very much is giving disguise.

Bridget 14:05

Ah, okay.

Laura 14:08

What do you like? What do you think about that?

Bridget 14:09

So you're thinking wig and glasses kind of situation.

Laura 14:12

It just looks so consistently the same across all of the photos.

Bridget 14:15

I like this theory because I was thinking about the author of My Brilliant Friend who values her privacy and her anonymity, and there is not a photo to be found of her. I like this theory that there's a disguise happening because if you were a thriller writer, maybe that's up your alley.

Laura 14:31

Well, we'll put some photos in our Instagram stories and you guys can take a vote on whether you think it's a disguise or not.

Bridget 14:37

Maybe we could go to the party shop and buy a wig and some glasses and we'll put photos of us next to Frida and you can pick which one is Frida and see if it's a good disguise.

Laura 14:49

I like it. In terms of her motivations for remaining anonymous, how do you think you'd feel finding out that your brain surgeon was also like a best-selling novelist?

Bridget 15:02

Would it I don't know if it would bother me? That's a good question. I don't know if it would bother me, but I would be thinking, have you got your priorities in the right order? Because if she's got time to write 30 books, and I don't know what the timeline is.

Laura 15:16

It's actually crazy. Like, I was just having a quick scroll through the most authoritative of sources, Wikipedia. What'd you say before she's got like 20-something books?

Bridget 15:27

Well, I think 29 when I counted on her Wikipedia.

Laura 15:29

That looks more accurate just from a little, you know, quick eyeball count. But the release dates on these things I'm seeing 2024, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2024, 2020, 2020, 2021, 21, 21, 22, 22, 22, 23, 23, 24, 24, 2 in 2025, one more in 2022, and 2024. There's probably a better way to sum that up. But I feel like me rattling that off sort of like proves the madness.

Bridget 16:03

That's multiple books a year. Yes. Okay, I've changed my mind. I would not want her out of my brain switcher. Get out of my brain. Get out of my brain. I don't know what you're gonna do. And also something that I was gonna talk about later, but I think fits in very well here is the plagiarism allegations that have been leveled against her. So obviously, this is all alleged, but there are a few of her books, this one included, that a lot of people have said are direct ripoffs of other books. So a lot of readers have noticed that The Housemaid is very similar to The Last Mrs. Parish by Liv Constantine. This is not the first time that readers have noticed the similarities between her books. So she has another one called The Wife Upstairs, which a lot of people say is very similar to Verity. And reading the synopsis, it does seem very similar to Verity by Colleen Hoover. And a lot of readers have also noticed the similarities between The Teacher by Frieda McFadden and My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell. Even worse, in both books, there is the exact quote: It's just my luck that when I finally find my soulmate, she's 15 years old.

Laura 17:15

Oh, whoa. In My Dark Vanessa and the Teacher.

Bridget 17:18

And the teacher.

Laura 17:20

Oh.

Bridget 17:20

Which is pretty interesting. I have seen some people say that they think she uses ChatGPT to write her books. And I mean, I'm not here to say yes or no. Only Frida can tell us. But there's a lot of interesting information.

Laura 17:38

I haven't read some of those books. I've read My Dark Vanessa, which doesn't really help us here. And I have read Verity, although I barely remember it. But one of my notes was, I swear to God, I've read this before. Whether I was thinking of things like the woman in the window or the woman on the train or whatever the heck those are, or Verity, or like a mishmash.

Bridget 17:56

Even Gone Girl, I would say. Yeah. But I had the feeling too, right from the start. I thought, I have read or I have seen a movie with this exact sort of vibe before, and I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was.

Laura 18:07

If she's using AI, think of like the environmental damage this woman is doing. She's a climate criminal. I'm reading an article on the Chicago Tribune. Insatiable fans propel doctors' literary career. That's the headline. But it does say she has largely stepped away from her medical practice to focus on writing, but continues to see patients once or twice a week in case she decides to return to medicine full-time. The article also says something quite interesting about the teacher, and that is that some readers complained about a scene in her novel in which a woman finds herself alone in the dark with a possible attacker but without her cell phone because she's wearing a dress without pockets. Wow. Just toppling the real world problems one by one. Tying into that as well, there's a quote from Freda McFadden where she says, It's hard with everything you do being a little bit more under the microscope. Somebody will always seize on something and get mad. She mostly shrugs off the criticism and moves on to the next idea. She goes on to say, I'm just trying to be entertaining. I'm not trying to write war and peace. I love that.

Bridget 19:20

Hey, don't hate me. I'm just having fun. Don't have a cow, man. Before we move on to talking about the characters, I just quickly want to touch on the packaging of this book. So we have the tagline on the front cover from behind closed doors, she sees everything. Does she? Because from my opinion, Millie's pretty dumb. She doesn't know anything that's going on. And Nina's lot looking what? When is she locked up? Who is she? And then reading the blurb doesn't make sense either. So I only try on one of Nina's pristine white dresses once, but she soon finds out. She doesn't try it on. She's given the dress. Nina doesn't find out that was the plan. Yeah. And by the time I realize my bedroom door only locks from the outside, it's far too late. She realized that the first day she was there.

Laura 20:14

That's like the first red flag. Yeah.

Bridget 20:16

The first day she's like, I can't put my finger on what's weird about this room. And then the next time she's there, she's like, Oh, I know what it is. It locks from the outside. And then, but the Winchesters don't know who I really am. They don't know what I'm capable of. Millie's not leaving her story. Nina knows exactly what you're capable of. That's the only reason why you're there. What who is writing these? Because we have this problem time and time again where the blurbs don't make sense. And the tagline does not make sense. Who has this job? Give it to me. Yes, I could do well. I mean, probably not. I could do a more accurate job. I don't know if it would be better, but it would be more accurate.

Laura 20:54

Well, while we're on the topic, let's talk about Millie because she is the protagonist of this book for the majority of the time. How did you feel about Millie?

Bridget 21:03

Millie was boring. She was dumb. She gave nothing. Her internal monologue was dull. And that's about it for me. But how about you? How do you feel about Millie?

Laura 21:16

Yeah, I also thought Millie was pretty dumb, pretty forgettable. It was one of those situations where it's like, hey, we're gonna tell you she's like a ragtag, like bad girl, like jailbird, like Miss Fit Rockstar. Millie from the black. But then like you never see any pizzazz or flair or drive or personality from her. She keeps saying she can't go back to jail, but we don't get any context about like what happened in jail. She has no thoughts really, like no critical thinking, no self preservation. I don't know. There's really like not much to say about it.

Bridget 22:00

I was having a bit of a moral dilemma with this because I was thinking on the one hand, Millie's boring. She ignores all of the red flags, all of the blatant warning signs, and she puts herself in this position, which is an unfathomable position, unrealistic position that she's in. But on the other hand, I was thinking I'm being very victim-blamy. She has spent the last ten years in prison. She was in prison from a very young age. And I can't imagine what that would do to someone in their formative years, having to be in that environment for 10 years, and then being thrust out into a society that would have changed so much. And then not really having the street smarts or a, you know, social awareness or anything like that to make their way through life. I don't know how that would affect you. But I don't think the book was well written enough to have that be the point. I think the way that Millie was written is just how she was written because maybe a lack of skill or a lack of thought behind that character. I think if it was a different kind of book with a different kind of author, that might be an insight to consider about her personality. But I just don't think it was in this book. I think it was just like, dear Diary, today I got up, I made some toast. Andrew's so handsome. Nina was mean to me, I went to bed. And I think that's just her in her entirety.

Laura 23:25

I think you've articulated the thing that I was sort of ticking over in my brain, but in a way more coherent kind of way. With some of her initial sort of internal monologue and dialogue, I was thinking, my God, this is so plain. And I couldn't figure out if it was by design. Due to her time spent in prison, I thought, yeah, maybe she was sort of having like a slightly less developed, more juvenile outlook on the situation. But throughout the novel, came to realize, oh no, everyone is characterized like this. Everyone speaks to one another like this. This is just all there is.

Bridget 24:00

I found myself getting really frustrated by the choices that she made. She was warned by Enzo multiple times. So the first time she saw Enzo and she tried to greet him, and he just looked at her and silently shook his head. If I was at a job interview and there was an employee that acted like that towards me, I would be thinking, I've got to get out of the situation. Once again, I know that she's living in her car and I know that she's desperate. I I I know all of that. I'm trying very hard to be fair to Millie because her situation is not one that I have found myself in. But she had that that morning, the second morning he said to her, danger in Italian. She translated it. She never gave it a second thought. Later on, she had another conversation with Enzo and and he tells her something like that there is danger here or you should leave or something like that. And she said something to the effect, if only he spoke better English, I would have moved out by now. And I thought, you have been told multiple times. You have got the message multiple times. You just haven't thought about it. You haven't given it any thought. And is she the dumbest person alive? Yes. And that's all I think about her.

Laura 25:06

Yeah, and I think at the end of the novel, like cut to, spoiler alert, but Millie ends up being this sort of like vigilante like assassin for rich housewives in bad situations. But throughout this novel, nowhere have I seen anything that indicates that she has the kind of drive or character or like any sort of attributes that would lend themselves to her being in that line of work. I got the impression she accidentally murdered Andrew. She was like, Oh my god, he needed water. Oops, like my bad.

Bridget 25:40

And even like some of the more chilling details, like how she gave him the pliers and made him rip out his own teeth. And then his mother was like, Oh yeah, that's what I used to do to him, or whatever, like for some unknown reason. That wasn't planned by her. She isn't some sort of uh psychotic mastermind. I think she just found some pliers and was like, hey, here's a cool thing to do. Pull your teeth out. And we didn't see her, like any of her actions that were particularly manipulative or cunning or even clever. Um, she seemed to be in a constant state of panic and was just apologizing all of the time. I think that's what she wanted Nina to see because she wanted to keep her job and she wanted to keep the peace. But we can see her thoughts. So we should be able to see those inner workings of someone who was going to go on to become a hitman, basically.

Laura 26:31

Yeah. It's not just specific to Millie, but the impression I got from the dialogue and the writing and the internal monologues and all of it packaged up together was sort of the same that I got from Fifty Shades of Grey, where you said it sounded like an older woman trying to be young. And I also would say that I thought she was like an English author pretending to know about America, but apparently she's not. Because I thought the dialogue was like so clunky and like unnatural.

Bridget 27:04

It was really juvenile, I think.

Laura 27:07

Yeah. And Millie's dialogue in particular had this really kind of petulant tone. And there's an example on page 104 where she's watching Nina and Andrew have an interaction, and she says, Nina is so freaking lucky. She's got everything. Yes, she did have to stay at a mental institution, but at least she wasn't in prison. And here she is with an incredible house, tons of money, and a husband who is kind, funny, wealthy, considerate, and well, absolutely gorgeous. And it's just kind of like grow up.

Bridget 27:39

Babe, get a grip. This is a really dumb thing to compare it to, but I was thinking a lot about a part in the Taylor Swift documentary Miss Americana when she says that she feels as though she is stuck at the age that she got famous, and so mentally she's 15, 16. And I was sort of wondering if that would feel the same for someone who was in prison. Because if you're going in prison when you're 16, 17, you're not really having any personal growth. Because I in some ways I guess it's a little bit like school, and you have a routine, you have these people controlling your life. You don't really know who you're going to be when you're out on your own and you're responsible for making your own decisions. So I thought that maybe that childlike dialogue was due to the fact that she went into prison when she was so young. But I also thought that she would just not really give any thought to anything. Like when she found out that Nina had tried to drown Cecilia when she was a baby, she like straight away changed her mind about everything. And she was like, Oh my god, Nina's crazy. Who would drown their own kid? That's so terrible. How can she look at Cecilia and know that she tried to drown her own kid? But then she would also be like, Oh no, I have to remember. She's, you know, maybe she had postnatal depression. And there was never any thought other than flipping between those two things and trying to remind herself of the other. Like she felt sympathy or empathy for Nina. But then she'd be like, but wait, she's crazy. And it was just back and forth. There was no going further than that.

Laura 29:09

I love how much you thought about this. I guess on a level I thought about that once or twice, and then I just decided it just wasn't that deep. But I think after I finished reading it, that was when I discovered that she was a brain surgeon. I forget exactly what she was. And like not to say that like because you can do surgery on brains, that means you're like a psychologist or like really well versed in like mental health issues and also therefore able to really eloquently and responsibly deal with those subject matters in a book. But I did sort of think, oh, that's like a weird lack of nuance and explanation on these topics from somebody that works with brains. That's true, yeah. I don't think it's that thought out, but I do really like your explanation about her being stuck in this sort of juvenile mentality. And I can't figure out if that makes like some of her thoughts around like sex and like maybe we could have some fun, like better or worse. But I'll take it on board and I'll I'll ruminate on it.

Bridget 30:11

It also sort of feels to me like a female character written by men. She doesn't seem to me as if she's been written by a woman because she is so surface level with all of her thoughts. And it it just feels like you know, like when men are writing about breasts, and it's like the breasts bounce happily, or something like that. And so all she ever thinks about is he's hot. I want to have sex with him. I haven't had sex for a long time. I don't know, there's just no like character development or even a personality until I got to part two and realized that Andrew was the true evil person in this situation. The whole time I was like, what is he seeing Millie? What is wrong with this man?

Laura 30:56

She's just a husk. She is a husk. And I think she spends so much time reiterating stuff that's really, really obvious. Like I think halfway through the book she says something like, It's like Nina's always dissecting everything I do. And it's like, yeah, that's a really well-established fact by this point. Or, you know, I have a crush on Andrew, or wow, Nina seems a bit unstable, or Cecilia's a strange kid. Yeah, we know. You've been saying that at least once a chapter for this whole book, and now we're almost done.

Bridget 31:29

There was one part where I sort of got a little bit excited because it was sort of veering into more the kind of book that I would like to read, and it was when she took a book to the park. Yeah. I was like, oh my god, we're gonna get like a day in the life. Come with me and my day off from my psychotic boss. But then nah.

Laura 31:51

You mentioned the switch up where we find out that Andrew is the baddie all along. But did you see that coming? How do you feel the mystery element of this played out?

Bridget 32:02

I didn't see it coming. I'm not really someone who reads searching for plot twists or anything like that. I had seen on Goodreads somebody was reading the second book of the series, and one of their reading updates was I miss Nina and Enzo. And that was made me sort of think, where are they going in the story and how are they related? And so I was thinking they were having an affair. That was really all I was thinking. But most of my notes for part one are just utter confusion about Andrew. And so looking back now, I'm thinking I'm pretty dumb to not have picked that up because I'm saying things like, the husband is ridiculous. Why not tell Millie she's insane? Why would he talk to her about infertility? I hate Andrew. Andrew sucks. Give the girl money and get her out of there. And so reading that now, I'm like, well, okay, duh, of like all of these things. There were so many signs for me to know that he was also being manipulative and manipulated by Nina. But I think I'm so used to reading shit books for this podcast that I didn't really expect a plot twist. I thought that was just the way it was gonna go. What did you think?

Laura 33:08

I truly shocked myself by calling almost every single thing that happened in this book. Even from the very start, where she's like, I wonder how Nina would feel if she knew I'd spent the last years in prison. I think she knows. I think she's done a background check on you because you keep thinking about it so much. You keep thinking, how could she not do a background check on me? And then she says something like, If only they knew what I did. And I was like, Oh, murder must be murder. Because I don't think if she was wrongfully convicted or something like that, she'd just say it. So it has to be something that's like the worst of the worst. And then I've just felt like the whole time when Nina was being crazy, I was like internally screaming, believe women, I support women's wrongs. Andrew was coming on way too hot. He was being so like smarmy and well, not even smarmy, but it was kind of giving me like the dad from Juno sort of vibes. Like, why is he talking to her so much? Why is he there? Just leave her alone. She's there to do a job. You don't need to be putting your feelings on her. And so, even down to things like God, it's so dumb. Even down to things like the cop being his ex-wife's dad or something. I didn't call that exactly, but I was like, well, she'll come back at some point. Like, she's coming back. Enzo's gonna hook up with someone. Nina is telling the truth in some way. I shocked myself by seeing through it because I almost never do.

Bridget 34:41

That's great. Good job.

Laura 34:42

Even like when she first goes into the room and she's like, Oh my god, I had a feeling something really bad had happened in this room. Danger, danger. Oh my god, it locks from the outside. Oh well, I'll take this job.

Bridget 34:54

Are you dumb? Yes. When I read the part where she saw the blue bucket in the cupboard, I was like, oh, in the back of my mind, there is always a thought occurring about Joseph Fritzel, who was the Austrian man who kept his daughter captive for 24 years in like his basement that he'd converted into sort of like a torture chamber, and he was like sexually assaulting her, and she had seven children from him. And I think that she escaped, or you know, he was found out in the mid-2000s when I was in high school. And I think at that time it was on the news a lot, and I was watching the news a lot, and so I remember around that time my family and I moved into a house that had this creepy little downstairs bathroom, and I was just like, oh, it's the Fritzel bathroom. And so anytime there's like a creepy bathroom or like a bucket in a cupboard, I think about Joseph Fritzel. And so immediately my mind went to that, and I was like, Oh, they kind of keep the daughter in the in the attic or something, but at no point did I make a connection between her being in the attic or anything else. So I was Fritzl blindsided by Fritzl.

Laura 36:10

I mean, it's like a tenuous connection, but I do think it's a pretty good indicator of where this story ended up. So you're not far off the mark.

Bridget 36:17

That's true. I just didn't have those uh those two neurons connecting enough.

Laura 36:21

Before we move on to another character, I mean, I know I've talked at length about the dialogue and the writing and how I'm finding it dumb, but I just want to point out that two of the chapters ended with, it's none of my business. Isn't that dumb? And I just found like the writing was so staccato and repetitive.

Bridget 36:43

A lot of simple sentences.

Laura 36:44

Yeah, that it often pulled me out of it because I was like, didn't you just say that? And in this case, she did say it just a couple chapters earlier. But like the end of chapter seven is it's obvious that Andrew is still crazy about Nina, but something has changed. I can sense it. Nina isn't the person she used to be, but it doesn't matter. It's none of my business. One of those things on their own is fine. We get it. So at the start of the episode, you were saying that one of the reasons you tend to not partake in thrillers is that you can't stand the sort of second-hand embarrassment that comes with that. And my heart goes out to you in this respect because I feel like there was a lot of that in this book. One that made me cringe so hard was on page 173 after hearing a conversation between Nina and Andrew. He's like, I'm I want a divorce, I'm leaving you, and Nina's crying and stuff. Millie comes out into the kitchen and is like, Are you guys okay?

Bridget 37:42

And then asks if she needs help packing.

Laura 37:46

Yes. After he was like, I'm leaving you for her. She is so delusional.

Bridget 37:53

She is delusional, and that was one of the parts that I was cringing at. Another one was when they were about to go on their date to the theater, and I just thought, why are you doing this to yourself? You know it's only gonna end badly.

Laura 38:08

She was so willfully stupid. Like when she looked through her phone for the first time and was like, oh, there's a tracking app in here. What do you mean you didn't look through your phone? There was a point on page, like this is only a 300 and something page book. On page 166, she says, I can't push away the feeling that I made a terrible mistake crossing Nina Winchester.

Bridget 38:33

Babe, we know. Yes. That's the premise of the book up until this point. You've known that since the first time she was a little bit insane. When she lied or forgot that she told you something or accused you of forgetting things, and like you've known from the very beginning that this is not a person that you want to cross because she's apparently certifiably insane.

Laura 38:56

Well, actually, that reminds me, because they're making Millie feel like she was the one that was forgetting things and that kind of thing. I liked that element, and it kind of got me thinking, oh okay, so maybe Millie is the crazy one. Maybe Millie was in prison for some sort of reason, and especially when she started saying things like, I could give him a baby, and like I love him, despite having one conversation. I was sort of thinking, oh, okay, maybe she's the problem. When she starts trying to force herself onto Enzo.

Bridget 39:27

Oh, that I yeah, that was so embarrassing. Another thing that was really embarrassing with her in Enzo was when she just couldn't get through her thick head that Spanish is different to Italian. And I mean, yeah, sure, you've been in prison for 10 years, but you're telling me there's not one single Spanish person you've ever had a conversation with, or you've never watched a movie, or you've never had your eyes open in real life. You don't know that how to say thank you in Spanish is different to how you say thank you in Italian. Are you for real? That was and it took her like multiple tries to get single words correct.

Laura 40:02

Yeah. Oh. And another thing she did to Enzo that I thought was quite weird was when he comes in the house after helping her with the package, she said something like, I half filled a glass with water and gave it to him. I would be so pissed off if someone just gave me half a glass of water.

Bridget 40:19

I thought that too. I thought he's hot, he's thirsty. He's probably really hot. He's been outside half stingy. It's free.

Laura 40:26

Yeah. And so I was like, is he gonna be like, Can I have more water? And she'll be like, beg. Only if you sleep with me. I was really grasping for anything at this point. But speaking of crazy, what a disrespectful segue. Should we talk about Nina?

Bridget 40:43

Yes, let's talk about Nina from the very start, even before I knew that she was the real victim in this situation, obsessed with her. Her first full day of work at the house when she woke up and realized that Nina just trashes the place and puts like towels on the floor and you know, pulls shit out of the fridge. I wrote in my notes, obsessed with Nina's morning routine. Like, what?

Laura 41:09

What an icon. Nina was one of my probably my favorite part of the book. I think she was what kept me going throughout it. It was kind of like rage bait, her saying, I told you, like, I told you this, and you got it wrong, and you can't get good help, but all of that kind of stuff kept me just fired up enough to want to keep reading.

Bridget 41:30

I think I would have liked to have seen a little bit more of those little mind games that Nina was playing. I especially loved it when the PTA women were there. I loved that switch up of her character, and I would have liked to see a more like conscious Nina, like after they'd left, she would have flipped back into regular Nina. But I mean, I don't have too many complaints about Nina as a character. The only thing that I would say is I think that the ending was very dumb. I think there's no way she would have left Cecilia with Enzo to go and rescue Millie and then say to Millie, you go, I'll take the blame for this. Why would she suffer for eight years because she was worried about Cecilia? And then take the blame for some girl she doesn't even know, doesn't care about. It doesn't make any sense to me. I mean, while we're on the topic of the ending, I also thought that the ending was quite cheap where Nina sets Millie up to become sort of a hitman. I thought that was stupid.

Laura 42:28

Um But the sequels. Yeah.

Bridget 42:31

Other than that, Nina, obsessed. What did you think?

Laura 42:34

Yeah, I I feel basically the same. I really think like we lost grip on reality when her character was just like, he, he, um, everything I fought for for eight years has been flipped over the space of a conversation with Enzo because for some reason I want to take the blame for this lady who hours ago I was fully prepared to let die. It was actually so funny when Enzo was like, we have to go back and save her. And Nina was like, but she's a criminal. And so I had to be like, rein it in, babe. She doesn't deserve to die. So two-dimensional. And then at the end, where it's implied that Enzo and Millie are together after all. What? It actually made no sense. I basically blocked out that. Like, I think it was sort of like the cops started talking, being like, I'm prepared to brush this under the rug. And then I was like, all right, it's all downhill for here. Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb. And yeah, it delivered on that. Yes. I do have a question I want to ask you about Nina. And that is that there were multiple references to an odor or a stench or a perfume.

Bridget 43:53

Did you have smell in mind? Not particularly, but I'm not really that good at identifying scents or perfumes or anything. But I do remember when I worked in this cafe that was like the bane of my existence. And it was within a department store. And the clientele we would get was a very particular kind of wealthy older lady. That kind of vibe. And so we would often get a very uh like a grenade of perfume just coming at us. And that's what I sort of imagined. And we were like, quick, clear the window seat, get it free. Because they would always complain that the window seat wasn't empty, or you know, there was a teacup on there because the person had just left and we weren't fast enough to clear it. So it's like a triggering smell for me. Get the coffee on and move that teacup.

Laura 44:40

For me, it's like that baccarel rouge and any kind of dupe scent. So I don't really know what it is in that scent, but you would know the smell of it because every man and their dog has a similar perfume. It's in like some of the chemist warehouse, like Ariana Grande perfumes. Oh, I love the Ariana Grande. It's one of the sort of like bass notes. And to me, it's like really whiffy, like fermented, rotting fruit kind of smell. That's how it comes to me. I've like searched like Baccar Rouge stinks on TikTok, like to try and find like-minded individuals. I hate it so much. And so to me, it's like that. It's such a like intense, kind of clawing smell, so similar to what you're describing.

Bridget 45:25

Kind of like an air freshener sort of smell, or not really?

Laura 45:27

Kind of smells like Yakolt. Oh, to me. Maybe this is how I find out I have a brain tumor.

Bridget 45:37

Any thoughts on Andrew? I think part two really saved the character of Andrew for me because the whole of part one, I was thinking, you're a loser. Who is this absolute loser? What are you doing? Like, why are you talking about your fertility issues to this girl? You don't know her. Um, when they were watching Family Feud, that was so boring. But I would say that even with part two, it wasn't really that interesting. He wasn't that interesting of a character to me. I was pretty horrified with the things he was doing. Like I was reading it and it was like quite a fast read, and I like my mouth was constantly just being like, oh my god. But I don't know. I didn't really care too much about him. What did you think about Andrew?

Laura 46:18

Um, I guess my overwhelming feeling was like, why? And I know it's implied like his mum did it to him too, or his mum was like abusing him in a similar way. I was that your impression. Yeah, I think so. I think that's another thing that could have been Oh, I mean, we got nothing. So I would have liked to know a little bit more why. Like, not that it really matters in the end, because I think, you know, if you're gonna be making someone pull hairs out of their head and like do these stupid things, these punishments, as he calls them, like there's not much you can do that bases those decisions in logic. But yeah, I enjoyed those parts.

Bridget 46:58

I think they could have been juicier. Like if you're reading a thriller, I think you're the kind of person that wants something that you like you want to be thrilled by something and you want something like gross or gory or evil to happen. And I think the pace at that point in the book was so fast, like time just flew. Like she was like, at one point, six months went by without anything happening. And I thought, okay, this like you are literally being tortured right now, and we're not even touching on it for more than a sentence or two. I think it would have made it a lot more interesting, that part of the book, if we had a little bit more into the maybe like the effects or I don't know.

Laura 47:38

Yeah, I agree with you. Some things like pulling the hair out. I was kind of like, that's not that many strands, but I guess if he's obsessive about the root, then I guess that sucks. But other ones like the books, I was kind of gonna test it, but I just kept thinking this can't be that hard.

Bridget 47:55

I thought the same thing. But maybe we just don't have big enough books.

Laura 48:00

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I've seen a phone book before and they're just not that big. Maybe we should Google New York phone book or something. Yeah. It's not strictly related to this book, and I think it could be somewhat of a hangover from having recently read The Spanish Love Deception. But something that always, always really gets me bent out of shape is the word freaking. I don't know if it's a case of just like how it's written. Seeing it written on paper makes it more annoying than having it said or saying it. But Millie kept saying freaking. At some point she said, like he's in his mother freaking box of shorts or something. And it got me thinking, like, what is the Gen Z or like modern day equivalent of freaking? Because there's gotta be something better we can use. Like you wouldn't say, Oh, he's in his fucking box of shorts. That's too far. But like what's the like we can't just keep letting people say freaking, I've had enough. I was thinking maybe actual, like literally, he's in shorts. He's in his literal box of shorts.

Bridget 49:07

Yeah, we could go like full moss from the IT crowd and say he's in his flipping box of shorts. He's in his literal box of shorts, he's in his actual box of shorts. Maybe you'd add in like a no-cap on the end. What the actual frickin' crap. He's in his box of shorts.

Laura 49:27

Okay, why the frick?

Bridget 49:30

Skippity toilet box of shorts. I've had enough. Yeah, we've had a lot of books that are heavy on the freaking. I think it's just a conversational style that I don't jive with. It's like the embodiment of he's right behind me, isn't he? Like that sort of vibe, that sort of case, and like the widower we're widowerwe right behind me, isn't he? I would like to talk about the difficulty that I had trying to find an ebook or an audiobook copy of this. So, as we spoke about in our January bonus chapter episode where we did our talk lit with us episode, I don't like supporting Amazon, so I don't have an audible subscription. If I can't get something on Libby, then normally I will go to Libro and I will try to buy a credit there and use a credit to support independent bookstores. On Libby, I have four library cards, one for my real library and three for fake ones in the United States. But I tried my best to get my hands on a copy of the audiobook for the housemaid. I placed a hold on the 16th of January and I started at 1,274th in line. So today, quite a few weeks later, I am now 1,207th in line. So I've only moved up about 70 places. There's 15 copies in use. There's about 1,300 people waiting in total and 90 people waiting per copy. And the estimated wait time for me is several months.

Laura 51:05

Which that's incredible.

Bridget 51:08

Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen something longer than this. Although when I tried to get a copy of Atomic Habits, there was a similar kind of wait time. Then I made my merry way to Libro and I tried to buy the copy on Libro, not available. So then I tried to go onto a few other things, not available. So I think what's happened here, it is an Amazon exclusive audiobook.

Laura 51:34

Oh, so much shit.

Bridget 51:36

Which is so frustrating because I'm really scared for a world in which we can only get access to media through a company that is controlled by one man. And it just makes me really sad. So, did you manage to get a copy of an audiobook?

Laura 51:53

No, I didn't. I couldn't find it anywhere. Um, I don't have an audible account. And I'd already bought the book, so I was kind of like, well, I've spent 14 of my hard-earned dollars on this thing. So once I realized I was flying through it, I was kind of like, ha ha, I don't need it. So just one medium this time round. All good things must come to an end, and also all bad things. So with that in mind, Bridget, would you care to give me your least favorite character? Least favourite. Oh, do we normally start with favorite? I don't know. I can't remember.

Bridget 52:26

Let's go least favourite, switch it up. My least favourite character was, I mean, Millie. She was the one that we heard the most from and somehow also the least from. Boring.

Laura 52:37

How about you? I honestly think possibly the police officer.

Bridget 52:41

Oh yeah, he was pretty useless.

Laura 52:42

He was just sitting on this knowledge, just waiting for the right time, but doing absolutely nothing to protect any of the victims or get anybody else on board.

Bridget 52:52

Yeah, if you're aware of corruption but you do nothing about it, then you're a part of the problem. Exactly.

Laura 52:58

I don't think your daughter would be too happy with that, sir. What about your most favourite?

Bridget 53:02

My most favourite was definitely Nina. But I sort of liked her better when I didn't know that she was putting it on. I liked it when she was just chucking wet towels around.

Laura 53:11

Yeah. How about you? Nina's also my favourite. Just fling your tampons around and get silly. I loved her. She was so good. She was disgusting.

Bridget 53:21

I'm a bit confused about this one, so I want you to go first. Are you going to rate The Housemaid by Frieda McFadden lit or shit?

Laura 53:28

Oh, I don't know. I really don't know. Because I think basically echoing what I said at the start of the episode, did I think it was written well? No. Did I like the characters? No. Was I hooked against all odds? Yes. But at the same time, if I could go back in time and with the knowledge I have now, have the choice of picking up another book to read, like I would pick up something else.

Bridget 53:58

Yeah, it's not added anything to my life. I'm not gonna read in any of the sequels. I'm not gonna watch the movie. I probably won't think about it after this.

Laura 54:07

I feel the same, but I do think I'm gonna rate it slightly lit. Like a matchstick-sized level of lit.

Bridget 54:15

Yeah, I I am too. I I don't think I can rate it shit because it was so easy to read. I flew through the end especially.

Laura 54:23

I think it would be a good book to help you get out of a rut, because it certainly lifted my spirits after reading The Spanish Love Deception.

Bridget 54:32

I was actually thinking about our episode when we talked about our reading slumps, and I can't remember if it was you or if it was me that said a good strategy is to read something that's a bit like reality television, like something a bit trashy, something short, something that gets you interested. And I think this fits that perfectly because while I didn't necessarily like this book, I wanted to finish it. So I think I think for that reason alone, it sort of hooked me. I have to rate it lit.

Laura 55:01

It's been so hard to talk about this book. Yeah, I just feel like if you rated this book five stars, good for you. I don't know really quite how you got there, but in the words of in the words of Millie, it's none of my business.

Bridget 55:18

It's time for us to finish our shifts and head on up to the attic for the night. So if you have enjoyed this episode, please give us a rating on whichever podcast platform you use. Have your say on what we read next by keeping an eye on the link in our show notes and on our socials. Make sure you subscribe to the show, and if you want to be on the same page as us, follow us at talklit.get on Instagram and TikTok.