The Housemaid Book Review: Is It Worth Reading?

The short verdict: Yes, The Housemaid is worth reading if you want a fast, twisty thriller you can finish in a weekend. It isn't beautifully written and the characters are thin, but the plot is built to keep you turning pages, and it does that very well.

It's also a strong pick if you "don't read anymore." More on that below.

This review is spoiler-free until the clearly marked spoiler section near the end.

Strengths and weaknesses at a glance

What works

Short chapters that almost always end on a hook
A twist that changes how you see the first half of the book
Plain, easy prose that never slows you down
A tight setting: one house, a few people, a locked door

What doesn't

The writing is functional, not memorable
Most characters are types more than people
Some dark material (abuse and violence) that won't suit everyone
Once the twist lands, the last stretch trades tension for payback

What it's about (no spoilers)

Millie Calloway is out of options. She has a criminal record, no job, and she's been living in her car. So when Nina Winchester, a rich woman on Long Island, offers her a live-in job cleaning the family's huge house, Millie takes it on the spot.

The house is beautiful. Nina is not easy. Her moods swing wildly, and the rest of the household, her husband Andrew and their daughter Cecelia, seem to be walking on eggshells. Millie's room is a tiny attic space. The door locks from the outside.

That's the setup. Almost everything that makes the book fun comes after it, so we'll stop there.

Why it's so hard to put down

The Housemaid is a machine for turning pages. The chapters are short, the sentences are simple, and something is always slightly wrong. You finish one chapter and the next one is only a few pages long, so you read that too. That's the whole trick, and it works.

The bigger reason is the structure. For a long stretch you only see the house through Millie's eyes, and you believe what she believes. Then the book shifts, and a lot of what you thought you understood flips. The clues were there. You just read them the way Millie did.

It's clearly working on a lot of people. The Housemaid came out in 2022, first as an ebook from a small digital publisher, then in paperback from Grand Central Publishing. It hit #1 on The New York Times fiction bestseller list in January 2026, almost four years after it came out and a few weeks after the movie adaptation opened in US theaters. On Goodreads it has an average of 4.26 stars from close to four million ratings.

The honest weaknesses

Nobody reads The Housemaid for the sentences. The prose does its job and nothing more. You won't underline anything. A Yale Daily News columnist who loved the series still wrote that McFadden's prose "isn't particularly captivating or poetic," and that's fair.

The characters are thin, too. The same columnist said they mostly serve "as vessels to propel the narrative forward." If you need to feel something real about the people in a book, this one may leave you cold.

It also gets dark. The book deals with domestic abuse, confinement and cruelty, and the second half centers on all three.

Finally, the ending. After the big turn, the book stops being a guessing game and becomes more of a revenge story. If you came for payback, that's satisfying. If you came for the guessing, the slow, uneasy first half is the better part of the book.

Who should read it, and who should skip it

Read it if:

You're in a reading slump and want something you'll actually finish
You like Gone Girl-style twists and unreliable narrators
You've seen the movie and want to know what they changed
You want a book that feels like bingeing a TV show

Skip it if:

You read for beautiful writing or deep characters
Stories about domestic abuse are hard for you right now
You've already read a lot of domestic thrillers and guess twists early

Why it's a great book for people who "don't read"

If you haven't finished a book in a while, the problem usually isn't that you can't read. It's that the first book you pick up feels like homework. The Housemaid never does. It's 336 pages in paperback, but short chapters and plain prose keep it moving.

That same Yale Daily News columnist said thrillers are her go-to when she's in a reading slump, and that she ended up "reading them both in just a few hours," meaning the first two Housemaid books. As she put it, "Thrillers are not for deep reflection, but for enjoyment and entertainment."

That's the point. Finishing one book you enjoyed is how you start reading again. If that's you, our guide on how to get back into reading has more ways to make it stick.

Spoiler section: the twist and the book vs the movie

Stop here if you haven't read the book or seen the movie.

The twist

Nina isn't the danger. Andrew is. He's been abusing Nina for years, locking her in the same attic room as "punishment" and having her labeled unstable so no one would believe her. Nina hired Millie on purpose. She read about Millie's record, including the prison time she served as a teenager for killing a boy who attacked her friend, and she bet that Millie could do what Nina couldn't: stop Andrew for good. Nina's cruelty toward Millie was part of the plan, to push Andrew toward Millie so Nina could get out.

Once Andrew locks Millie in the attic, the tables turn. Millie traps him in the room instead, and the book ends with Andrew dead, a detective who quietly decides not to dig too hard, and Millie interviewing for a new job with a woman who has a bruise on her arm.

Does the movie follow the book?

Mostly, yes. The 2025 film, directed by Paul Feig and starring Sydney Sweeney as Millie and Amanda Seyfried as Nina, keeps the setup, the twist, and the final scene with a new employer. It does change some of how things play out, including these two:

How Andrew dies. In the book, Millie keeps Andrew locked in the attic and he dies there. In the movie, there's a fight, and Millie pushes Andrew down the stairs.
The detective. In the book, the investigator who closes the case is a man whose daughter was once engaged to Andrew. In the movie, it's a policewoman whose sister was.

Our take: if you haven't done either yet, read the book first. The twist depends on seeing everything through Millie's eyes, and a first-person book can keep you there longer than a camera can.

Should you read The Housemaid series in order?

Yes. There are three novels in the main series, plus a novella:

The Housemaid (2022)
The Housemaid's Secret (2023)
The Housemaid Is Watching (2024)

The novella, The Housemaid's Wedding, came out in November 2024.

The Yale Daily News columnist said The Housemaid's Secret could work as a standalone, but still recommended reading the first book to get all the connections. Start at the beginning.

FAQ

Is The Housemaid worth reading? Yes, if you want a fast, twisty thriller. Skip it if you read mainly for great writing or deep characters.

Is The Housemaid an easy read? Very. The chapters are short and the language is simple. The Yale Daily News columnist read the first two books in just a few hours.

Is The Housemaid scary? It's tense and dark rather than scary. There's nothing supernatural, but it includes domestic abuse and some disturbing violence.

What age is The Housemaid appropriate for? The book has no official age rating. It includes abuse, sex and violence, so it's best for older teens and adults. For comparison, the movie is rated R in the US and 15 in the UK.

Does the movie follow the book? It keeps the setup, the main twist and the ending scene, but changes how Andrew dies and several of the scenes along the way.

Do I need to read The Housemaid before The Housemaid's Secret? It's strongly recommended. The second book brings back characters from the first.

The Housemaid proves something useful: you don't need willpower to read, you need a book that pulls you forward. Read First helps with the other half, reading before you scroll.