First of all, I loved the high-tech idea introduced in the novel. Snoop’s founders developed an app where you can listen to the music someone else is listening to at the same moment they’re listening to it. It’s a bit invasive right and it felt perfect for this locked-in mystery type of novel where you don’t know who has eyes on who. Leading man Topher wants to sell his wonderful company in a buyout that’s on offer, his ex-wife Eva is opposed, ex-employee Liz and Snooper founder Rik are caught in the middle, having to choose sides. And then, suddenly, one of them goes missing and the cards are reshuffled…

I love the guessing game in this type of novel and I don’t mind a big cast at all, it makes it just a bit more challenging and who’s not up for this kind of challenge eh? Unfortunately, this time there wasn’t much guessing because at about 60% into the novel it was pretty obvious who the killer was and I felt it was too soon to be done with the joy of sleuthing. I had a marvelous time up until then and it all became clear going from one scene to the next. You’re not going to believe it, I know, because there are 11 people at the cabin at the start of the novel. Nine of them are guests and two act as cabin staff. Even so it’s nearly impossible to miss which one the killer is. The author also gave away how many are going to be killed quite early in the story and that didn’t go unnoticed so yep I was making check marks as we went along. Fear not, there’s still a very enjoyable time to be had because you might know who it is but you definitely don’t know why. The underlying reasons were far from obvious from the beginning and this is where I recognized the true brilliance of Ruth Ware in again.

I love the way she writes but aside from Topher (the alpha dog and main man), Erin and a few others, I didn’t find the other characters very interesting and I thought some of them could definitely have been developed more, like Ani and Tiger, because they remain rather vague figures without any real identifiers.

It was a good read but I simply didn’t love it the way I loved the first novel (The Lying Game, remember) and it was wayyyy too easy for a sleuth who loves a good challenge. I do look forward to her next novel though and in between I’ve already decided to pick up one of the backlist.

It took a while to get in to this book as the first few chapters are a little dreary and I was quite willing to give up I'm so glad that I didn't because it's brilliant.
After the initial introduction and purpose of the group being in the ski resort, One By One quickly delves in to an addictive 'whodunnit'.
I did have my suspicions on who the killer was quite early in the book, but the mystery of finding out if I was correct was just as fun.

Well, who knew? Agatha Christie appears to be living in the French Alps and working as a chalet host! Perhaps a little unfair to both Ms Wade - and Ms Christie.... However, what Ms Ware has done is to create a murder mystery tale with a classic whodunnit feel. Victims mount up in circumstances where the group of central characters are effectively cut off from outside help by an avalanche. Reading that cold does make it sound like it could all be too much of a cliche but the pace of the author’s narrative and the fluency of her writing mean that the thought isn’t prompted whilst reading. Indeed, the developing pace and tension make this a genuine hard to put down book.

Ms Ware tells her story largely through two key characters; like all the book’s characters these are well drawn and convey subtleties of personalities and individual traits very well. The plot doesn’t require any great suspension of disbelief and the eventual denouement ties up just about all loose ends. For fans of this genre there are plenty of clues to be picked up, but this is also a fun read for readers with wider tastes, too.

All in all, a book that does not short change the reader. Strongly recommended.

The perfect winter thriller, grab a hot chocolate and snuggle up under a cosy blanket for this who done it showing that knowledge isn’t always power. I especially loved the use of Friends do they know we know they know haha.

Probably the strangest book I've read this year. My first by this writer so I really didnt know what to expect. A group of colleagues from Snoop get bumped off in a snow-filled winter wonderland in this modern day Agatha Christie-styled thriller. The story was slow to start, in part while I got used to the writing, but soon speeded up to a gripping finale.

I had high hopes for this modern day murder mystery set in an Alpine ski resort where the directors and shareholders of a new music app meet to discuss the impending buyout, which will potentially make some, but not all, of them millionaires.
But I'm afraid I didn't get very far at all with 'One by One'. I found the beginning section, reading like website entries didn't engage me at all, quite the opposite. I found the hip, urban style not to my taste but I can see that it might appeal to a younger metropolitan audience.

Ruth Ware has written mysteries and thrillers involving dysfunctional families, toxic friendships and twisted romance. With One by One she wanted to explore a different sort of relationship – that between work colleagues – and how this type of relationship might come under strain when there’s a murderer in the company.

Full review here: https://westwordsreviews.wordpress.com/2020/11/23/one-by-one-ruth-ware/

Although not my favorite Ruth Ware, she's done it again! This novel focuses on a group of 8 people who are all on a work trip in a beautiful, rustic mountain chalet to discuss and plan the future of Snoop, the company they're all working in, steered by Eva and Toph, founders of Snoop.

Then something happens and one of them is lost in a ski accident, but when another turns up dead, how much of an accident was it? Everyone is a suspect with something to win or lose.

"Now we are ten.
Now we are nine.
Now we are eight.
The words chant inside my head, a kind of gruesome countdown, edging closer to zero, one by one."

The beginning is much slower, it takes a while to take flight, but it sets the scene and the strange dynamics between the characters. The story follows the perspectives of Liz who used to work at Snoop and Erin, the chalet girl, and it moved the pace at a good pace. Initially I did struggled to remember all the characters, however slowly got to know their individualities better and know who was who.

The second half of the book was magnificent - Ware is brilliant at endings and keeping the reader to the edge of the seat! I had no idea how it would all end once it was all revealed. The mystery element was spot on and the whole book felt like a game of Cluedo set in a winter escape.

Die Gründer und Top Angestellten einer aufstrebenden App Firma fahren Mitten im Winter für eine Woche Erholung und Arbeit in ein einsam gelegenes Chalet in den Bergen. Zwischen ihnen steht der mögliche Verkauf der Firma und die finanziellen Auswirkungen.
Die Geschichte saugt einen mit ihrer winterlichen Atmosphäre sofort ein. Wetter, Umgebung und Einsamkeit werden zur eigenen Gestalt.
Nach und nach lernt man die verschiedenen Protagonisten und ihre Positionen kennen. Es ist mir zu Anfang etwas schwer gefallen die verschiedenen Figuren auseinander zu halten.
Nachdem eine der Skifahrerinnen vermisst wird und eine Lawine das Chalet trifft, entfaltet sich die spannende Handlung. Fesselnd geschrieben, aber mir etwas zu viel hin und her und zu viel Deuten der Ereignisse durch die Beteiligten. Zu viele verschiedene Möglichkeiten werden langwierig durchgespielt.
Auch Ruth Ware hat sich hier an einem beliebten Agatha Christie Setting/Plot versucht und es recht passabel gemeistert.

High in the Alps a ski chalet prepares to receive the latest batch of guests. They are expecting a group who are the creators of a best selling music App called Snoop. They are a diverse group. Most come from moneyed backgrounds, stylish & entitled. Only one, Liz, seems out of place. Parts of the story are narrated by her & the rest by Erin, the hostess. After a mornings ski-ing a storm is threatened but one guest does not return. An avalanche hits & the group are marooned. With one missing & another found dead. Who will be next?

This was a cracker of a thriller. It was full of action & kept me guessing. Thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for letting me read & review this book.

I was able to whisk through this book as I found it a reasonably quick read, and there were elements I enjoyed. The dialogue was written well and conveyed the characters and their emotions and the overall plot was an entertaining one, however, I found it slightly repetitive. Not just the part which which recounting an event by another character but some of the actions and words used were often repeated also. The recounting of episodes were not always needed and seemed just to be there to pad out the book. I found the landscape, snow, coldness well described but didn't get the same for the house. The characters weren't very likable and I found the whole book a little rushed An easy and OK read but not one of her best.

10 top executives of a company called Snoop + 1 chalet high up + treacherous paths of skiing + 1 lost in snow + 1 ran away + 3 killed = few barely alive survivors. What happened in the chalet?

This was a classic whodunit which kept me completely involved in the story, trying to find the clues and detect the lies in each one’s story. The writing was smooth like the newly fallen snow but quite slippery where I couldn’t catch the lies.

I loved Erin the chalet girl, who looked after the guests along with Danny the chef, but with secrets on her own. Her intelligence and powers of detection shone through. Even though the plot arc was familiar, there was always the excitement of wanting to be right.

Guessing the perp and the motive to kill became a game which kept me occupied on a sleepy afternoon.

Thank you very much NetGalley and Harper Collins for an advance copy off One By One by Ruth Ware in exchange of my honest opinion.

This is the third book that I read by Ruth Ware and, so far, I have liked them all!

I had heard very mixed reviews about this book before I started it so I was aware it was kind of controversial and my expectations were not too high.

This book gave me all Agatha Christie vibes and it also reminded me of An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena and The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley.

Once said that, I found the start to be very slow. I liked the premises and the setting but until more or less 100 pages in nothing really happens.

I found that the first pages, like I said, a bit too introductory. It all had to do with the company Snoops, and I couldn't be less interested in this tech company, their shares, their financial problems and the workers.

Regarding the characters, I didn't especially like any of them. I found most of them to be selfish, not sensible at all, career focused, money driven and just very superficial.

Erin and Danny, though, the chalet hosts were quite nice to read about and more well behaved than the rest of the cast.

Once said all the above and once we got past the first 100 pages, Oh My God! What a ride this book was!

I could feel the tension, the fear, the questions everyone was wondering, the fact that one of them was the killer and they had no idea, the deaths coming without anyone being able to stop them... Amazing!

Because I didn’t especially liked any of the character that worked in Snoops, for me, from the outside, was quite “fun” to see the killings, their reactions, their theories, their suspects and their behaviour to one another!

There is a scene, quite late on the book, in the Chalet, with just Erin and Liz that Wow! I loved it! I couldn’t stop reading, I had to keep turning pages and find out what the hell was going to happen next!

Definitely a good, fun and entertaining book!

Hurrah! A new Ruth Ware which is a)a real treat to review and b)one of my favourite tropes, a locked room mystery!
At the start, a newspaper article makes it clear that the treacherous weather conditions have resulted in holiday makers being snowed in at a remote chalet, some have died and two survivors have made the dangerous trek to get help. Following this, there are social media-esque profiles of the owners/managers of an app named 'Snoop', a music palying app that lets you listen to the same music concurrently, borne out of the owners(once partners) attempts to make a long distance relationship less difficult.

All the characters sound bloody awful, by the time you 'meet' the two housekeepers/chefs of the chalet they are heading to, you are hopeful that they are the ones who die. The funicular ascending with the members of Snoop for a make or break holiday away, creaks with unspoken menace, the isolated setting perfect for those trying to get away. Except, when you are trapped with little to no chance of escape, there is every chance that lashing out might reveal potentially deadly secrets...

And herein lies the fascination,for me, with the characters and situations that Ruth creates. I read the Snoop profiles and thought 'UGH. How dreaful'. And that is the point, those social media profiles are designed to deflect, whilst simultaneously bringing the public 'closer' to the objects of their affection. Artifice, self-deception and intrigue abound when trying to create a persona that is so far different from your own, and the longer that you try to keep this up, the more chances of secrets being revealed present themselves.
It is a pressure cooker situation where levels of innocence and guilt are peeled away , as the numbers dwindle and the snow piles up outside the door. This is a perfect weekend read, preferably in a blanket fort with plenty of hot chocolate and a do-not-disturb note on the door. There is a blurb on the cover of the hardback which describes Ruth Ware as the 'queen of one more chapter.'

I would have to say that I agree.

Oh my goodness.. couldn't put this one down. Started fairly slowly but soon picked up and was an absolute roller coaster of a tale.
A group of associates gather together for a skiing/ work break and after an avalanche of devastating proportions the cracks begin to show. Danny and Erin the chalet hosts deal with the horrors that ensue....and the ending is a real page turner. Thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend.

One by One delivers pretty much what you might expect, and while it wasn’t a bad read it all felt just a little obvious to really rate more highly. I enjoyed it, just not as much as I’d hoped.
We have a fairly large cast of characters all linked by the fact they’re in an alpine chalet when disaster strikes. There are ten members of the trendy Snoop app holidaying, and their staff Erin and Danny. A storm arrives, setting off an avalanche which cuts their chalet off from the village. One of the party is missing, and this is bad...but then it gets a whole lot worse as members of the party are picked off.
Someone in the party is a murderer. Trapped in their resort home, they have to decide what to do to survive as they try to work out who’s behind these murders.
The large cast made this rather difficult to get behind. Some are left undeveloped as they are not really that important. It’s clear that there are tensions within the group, people have secrets and more than one has something they could see as motivation for murder.
From quite early on the signs were there as to who was responsible. Part of me hoped this would not prove to be the case; that there’d be some sleight of hand, a twist I didn’t see coming. Admittedly, I didn’t work out exactly why this situation had come about but it all felt just a little obvious. I also couldn’t help but feel the whole background of the app was for little purpose other than to explain a couple of key moments, meaning the time given to it was starting to seem unnecessary.
I’m grateful to NetGalley for granting me access to this in advance of publication, but it didn’t live up to my expectations having enjoyed Ware’s other novels.

I have to admit I’ve never really fancied the idea of skiing. I’m definitely not a fan of extreme cold and I’m pretty accident prone at the best of times. You would be more likely to find me in front of the fire curled up with a book while everyone went off to ski. Actually on second thoughts that sounds pretty good. Well it did until I read One by One, now I’m probably even less likely to book a skiing holiday in the future!

In One by One we meet the directors and staff of the popular music app, Snoop. Having decided to visit the exclusive alpine ski resort of Saint Antoine they soon find themselves in a dangerous situation. It’s safe to say that there is plenty of tension within this group already without the devastating avalanche that leaves them stranded. Then what follows is a deadly cat and mouse game.

The plot itself moves pretty steadily. I have to admit it took me a few chapters to get a feel for the characters as there are quite a few to get to know. I had to check back a couple of times to some of the earlier chapters which helped to get it all sorted in my mind who was who. Although to be fair my memory is pretty terrible at the best of times! I wouldn’t say that I particularly liked every character. Let’s just say for the most part they don’t have the most likeable traits. However this didn’t really bother me too much because I am a fan of unlikeable characters. I guess I probably became more attached to Erin’s character as she was pretty much in the same boat as the reader. Which was basically in the dark and wondering what was happening as the mystery over certain events deepened. I thought the idea behind Snoop as a company was very interesting. Along with seeing how each character fitted in within this company. I was also eager to discover why there was so much tension and at times hostility within this group.

Just as the title says, one by one the numbers in this group are slowly but surely whittled down. I did have my suspicions over who was behind it all and even though I was proven right, it didn’t ruin my reading experience. I just enjoyed putting the clues together and wondering how everything would play out. The setting itself provided a menacing presence as the isolation brings increased tension to the characters situation. One by One is the kind of book you want to read wrapped up all cosy and warm as the cold, dark mystery unfolds.

The characters (and lack of characterization) were what let this book down for me.

I am a long-time Ruth Ware fan and have enjoyed all her books up until now, though some more than others of course. The premise of this book was fine, sounded quite interesting, if not quite as exciting as The Turn of the Key and The Death of Mrs Westaway. Where this book just didn't work for me was in the fact that there are twelve characters but several of them I couldn't keep track of because they basically had identical "I'm a shareholder/businessperson" personalities. I am someone whose reading experience is very much affected by my emotional connection to the characters, and that was just lacking here.

It was also frustrating that the culprit's identity is revealed with so many pages left to go (though most seasoned thriller readers will likely figure it out much sooner anyway). This dampened what little tension the book had managed to muster up until that point.

There is no doubt that Ruth Ware is one of my favourite authors and One By One is her latest gripping story. Set in the beautiful and snowy French Alps, it features a group of people gathering for a corporate retreat, the two staff members running the remote resort, dangerous secrets, a killer ready to do anything to protect those secrets, and weather conditions that keep the characters isolated from the rest of the world. And, because of all these elements, I spent an enjoyable Saturday completely engrossed in the story.

Based on the many thrillers I read, corporate retreats are a bad idea… they always end badly! In One By One, inspired by Agatha Christie, Ruth Ware creates a story in which the employees and shareholders of a successful app company reunite in a resort to discuss the future of the company and to ski. With millions of dollars at stake and secrets threatening to come to light, the tension is high. Things get worse when an avalanche isolates them with no cell reception and no way to call for help. When one of them disappears, it becomes clear that there is a killer on the loose and no one is safe. When everyone is a suspect, who can you trust?

The story is told from two points of views. Lily, a former employee of the app company, finds herself in the middle of the battle between the two founders of the company. Thanks to her perspective, we get a deep and interesting insight inside the company and its members. On the other hand, for Erin the chalet in Saint Antoine is her escape from her past. Even from the outside, it is clear that tempers are fraught between her new guests and things take a dark turn when one of them disappears.

Ruth Ware never disappoints. I loved the cold and immersive setting, the deceitful and suspicious characters, the clever, chilling, and addictive plot. I raced through One By One. How could I not? I needed to know who the murderer was and it took me by surprise. I don’t know if One By One is my favourite of Ruth Ware’s novels, because I love all of her books, but it is definitely a must-read! Highly recommended!

It begins as a bonding holiday for the directors and shareholders of the hugely successful app Snoop, which is the new craze to hit music world but they soon realise they are there for another reason. I liked the opening chapter of this book, set in the Alpine ski resort of Saint Antoine. The last guests had gone and all the cleaning, preparation and re-stocking the chalet had been completed. Erin and Danny, the chalet hosts, were taking a well earned time out before the new guests arrived. They weren’t to know that it was literally the calm before the storm.
The new guests are a real mixed bunch that took a little time to get to know, especially with some of them having names that could be male or female. They are mainly boisterous which makes them memorable or geeks and mousey which again worked for me. The atmosphere turns sour when the real reason for the trip is revealed.
When the group are taken out on the slopes it is with caution, although they are of mixed abilities. A weather front is coming in rapidly. Left by Erin, so she can do chores back at the chalet, the group make their way up the mountain. Not everyone returns and when they do it isn’t long before the chalet is hit by an avalanche, making the rest of them cut off from the nearest town.
By the time the avalanche hit I had got to know the characters and what their role in the company was. The story moves into a ‘Whodunnit’ mode as unexplained deaths hit the group. There are plenty of people with a motive for wanting their colleagues, friends and co-shareholders dead, but which one is capable of murder?
The descriptions of Saint Antoine are superb, the slopes, the Piste and the avalanche. Ruth Ware is an atmospheric writer as she built in my mind the scene of beauty and treachery and the deterioration of everything in the chalet, including the people as time goes on. The last quarter of the book is very intense with brilliant heart-pounding moments that made this book impossible to put down.

I wish to thank the publisher and NetGalley for an e-copy of this book plus a hard copy, which had been delayed in the post due to covid.