Title: THE MAID
Author: Nita Prose
Publisher: Harper Collins Australia
Read: December 2021
Expected publication: 20 January 2022
My Rating: 🌟🌟1/2
Book Description:
Molly the maid is all alone in the
world. A nobody. She’s used to being invisible in her job at the Regency Grand
Hotel, plumping pillows and wiping away the grime, dust and secrets of the
guests passing through. She’s just a maid – why should anyone take notice?
But Molly is thrown into the spotlight when she discovers an infamous guest, Mr
Black, very dead in his bed. This isn’t a mess that can be easily cleaned up.
And as Molly becomes embroiled in the hunt for the truth, following the clues
whispering in the hallways of the Regency Grand, she discovers a power she
never knew was there. She’s just a maid – but what can she see that others
overlook?
What attracted me to this book:
I read some fantastic reviews about
Nita Prose’s debut novel THE MAID, so of course I couldn’t resist, even though
“cozies” are not usually a genre I read very often.
My musings:
Molly Gray is a socially awkward
twenty-five year old woman who has been living with her grandmother until she
passed away from cancer a few months ago. She is still feeling her absence and misses
her guidance dearly, and barely makes ends meet as a maid at The Grand Regency
Hotel, a job Molly loves because she feels a lot of satisfaction in creating
order. One day she finds a dead guest in
one of the rooms she regularly cleans, and her life is turned upside down.
THE MAID was a light, borderline humorous
read with some deeper themes of loss, grief, friendship and finding your way in
the world. Molly was a quirky if slightly naive character, and I kept picturing
her as a kind of female Forrest Gump – kind-hearted and honest but always
slightly behind the eight ball. Unfortunately
I never quite connected to Molly as much as most readers whose glowing five
star reviews can be found everywhere on Goodreads and social media.
Unpopular opinion: I found Molly to
be an inconsistent character, totally naive one moment and quite streetsmart
the next. I also found the plot quite predictable and not very original, but
perhaps that is the characteristic of a cozy mystery and I am simply not the
right reader for the genre. I much preferred the snarky honesty of Gail
Honeyman’s Eleanor Oliphant, the original protagonist who seems to have sparked
an avalanche of books with neurodivergent characters. All side characters felt
like wooden caricatures to me, their relationship to Molly only ever skimming
the surface without real background or depth. If I am totally honest, I struggled
to finish the book because I did not feel invested in any of the characters.
However, I think that this book would make a perfect screenplay / TV series!
Summary:
All in all, THE MAID has received high praise by
countless readers on social media and will appeal to people who appreciate a gentler,
less snarky version of Eleanor Oliphant. Personally, I found it a bit slow and predictable,
and wanted more character development, even though it ticked the boxes for a
light, slightly humorous read.
Thank
you to Netgalley and Harper Collins Australia for the free electronic copy of
this novel and for giving me the opportunity to provide an honest review.
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