Regi is a 35 year old who lives in a house share with three other girls in their early twenties. She has OCD and has several rituals she must perform when feeling anxious. One of her housemates introduces her to Instagram and she soon becomes obsessed with the account of Mrs Clean (think Mrs Hinch!)

The story is fairly slow paced as we get to know more about Regi's life, with chapters from then and now, hinting at a dark past. I liked the character of Regi and felt a little sorry for her. The other characters in the book were interesting, though not all were likeable. As the story progressed I tried to work out what had happened to make Regi the way she was.

But then there was the ending. It left me totally confused. I listened again to the last coupke of chapters and still didn't get it. In fact I had to look at other reviews on Goodreads to finally work out what had happened and quite frankly I feel cheated!

So, three stars because I did enjoy the story, but hated that ending!

The narrator, Helen Keely, did a great job though.

This was a very strange book. It took me a long time to get into it. The highlights were the beautiful well executed portrayals of OCD and PTSD. They were very well written and convincing.

On the downside , I found the plot really confusing. I am still not sure what happened in Reggie's past. I thought the narration was good initially, however I don't know if the narration added to my confusion.

I think the key word here is "confusion". The superficial plot points, like the Instagram posts and the housemates, where all very obvious. I didn't feel that there were any great plot twists, unless the abused woman was not Reggie, but the lady trapped in the flat- but there was nothing to highlight that as a conclusion, except that we learn Reggie had a different life other than the one we thought she had.
Sorry - not for me- I just didn't get it at all.

Regi, a mature student with OCD, becomes obsessed with Mrs Clean on Instagram. Something has obviously happened in her past that she does not want to remember. I found that OCD was too much of a focus in this book, it started to become very repetitive (I suppose that is the point!) but it took away other aspects of the book. The timeline was also a bit confusing, however, the end made up for it.
I listened to the audiobook and Helen Keeley did a fantastic job of narrating.

The perfect life? ...Or the perfect lie?

When Regi moves into her new house share, she's ready for a clean slate. A new home. A new routine. A new identity...

Desperate to escape the shadow of her past that follows her everywhere she goes, Regi finds the ideal distraction in the perfect lives of others on social media.

But as innocent scrolling turns into an unhealthy obsession, Regi will soon learn that seeking perfection comes at a price...
Thanks to NetGalley and Boldwood Books for providing me a complimentary copy of ‘The House Mate’ by Nina Manning in exchange for my honest review.
This was the first time I came across Nina Manning and her work; the description of the book caught my attention immediately. However, when I started the book (I used the audiobook form) I just really couldn’t get into it. At times I felt bored and to be honest it was a struggle to get to the end. I’m not sure as to whether I didn’t enjoy it because of the plot or because at times I found it hard to follow.
The main character Regi suffers with OCD and her house mate shares an Instagram account with her called ‘Mr Clean’ and Regi begins to become obsessed with the account. Over the past few years people have developed an obsession with social media, so it was interesting to see this portrayed in a book.
I really did not like the ending of the book. I felt very confused and let down, I was expecting a really big ending but it felt very ani-climatic.
As this was the audio version of the book, I feel like I need to comment of the reader, Helen Keeley. I found her very annoying and I did not like how she used different voices. I really think this was a huge part as to why I didn’t enjoy it as much as I wanted to. I might try to read it again but through a physical copy.
Overall, if you like psychological thrillers then this book may interest you. I would recommend if you do read it then to read a physical copy of e-book instead of the audiobook version.

‘The House Mate’ was an engaging listen that had me from the get go.

Regi, a late 30s, mature student with a mysterious past moves into a house share with 3 young students. She quickly gets into the world of instagram, and whlle reluctant to share on social media herself, she quickly becomes obsessed with the inspirational ‘Mrs Clean’ and also somewhat with a ‘troll’ who criticises Mrs Clean’s every post.

So many questions popped into my head whilst listening! What in her past is Regi so keen to hide from? Who is following and calling Regi?...and why is she trying to hide from him? Just what is going on with her house mate’s creepy boyfriend?!

In a million years I would not have anticipated this plot and things really don’t become clear until the end. This is most definitely a novel that keeps you guessing.

Smoke and mirrors are used so effectively by author, Nina Manning, and I am utterly in awe at her consistently ability to create characters with deep insight into the dark and twisty workings of the mind!

The narrator also did a fantastic job on this, and absolutely did not give any spoilers which in hindsight must have been a job in itself. Her voice was so lovely to listen to. Admittedly I didn’t enjoy the nasality of one of the housemates, but as she only had a small part it really wasn’t a problem!

My greatest thanks to Netgalley, author and publisher for the opportunity to review this audiobook in exchange for an advance review.

Wow - I had to find time to listen to this book as I needed to know what happens next. It is rare that I don't guess it but this one had no idea (sorry spoiler)

The narrator was perfect and I loved her voices esp. Minnie's

This is my listen to of 2020 - it was so good. What a mind to come up with this story, so unique but so believable.

I need to investigate more from this author and narrator.
I really am really grateful to netgalley for providing me with an advance copy of this audio book for an advance copy in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Such a unique thriller about perfectionism and the dangers of Instagram.

As a true domestic thriller junkie, I'm always on the lookout for new authors to follow forever, and I've had my eye on Nina Manning before. I'm so glad I reach for the audiobook version of The House Mate because it was everything I love in a good thriller:
- an ambiguous domestic situation
- a relatable and intriguing (not plain) main character
- well-developed side characters
- edge between mental illness and madness
- fast pace
- shocking ending (I had to read it twice)
- intriguing themes (in this case OCD, online identity, social media, perfectionism and obsession).

The plot follows Regi who wants a clean slate and moved into a house share. In her quest for perfection, her life becomes increasingly dictated by one Instagrammer... As someone obsessed with Instagram, this was a major hit (and warning) for me!

My reading experience was definitely enhanced by the audio version - in my opinion, the narrator did an excellent job conveying the emotions and the tension that accompanies you throughout the book.

*Thank you to the Publisher for a free advance copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

This was absolutely fantastic!
I'm pretty new to audiobooks having only started listening to them regularly about a month ago so when I saw this psychological thriller available on Netgalley as an audiobook I jumped at the chance to listen.
This follows the story of Regi. She suffers from OCD and anxiety (stemming from a past trauma) and I found her so relatable and interesting to read about, I totally understood the compulsions etc and although I've seen other reviews describing this as excessive that is exactly what OCD is, excessive and oppressive- I found these descriptions made the book feel tense and claustrophobic adding to the sense of suspense.

She has just moved into a student house with girls almost 20 years her junior... I hated the housemates, they were so irritating and I really felt for poor Regi having to live with them 😂

Regi finds herself becoming obsessed with Mrs Clean- a Cleanstagram account which she finds soothing to follow which leads her down the rabbit hole through an unlikely but fantastic story.

I don't want to spoil this book. This deserves to be enjoyed with as much of a blind eye as possible- I thought this was going one way and not only did it end up going a different way but it went down a road I could have NEVER have foreseen.

I found this book build to a tense crescendo of anxiety and confusion but the answers do come and they are SO satisfying. This is one of my 2020 favourites and I'm so thankful to Netgalley, Nina Manning and Boldwood Books for giving me the opportunity to review the audio version!

This one is a must-read/ must-listen, let me know what you all think!
-K 🐝

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review. It has been published in October 2020.

"The House Mate" by Nina Manning was quite a disappointing read.
It's listed as a mistery/thriller, but in reality is neither.
The premise is really good: a flawed, damaged woman escaping from a traumatic past and looking for a fresh start in life gets caught up in a social media obsession and then realizes she's being stalked. It sounds like a pageturner... sadly, the actual book doesn't deliver on its promises.
First of all, the plot takes forever to get started: nothing at all happens in the first 20% of the novel, and even after that, the pace is molasses-slow.
The protagonist relates every tiny detail of her day to day life with no editing at all. You are only meant to put in a novel the interesting parts of what happens, not just about everything! I was left with the impression that most of the scenes were just fillers, and that the actual plot occupied a minimal part of the total. It feels like this book was never seen by an editor.
As for the characters, they're sorely monodimensional--all of them. You've got the "neurotic, damaged damsel in distress with a baggage", the "new boyfriend", the "nice house mate", the "not so nice house mate", the "youngest, silly house mate", the "cheating boyfriend"... Not a real person in sight, just cardboard caricatures.
Besides, the protagonist wallows in whining and self-pitying way too much to be relatable, which is probably why the narrator who read the audiobook used a doleful, mournful voice 90% of the time. Listening to such a tone for so long is about as pleasurable as listening to fingernails down a blackboard.
The alleged big reveal in the ending (which I'm not going to spoil for you) concerning the identity of lucybest65 - the Instagram troll that the protagonist had been stalking online and offline - is sorely obvious since the very beginning. When the protagonist says "The final piece of the puzzle fell into place" in one of the final chapters, I literally wanted to scream at her: AT LONG LAST!
As for the ending itself, I'm not even going to get into how weird and out of place it was. Don't get me started on all the differences between *misleading* the reader with false leads and ambiguous clues and just plain *cheating* the reader by flat out lying.
Without spoiling it for you, I can just say that the ending was the biggest disappointment of all: it didn't solve any of the open matters that the whole novel had focused on in painstaking detail for the previous 300 pages or so, it just threw in a bunch of totally new, unrelated matters and solved those instead, very hastily and unsatisfactorily, in just a few chapters. Basically, such an ending made the previous 8 hours of audiobook totally irrelevant and pointless.
To top it all off, this inexcusable ending took a story that had previously been pretty female-centred (female author, female protagonist, most of the supporting characters also females, stereotypical abusive male villain...) and suddenly slapped on it one of the most misoginistic deus ex machina I've ever read: the protagonist breaks the law for no good reason at all, puts herself in danger by acting with unjustifiable stupidity... and luckily gets saved by a man (and not just any man!).
The only thing worse than a deus ex machina ending is a misoginistic deus ex machina ending!
Even the compliments this champion of machismo pays to "his" woman are sexist: "All those years with a copper, I suppose it was worth something" he comments when trying to congratulate her for her investigative acumen.
Speaking of investigative acumen, the whole plot resolution relies on so many bad choices and behaviours that make no sense at all... Why would somebody send cryptic requests for help to perfect strangers on Instagram, hoping for their comments to be noticed among tens of thousands of other comments and for a persistent stalker to trace them back to your place and show up uninvited, instead of sending a proper request for help to... I don't know, the police, maybe? Social services? You have internet access, for goodness' sake: just use it in a less stupid way!
Also, in what parallel universe would a drug lord leave the door to his hideout unlocked?
And most of all, what kind of teenage son after being abandoned by his mother for years would just accept her without batting an eye when she suddenly decides to come back into his life - as a part-time mom, rather than a full-time one - and even happily share her with her new boyfriend on the very day of his birthday? This sixteen-year-old has no animosity at all, neither towards his runaway mother nor towards her out-of-the-blue boyfriend, a complete stranger to him. Very credible.
These characters are just too fake!

Firstly, I thought the narration was excellent and suited the book well.
The story was good. Having lived through an abusive relationship, some parts were extremely hard to listen to, but extremely well written. I was enthralled until right near the end when I became completely confused. This confusion lasted till the last few lines when I had a sudden shift in mental processes and my brain went, oh, right, of course! I had thought I was going to have to go back to the beginning and re-listen.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author and boy am I confused 🤷🏼‍♀️! I must admit I did have to read some reviews on goodreads to understand what on earth was happening!! I found the main character Regi ‘s OCD quite frustrating as it got really repetitive which I suppose is the point ! The ending was the most confusing ending to a book that I’ve ever read !!

This was the audio version of this book and the narrator was excellent and made it an enjoyable listen

This one is a similar theme to my previous audiobook. It was an easy listen but could be very descriptive in places to the point of being repetitive. I found the plot to be all over the place and even seemed like there was a couple of storylines going on and it left you wondering what they really had to do with each other. But in another way I was intrigued to see how it all came together and really had high hopes but it was like the author just came up with a random outcome and hoped it stuck but I really felt cheated. Helen Keeley did a great job on the narration and I would like to listen to more books that she narrates.

Thanks to Netgalley and Boldwood Books UK Audio for the opportunity to read this ARC and review that was published on the 15th of Oct.

Regi is a mature student in a shared house. Her housemates tolerate her distant behaviour and OCD to varying degrees. It quickly becomes apparent that Regi is running from something traumatic in her past and she seems to be scared of someone. Partly as a way to cope, she becomes interested and then mildly obsessed with a cleanstagrammer. Reading the comments on the Instagram posts it seems not everyone is a fan. I won't give away any more of the plot but there are some major twists and curveballs in the book. Its an enjoyable read, even if the main character, Regi can be quite annoying at times. The narration is done well and the voice suits Regi.

I really enjoyed the eARC of The House Mate and was so happy to be approved for the audiobook. The audiobook brings the characters and plot to life even more. Dark, mysterious and gripping!

Regi would like nothing more than to bury her past, forget all about it and start anew. As she attempts to do just that, moving into a new home with a new name, Regi becomes addicted to social media and the seemingly perfect lives of others online, but no one is perfect and Regi is about to find out that she’s not the only person living a lie. Keeley provides a fine narration to this tense and claustrophobic tale

I listened to the audiobook of this story. Thanks to Boldwood Books UK Audio and NetGalley for a copy for review.
The condition of OCD was extremely well covered and had me feeling great sympathy for any real sufferers. Unfortunately I didn’t enjoy the book and found it a little over the top and in parts quite contrived.
I didn’t enjoy the narrator either and that was possibly why the story just didn’t gel for me.

I listened to the audiobook of this story. Thanks to Boldwood Books UK Audio and NetGalley for a copy for review.

Regi wants to start afresh and has moved into a house share with younger girls. She clearly has issues and suffers from OCD, among other things. One of the younger girls introduces her to Instagram and she becomes unhealthily obsessed with ‘Mrs Clean’.

The story is told by alternating between ‘then’ and ‘now’ and is from the points of view of two characters. This wasn’t clear to me until about halfway through the book. I got confused as I thought the story was was only from Regi’s point of view.

I thought that the portrayal of the Instagrammer and the obsession with it was sadly accurate. I can think of an Instagram account that ‘Mrs Clean’ was based on.

The characters weren’t very likeable and I thought it was a bit naff that the grumpy housemate was called Karen.

The plot was confusing to follow and I found it a bit far fetched at times.

Despite getting confused about the characters, this book is an easy read and did hold my interest.

The ending was a bit cliche and predictable for me.

Narration was good but slightly OTT at times.

Overall, this book was OK but it wasn’t easy to follow and the ending let it down for me.

Narrator 5 stars

Book 3.5 stars
I finished this book in one sitting. When you read / listen to a lot of books it can be hard to find something original and this definitely hit the original mark for me. It held my attention from start to finish, and even got me a little emotional with the last 95%

This is the first book I've read/listen to by the author and will definitely be heading over to Amazon to see what others are for purchase

Heading toward 4.5 stars for me!

I was gripped from the start and compelled to get to the fast paced end in 4 audio sessions!

Definitely going to look for more by this author and narrators.

Thanks to Netgalley and Boldwood Books UK Audio

Well, I suppose it's a bit my fault here because I have already read a Nina Manning book before and absolutely detested it but forgot. Had I remember that I would never have requested this new one.

In any case I did, and now I have to honestly review it.

This is a mess. It's over the top in all senses and reads more like a telenovela than a thriller. It has some really laughable passages and characters. And to top it all, we have a supposed twist that is in reality nothing else than an author cheating on her readers by simply throwing random new info at the end and hoping it'll stick.
It doesn't. It just gets convoluted and frankly, ridiculous.

The narrator does a decent job with the terrible material she was given though.

I'd like to thank NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an audiobook ARC of this novel.