CANR
WORK TITLE: The Woman in Cabin 10
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1977
WEBSITE: http://www.ruthware.com/
CITY: London
STATE:
COUNTRY: United Kingdom
NATIONALITY: British
LAST VOLUME: CA 389
Ruth Ware’s ‘The Woman in Cabin 10’ Adaptation in the Works at CBS Films
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1977, in Sussex, England; married; husband’s name Ian; children: two sons.
EDUCATION:Graduate of Manchester University.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and novelist. Previously worked as a waitress, bookseller, teacher of English as a foreign language, and a book publicist.
WRITINGS
The Woman in Cabin 10 has been optioned by CBS Films.
SIDELIGHTS
Ruth Ware grew up on the south coast of England in Sussex. Following her graduation from college, Ware spent time living in Paris, France, before moving back to England. Her debut novel for adults, In a Dark, Dark Wood, is a psychological thriller revolving around a group of women friends who meet in a remote English country house to hold a bachelorette party prior to one of the friend’s wedding.
In an interview with NPR: National Public Radio Website contributor David Greene, Ware said the inspiration for the novel came when a friend pointed out that “she’d never read a thriller set at a hen party.” Ware went on to note that her friend’s observation made her think that she had never read such a thriller either. In addition, Ware pointed out to Greene: “It’s the perfect setting. You know, you have a group of quite disparate people thrown together. Emotions are running high. You’re cooped up in a strange environment that you can’t get away from. It just seemed like the perfect recipe for both a novel and disaster.”
In a Dark, Dark Wood is narrated by Leonora “Nora” Shaw, a twenty-something crime writer who leads a rather mundane and solitary life. Nora tells the story in a series of flashbacks after she wakes up in a hospital unable to remember how she got there and with a severe gash on her forehead. Nora recounts how one day she received an invitation to a bachelorette party. The invitation is from a former friend named Clare Cavendish, who is soon to be married. Nora is surprised by the invitation because she has not seen or talked to Clare for ten years. Nevertheless, Nora accepts the invitation because she is both curious about her old high school friend. Clare also once proved to be a valuable friend during a trying time when Nora’s high-school sweetheart broke up with her.
Nora soon joins the bachelorette group, which consists of six people who are either complete strangers to each or have become relative strangers over the years. In an interview for the Aunt Agatha’s Web site, Ware noted: “The characters were sort of secondary in that sense—they grew outward from me wanting a disparate group of people shoved together somewhat against their will. They’re also partly each an archetype of women I’ve met at bachelorette parties over the years.” These archetypes, explained Ware, range from the women who wished they were not at the gathering at all to the woman who is clearly out of place because of her complete difference from the other women. As for the party’s hostess, Clare, she reflects the typical bride-to-be who is stressed about the friends’ meeting and her upcoming wedding.
It does not take long for Nora to understand that Clare is an egomaniac. Furthermore, Clare surprises Nora by announcing that the man she is to marry is none other than Nora’s ex-boyfriend, James. Eventually, something goes wrong at the gathering, but Nora cannot remember exactly what until she starts mining her memory to recall the past events. Most troublesome to Nora is that she suspects she may have done something terrible.
“With its clever plot and a room of suspects, In a Dark, Dark Wood reads like an ode to Agatha Christie and Alfred Hitchcock,” wrote BookPage Online contributor Anna Lauren Levy, who also noted: “Fast paced chapters are laced with literary allegories.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor remarked that the mystery’s reveal was relatively predictable. Nevertheless, the Kirkus Reviews contributor also wrote: Ware sets “a truly spooky scene” and “creates a unique setting for the psychological scares.”
The Woman in Cabin 10 is also a mystery-thriller. It features travel writer Lo Blackstock, who sets out on a luxury cruise after surviving a devastating home invasion that has caused her severe anxiety. She overhears a commotion in the cabin next to hers—but when she tries to bring it to the attention of the crew, they deny that anyone occupies that cabin. “With few potential suspects and little support from the others on board,” stated Mary Todd Chesnut, writing in Library Journal, “Lo continues digging for answers.” “The isolated setting and social alienation,” opined Christine Tran in Booklist, “… combine with Los deteriorating mental state to generate a dark, desperate tension.”
The Lying Game is “about four women who meet at Salten House, a second-rate boarding school on the south coast of England,” Ware explained in a Powells interview. “The title comes from a game the girls played at school, competing to tell lies to gullible friends, strangers, classmates, and teachers. They were expelled in their final year at school, and since then have scattered, doing their best to forget the events of that year, while still being held together by their pull. When something washes up on a local beach, however, three of the women get a text from the fourth in their clique, Kate.” The discovery of human remains, however, have triggered their old social clique. “Ware masterfully harnesses the millhouse’s decrepit menace,” wrote Booklist reviewer Christine Tran, “to create a slow-rising sense of foreboding, darkening [the protagonist] Isa’s recollections.” “Ware’s third outing is just as full of psychological suspense as her earlier books,” declared a Kirkus Reviews contributor, “but there is a quietness about this one … that elevates it above her others.” The author “builds up a rock-solid cast of intriguing characters,” said a Publishers Weekly reviewer, “and spins a mystery that will keep readers turning pages.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, July 1, 2015, Joanne Wilkinson, review of In a Dark, Dark Wood, p. 37; July 1, 2016, Christine Tran, review of The Woman in Cabin 10, p. 37; June, 2017, Christine Tran, review of The Lying Game, p. 60.
Kirkus Reviews, June 15, 2015, review of In a Dark, Dark Wood; May 15, 2016, review of The Woman in Cabin 10; May 15, 2017, review of The Lying Game.
Library Journal, June 15, 2016, Mary Todd Chesnut, review of The Woman in Cabin 10, p. 71.
Publishers Weekly, May 9, 2016, review of The Woman in Cabin 10, p. 50; May 22, 2017, review of The Lying Game, p. 73.
Variety, March 16, 2017, Dave McNary, “Ruth Ware’s ‘The Woman in Cabin 10’ Adaptation in the Works at CBS Films.”
ONLINE
Aunt Agatha’s, http://auntagathas.com/ (July 18, 2015), “Author Interview: Ruth Ware.”
BookPage Online, https://bookpage.com/ (August 4, 2015), Anna Lauren Levy, review of In a Dark, Dark Wood.
Entertainment Weekly Online, http://www.ew.com/ (July 3, 2015), review of In a Dark, Dark Wood.
Irish Times Online, http://www.irishtimes.com/ (October 24, 2015), Sarah Gilmartin, review of In a Dark, Dark Wood.
NPR: National Public Radio Website, http://www.npr.org/ (August 10, 2015), David Greene, “‘Scream’ Meets Agatha Christie in A Dark, Dark Wood,” author interview.
Powells, http://www.powells.com/ (July 21, 2017), “Powell’s Q&A: Ruth Ware, Author of ‘The Lying Game.'”
Ruth Ware Website, http://www.ruthware.com (September 18, 2017), author profile.*
Ruth Ware grew up in Sussex, on the south coast of England. After graduating from Manchester University she moved to Paris, before settling in North London. She has worked as a waitress, a bookseller, a teacher of English as a foreign language and a press officer, and is the internationally bestselling author of In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, and the forthcoming The Lying Game (July 2017). She is married with two small children. Visit her at RuthWare.com or follow her on Twitter @RuthWareWriter.
Powell's Q&A: Ruth Ware, Author of 'The Lying Game'
by Ruth Ware, July 21, 2017 9:27 AM
Describe your latest book.
The book I've just finished writing is The Lying Game, which is due out this month. It's about four women who meet at Salten House, a second-rate boarding school on the south coast of England. The title comes from a game the girls played at school, competing to tell lies to gullible friends, strangers, classmates, and teachers. They were expelled in their final year at school, and since then have scattered, doing their best to forget the events of that year, while still being held together by their pull.
When something washes up on a local beach, however, three of the women get a text from the fourth in their clique, Kate, the only one of them still living down near the school. It says simply, "I need you." And so they drop everything — lives, children, careers — and return to Salten, where it seems as if 17 years of secrets and lies have finally caught up with them.
It was huge fun to write, and enabled me to live out my childhood fantasy of attending boarding school in fine, dark style!
What was your favorite book as a child?
I had too many favorites to narrow it down, but the first world that I can remember completely falling in love with was the Green Knowe series by Lucy M. Boston. It's about a little boy who goes to stay with his grandmother in her strange, rambling old house, Green Knowe, but it's really a love letter to the house itself, which was based on Boston's own home. It probably contributed to my fascination with place and setting.
When did you know you were a writer?
Since I could write. I started scribbling stories pretty much as soon as I could string a sentence together — and even before that, I was telling my sister long sagas about the secret lives of our teddy bears and dolls. The stories just got longer and longer until somehow they turned into books.
What does your writing workspace look like?
I write in a little room at the back of our house. It has a beautiful view of the Sussex Downs, but my desk faces a blank wall very deliberately — I think for me, it's important that the views in my head are more interesting than the real-life view.
What do you care about more than most people around you?
I think this is probably something most writers share, but I definitely care more about language and a well-formed sentence than many people I know. I find it genuinely upsetting when I read bad prose, and poor use of language in newspaper articles makes me so irritated, I find it hard to concentrate on the actual piece. I don't mean typos — anyone can do that. But things like talking about a “breech in protocol” or “the need to be discrete with our intelligence” in a document published by professionals makes me annoyed out of all proportion. It's not something I particularly like about myself — I don't actually think these things are more important than the subject matter of the article, and goodness knows, I'm sure I have my fair share of errors in my own work. But it's something I can't stop myself from noticing and gritting my teeth about.
Tell us something you're embarrassed to admit.
I played with Barbies until I was well into my teens. Actually sod that, I was embarrassed to admit it at the time. Now I think it probably made me a writer! They led very exciting Jackie Collins-type lives.
Name a guilty pleasure you partake in regularly.
I don't really believe in guilty pleasures. I think if it's making you happy and it's not hurting you or anyone else, then you shouldn't feel bad about it. That said, my mum was very good at making small things (a chocolate biscuit, a scarf) into a treat, and as I got older I came to realize that part of that was not having them too regularly. We only had ice cream on Wednesdays, for example — because it was the day furthest from the weekend when you needed a pick-me-up. So it was something we really looked forward to. Maybe for that reason, I always feel a bit sneaky when I pinch a chocolate biscuit from the tin after my kids have gone to bed. When I go up to kiss them goodnight, I have to hold my breath or they smell the chocolate!
Share a Top Five book list of your choice.
Here are my top five thrillers and mysteries set in schools and colleges. They're awesome settings for a mystery, both familiar and strange, and enclosed to just the right degree. It's surprising more novels aren't set in schools, I think.
Miss Pym Disposes by Josephine Tey
I have written before about my love for Josephine Tey. One of the things I like about her is how very different all her novels are. This one is set in a women's physical education college, and Tey makes great play of the dictum, mens sana in corpore sano. The healthy body is certainly there — but what of the healthy minds? Both the strength and the weakness of the novel is the fact that although we know it's a murder mystery, the actual murder doesn't occur until a long way through the book, which slows the pace a little; but at the same time, by the time it comes about, we have learned to care for and know, intimately, many of the people in this little world, and the idea that any of them could be either killer or victim is doubly shocking.
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
No secret either of my adoration of this novel. It's not a whodunit, for we know right from the outset who is killed and the narrator's participation in the event. All the characters are beautifully drawn, but the true star, to my mind, is the love letter to the academic cloisters that Tartt writes alongside the novel. Every brick, every leaf, every acre of Hamden College seems entirely real.
Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers
Gaudy Night is not my favorite Dorothy L. Sayers novel — that would have to be Strong Poison — but it is an enormously satisfying read, not least because after five books worth of persuasion, Harriet finally agrees to marry Peter. However, that is not the only reason to love it, for it is also quietly, determinedly feminist. In many ways, the book is an examination of the long struggle for women to be treated as academic and intellectual equals at Oxford and Cambridge — a struggle Sayers herself was intimately acquainted with — and which is mirrored both in Harriet's own struggle to decide whether to renounce her personal and intellectual freedom in accepting Peter's proposal, and in the crime she eventually comes to investigate.
Murder Most Unladylike by Robin Stevens
The Lying Game came, in part, out of my own fascination with boarding school stories as a child, and my later realization of how different the actual experience of being at boarding school would be vs. the idyllic Enid Blyton version. So for that reason it seems appropriate to include Robin Stevens's gorgeous mystery series aimed at readers aged 8-10, which I would have absolutely gobbled up as a child, and which no doubt would have fed my obsession even further. The books nod towards Blyton and Christie, but also grapple with questions of racism, class, and prejudice with a very modern sensibility.
Notes on a Scandal by Zoë Heller
This last one is a real cheat because — prepare to gasp — I've never read it! I know. Shocking for a writer of psychological thrillers. But when I put a call out on Twitter for recommendations for books set in schools and colleges, it was easily one of the top two or three titles recommended, and it made me remember all the good things I'd heard about it. It is, of course, a little out on a limb in one other way, because it's not set in, but rather around a school (the school in question not being residential). But that's probably semantics, and it's now firmly on my TBR pile.
÷ ÷ ÷
Ruth Ware grew up in Sussex, on the south coast of England. After graduating from Manchester University, she moved to Paris, before settling in North London. She has worked as a waitress, a bookseller, a teacher of English as a foreign language, and a press officer, and is the internationally bestselling author of In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, and most recently, The Lying Game. She is married with two small children.
Hi, I’m Ruth Ware, author of the psychological crime thrillers In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, and The Lying Game. Welcome to my website.
You can click here to find out more about my début thriller In a Dark, Dark Wood, or read an extract online at Dead Good Books or Entertainment Weekly.
You can find out more about my second book, The Woman in Cabin 10, here, or read an extract on Dead Good Books.
My most recent novel is The Lying Game, which came out in July 2017. Find out more here.
Follow me on twitter at @ruthwarewriter.
The Lying Game
Christine Tran
113.19-20 (June 2017): p60.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
* The Lying Game. By Ruth Ware. July 2017.384p. Simon & Schuster/Scout, $26.99 (9781501156007); e-book, $12.99 (9781501156199).
The text "I need you" demolishes the careful distance Isa Wilde has placed between her life as a happily married new mother and the painful, life-changing term she spent at Salten House boarding school. Long-estranged friends Isa, Thea, and Fatima answer Kate Atagon's text by returning to Salten, where Kate still lives in her father's decomposing millhouse. Ambrose Atagon, a well-known artist, was Salten's art teacher and frequent host of the girls' away weekends. He disappeared that final year amid rumors of inappropriate relationships with the girls, leaving the four friends with a disastrous secret. Now a body has been found in the marsh surrounding the house, and the women need to get their stories straight before the inevitable knock at the door. Once they are together, though, the years of distance and memories of their deceptive pastime, the Lying Game, breed suspicion. Ware masterfully harnesses the millhouse's decrepit menace to create a slow-rising sense of foreboding, darkening Isa's recollections of the weeks leading to Ambrose's disappearance. Previous blockbusters (including The Woman in Cabin 10, 2016) guarantee popularity for Ware's latest thriller, and, with arguably her most complex, fully realized characters yet, this one may become her biggest hit yet.--Christine Tran
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Tran, Christine. "The Lying Game." Booklist, June 2017, p. 60. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA498582733&it=r&asid=7db2ae6bea21d087cdba9b445573fb8c. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A498582733
The Lying Game
264.21 (May 22, 2017): p73.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
The Lying Game
Ruth Ware. Scout, $26.99 (384p) ISBN 978-1-5011-5600-7
When Isa Wilde, the narrator of this engrossing psychological thriller from bestseller Ware (The Woman in Cabin 10), gets a text--"I need you"--from old friend Kate Atagon, she knows she must drop everything in London and go to Salten, a town on England's south coast, where the two attended Salten House, a cut-rate boarding school. Doctor Fatima Qureshy and casino dealer Thea West, who also attended Salten House, receive the same message. At school, the four girls perfected what they called the Lying Game, with myriad rules and intricate scoring. An incident that caused the girls to leave before their senior year looms large as Isa, Fatima, and Thea gather at the house where Kate has always lived with her father, Salten's art master. Kate informs the group about a riverbank discovery--a human bone--that could unravel the foursome's 17-year pact of silence. Alternating between the past and present, Ware builds up a rock-solid cast of intriguing characters and spins a mystery that will keep readers turning pages to the end. Agent: Eve White, Eve White Literary Agency (U.K.). (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Lying Game." Publishers Weekly, 22 May 2017, p. 73. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA494099044&it=r&asid=b7342ac48b7ad9c8865c3346ab913324. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A494099044
Ware, Ruth: THE LYING GAME
(May 15, 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Ware, Ruth THE LYING GAME Scout Press/Simon & Schuster (Adult Fiction) $26.99 7, 25 ISBN: 978-1-5011-5600-7
Suspense queen Ware's (The Woman in Cabin 10, 2016, etc.) third novel in three years introduces four women who have been carrying a terrible secret since their boarding school days, a secret that is about to be literally unearthed.Isa Wilde, happy in her life as a new mother, receives a text one morning that simply reads, I need you, and hours later, she boards a train bound for the coastal village of Salten with her infant daughter in tow. She has come at her friend Kate's summons, and soon they are joined by two other women who received the same text, Thea and Fatima. Fifteen years earlier, all four were best friends at Salten House, sneaking off campus on the weekends to spend time with Kate's father, an art teacher, and her handsome, mysterious brother, Luc. Their school days ended in tragedy and scandal, however, and the four haven't been back to Salten since they were expelled. Now, a bone has been found in the marshes, and Kate has called the others back in a panic. They know more about the body than they should, but even they don't know the truth. Ware's third outing is just as full of psychological suspense as her earlier books, but there is a quietness about this one, a slower unraveling of tension and fear, that elevates it above her others. Though there's still a fair dash of drama, it doesn't veer into the realm of melodrama, developing consistently with the characters and with their personalities and pasts. Isa is a sympathetic narrative voice though her obsession with the concerns of new parenthood may put some readers off. Cancel your plans for the weekend when you sit down with this book, because you won't want to move until it's over.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Ware, Ruth: THE LYING GAME." Kirkus Reviews, 15 May 2017. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA491934340&it=r&asid=5079a7b7a5731ab480298ef72c7d80a3. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A491934340
Ware, Ruth. The Woman in Cabin 10
Mary Todd Chesnut
141.11 (June 15, 2016): p71.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
* Ware, Ruth. The Woman in Cabin 10. Scout: Gallery. Jul. 2016. 352p. ISBN 9781501132933. $26; ebk. ISBN 9781501132940. F
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Travel journalist Laura "Lo" Blacklock receives a press pass for a weeklong cruise from London to the Norwegian fjords. Despite the ship's opulence and lavish amenities for the nine passengers, Lo finds her stay far from relaxing. On the first evening aboard, she witnesses a woman being thrown overboard. But her claims are quickly dismissed by the ship's crew as all the passengers are accounted for. Lo's desire to chronicle the liner's maiden voyage for her magazine is quickly overshadowed by her obsession with solving the mystery, regardless of the lack of evidence of foul play. With few potential suspects and little support from the others on board, Lo continues digging for answers. Her relentless quest for the truth despite warnings to stop, entangles her in a web of deception and danger. VERDICT Ware's follow-up to her best-selling debut, In a Dark, Dark Wood, is a gripping maritime psychological thriller that will keep readers spellbound. The intense final chapters just might induce heart palpitations.-- Mary Todd Chesnut, Northern Kentucky Univ. Lib., Highland Heights
Chesnut, Mary Todd
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Chesnut, Mary Todd. "Ware, Ruth. The Woman in Cabin 10." Library Journal, 15 June 2016, p. 71+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA455185387&it=r&asid=fe571cb6e4ca27cca20465b1362fd3f6. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A455185387
The Woman in Cabin 10
Christine Tran
112.21 (July 1, 2016): p37.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
* The Woman in Cabin 10. By Ruth Ware. July 2016. 352p. Simon & Schuster/Scout, $26 (9781501132933); e book, $ 10.99 (9781501132940).
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Just before departing on a career-making assignment, travel writer Lo Blackstock endures a terrifying home invasion that brings the debilitating panic attacks she thought she'd conquered back in force. Still, Lo joins luxury-cruise magnate Lord Richard Bullmer on the maiden voyage of his new liner, along with a handful of jet-setters and travel-publishing elite. The first night onboard, Lo is awakened by a scream and a heavy splash from the next cabin and she alerts Security that the neighbor she met briefly that evening has been attacked. But everyone on board denies that the woman was ever there, and Lo is painted as a hysteric, especially after her anxiety medication is brought to light. With the memory of her own attack so near, Lo refuses to stop questioning the woman's disappearance, even in the face of career devastation and anonymous threats. The isolated setting and social alienation (also well played in Ware's debut, In a Dark, Dark Wood, 2015) combine with Los deteriorating mental state to generate a dark, desperate tension that will appeal to Ware's and Gillian Flynn's many fans. This is the perfect summer read for those seeking a shadowy counter to the sunshine.--Christine Tran
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Tran, Christine. "The Woman in Cabin 10." Booklist, 1 July 2016, p. 37+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA459888986&it=r&asid=7d81cd5a11b13342a100be456191a310. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A459888986
Ware, Ruth: THE WOMAN IN CABIN 10
(May 15, 2016):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Ware, Ruth THE WOMAN IN CABIN 10 Scout Press/Simon & Schuster (Adult Fiction) $26.00 7, 19 ISBN: 978-1-5011-3293-3
Ware (In A Dark, Dark Wood, 2015) offers up a classic "paranoid woman" story with a modern twist in this tense, claustrophobic mystery. Days before departing on a luxury cruise for work, travel journalist Lo Blacklock is the victim of a break-in. Though unharmed, she ends up locked in her own room for several hours before escaping; as a result, she is unable to sleep. By the time she comes onboard the Aurora, Lo is suffering from severe sleep deprivation and possibly even PTSD, so when she hears a big splash from the cabin next door in the middle of the night, "the kind of splash made by a body hitting water," she can't prove to security that anything violent has actually occurred. To make matters stranger, there's no record of any passenger traveling in the cabin next to Lo's, even though Lo herself saw a woman there and even borrowed makeup from her before the first night's dinner party. Reeling from her own trauma, and faced with proof that she may have been hallucinating, Lo continues to investigate, aided by her ex-boyfriend Ben (who's also writing about the cruise), fighting desperately to find any shred of evidence that she may be right. The cast of characters, their conversations, and the luxurious but confining setting all echo classic Agatha Christie; in fact, the structure of the mystery itself is an old one: a woman insists murder has occurred, everyone else says she's crazy. But Lo is no wallflower; she is a strong and determined modern heroine who refuses to doubt the evidence of her own instincts. Despite this successful formula, and a whole lot of slowly unraveling tension, the end is somehow unsatisfying. And the newspaper and social media inserts add little depth. Too much drama at the end detracts from a finely wrought and subtle conundrum.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Ware, Ruth: THE WOMAN IN CABIN 10." Kirkus Reviews, 15 May 2016. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA452197871&it=r&asid=61cb67b1acc22edacc33be3e55a68e57. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A452197871
The Woman in Cabin 10
263.19 (May 9, 2016): p50.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
The Woman in Cabin 10
Ruth Ware. S&S/Scout, $26 (352p) ISBN 978-1-5011-3293-3
In Ware's underwhelming sophomore mystery (after 2015's In a Dark, Dark Wood), Laura "Lo" Blacklock thinks stepping in for her pregnant boss for a week-long jaunt on the new miniature cruise ship Aurora will give her a leg up at Velocity, the magazine where she's toiled for years. A break-in at her London flat days before her departure does little more than set up Lo as an easily startled protagonist. Everything on the Aurora is sparkly and decadent, from the chandeliers to the wealthy guests, most of whom are either fellow travel writers or investors brought on by owner Lord Richard Bullmer, but Lo is distracted from the scenery--the ship is headed for a tour of the Norwegian fjords--by her certainty that she heard the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the water from the adjacent cabin. No one, unsurprisingly, believes her, or buys her story of a mysterious woman she saw lurking on the ship hours earlier. Those expecting a Christie-style locked-room mystery at sea will be disappointed. Agent: Eve White, Eve White Literary (U.K.). (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"The Woman in Cabin 10." Publishers Weekly, 9 May 2016, p. 50. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA452883318&it=r&asid=0cdf68dd6ed66227a13293cf2c97ec31. Accessed 10 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A452883318