It's the first thriller I read by Joanne Harris and I can only say "WOW" as it's brilliant.
A gripping, twisted and dark story that kept me turning pages as I wanted to know what was going to happen.
Ms Harris is a talented storyteller and her characters, plot and setting and wonderfully written.
Even if it's part of a series it can be read as a stand alone, I will surely read the rest of the series.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

A Narrow Door is the brand new novel by acclaimed author Joanne Harris. A return to the world of St Oswald’s the story follows Rebecca Buckfast – the first female headteacher of the school. She’s determined to take down the old regime and she’s doing it by allowing female students for the first time in the school’s history. As plans are made to create new state of the art facilities on the premises, human remains are uncovered in the construction work. As Rebecca works to protect everything she has built, secrets that have long stayed buried will soon be revealed.

Joanne Harris is one of my favourite authors so as soon as I heard about this I was incredibly excited to pick it up. Harris weaves a complex and exhilarating story, one that hooked me from the very first chapter. A Narrow Door is well crafted and I loved the prickling sense of unease that continued to build and build as the story progressed. Joanne Harris has such a beautiful writing style and the excellent descriptions of the hallowed halls of St Oswald’s and King Henry’s really came to life. The story was well-paced and I ended up reading the second half of the book in a single afternoon. There were some surprising moments that I definitely didn’t expect and while this is the third book set around St Oswald’s, it can absolutely be read as a standalone.

The thing that fascinated me most was the complex and multi-layered characters that Harris has created. Rebecca Price is a fascinating character and I really enjoyed reading the story of her life. She is a determined and ambitious woman and will do anything to succeed in the man’s world she finds herself in. She made for a really compelling protagonist, even more so as the story grew darker. A Narrow Door is an incredibly gripping and clever read, one you absolutely won’t want to put down.

'Becky was an only child, and yet she had a brother'.

The first thing I should say about A Narrow Door is that it's the third part of a trilogy of psychological thrillers set in and around the same private grammar school, St Oswald's, and the town of Malbry. I hadn't read the previous books (shame on me) but A Narrow Door works very well as a standalone thriller, while hinting at the background that has already been established and bringing back familiar characters.

The book is structured as a sort-of dialogue between the new Head of the school, Rebecca Buckfast, and old-school (in every sense of the world) Classics teacher, Roy Straitley. Buckfast is a new broom, having assumed the Headship after a period of turbulence. She is the first ever woman Head of what has previously been a boys-only school. Straitley initially presents as a crusted remnant of the Old Guard, but while the traditions of the school are written on his heart, he's actually much more complex. In a subplot, Buckfast's merger of the school with its' girls equivalent has added a new member to Straitley's familiar clique of "Brody Boys", who in the course of A Narrow Door, comes out as trans. We see Straitley working, with eventual success, to accept this. Similarly, while sceptical of Buckfast, he pays close attention to her story and often appreciates her troubled past and her various dilemmas.

Buckfast and Straitley are looking back from 2006 to events both in 1989, when she was a young supply teacher at St Oswald's even more hidebound local rival, King Henry's, and in the early 1970s when her older brother Conrad, then a King Henry's boy, disappeared. The conversation is brought on by the apparent discovery, on the school grounds, of a corpse and a King Henry's prefect badge. So Conrad's shadow, or ghost, hangs heavily over a story that is already presented as part of the past ('Everyone in this story is dead, or changed beyond recognition... The house is no longer a shrine to [Conrad]... No one living there listens to the numbers stations anymore.') but a past that Becky seems to interrogate (she knows who lives in that house now).

On the surface, Becky Buckfast is trying to persuade Roy Straitley not to report the discovery, for the good of the school. Perhaps "persuade" is the wrong term - overtly, she's explaining aspects of her earlier life and appealing to his interest in a friend, another former teacher, Eric Scoones, who has retired under a cloud. Then, she says, they can, together, make a decision. Underneath, of course, she's working flat out to influence him, drawing on a lifetime of men patronising and underestimating her.

The way that the apparent dialogue works is complex and absorbing. Though it's presented as it might have been spoken, what we read in Buckfast's account isn't all told to Straitley, and nor are his ruminations on it, though addressed to a "you", actually all said out loud to her. We may infer, I think, that she does more of the talking, but exactly how much each says, we are left to wonder. We "hear", therefore, a great deal of commentary from both, and soon appreciate that games are afoot (Buckfast: 'I'm rather good at meeting men's needs... They need to hear their praises sung') if not what the rules are.

So we know very soon that Buckfast is the unreliable narrator supreme, that she's delaying some information, suppressing or spinning others - but not what, or exactly, why. Harris takes her time laying out Becky's earlier life, centred on the trauma of her brother's disappearance when she was six years old and the effect it had on her and on her parents. They are subsequently cold to her, obsessed with Conrad and refuse ('cocooned in their grief like a pair of dead moths') to accept that he might be dead, laying a place for him at the table and speaking of him in the present tense. Darker still is her father's descent into conspiracy theories about "numbers stations" - the image of the stricken house silent apart from a radio reciting strings of numbers in a flat voice is a strong and compelling one - and the periodic appearance of some imposter trying to impersonate Conrad.

Alongside this we see the 1989 Becky, having endured nearly twenty years of this frosty treatment, reappear for her temporary job at King Henry's (where she was with Conrad when he vanished). She's not yet the armoured, assured Head of 2006 and suffers greatly from the sneering patriarchy of the school Common Room and of the boys she's meant to be teaching. Yet she has a nose for secrets, of which there are many in this book. Becky takes the King Henry's job to the disgust of her boyfriend and later fiancé Dominic ('charming, funny and smart') who has 'rescued' her and her young daughter from a life of wearying poverty. Dominic seemed to me to have somewhat controlling tendencies: the background to these is just one of the fascinating secrets that is gradually made clear. Indeed secrets - and, closely related, memories, fantasies and lies - prove to be at the centre of the narrative (the story itself, the version of it that Becky is giving to Roy, and the acting out that all involved here have been engaged in ('They look so real, those memories, and yet they were a performance'). There is a hole in the middle of everything in that Becky does not (did not) remember what happened to her brother while, as a six year old girl anxious to please her parents, the police and adult authorities in general she was continually pressed to expand on the confused impressions she did have, leading to a whole structure of fantasy growing to fill the gap.

The exploration of that fantasy, which to a degree the adult Becky now seems to have weaponised in the service of her plans, and its relation both to the person she has become and to the role she now fills, makes up the bulk of this story and it is completely, absolutely, enthralling. (At times the book can be very disturbing, and Becky's childhood fears - never far from the surface - erupt to consume her). Beware, however, for nothing here is quite what it seems.

Harris's unwrapping of the all the layers here fascinates, casting light especially on patriarchy, variously represented by the cliquish schoolmasters, everyday men who, Becky recalls, 'at twenty three I was quite unaware of how often [they] turned to locked at me', and her patronising and controlling fiancé ('To be a woman... is to be the constant recipient of unwanted pieces of male advice.')

In all, a wonderful read and I am kicking myself for having missed the previous part of this trilogy, something I need to put right very quickly!

A totally gripping and intriguing mystery. Dark with sinister undertones with twists and turns all the way though. I've always enjoyed Joanne Harris books and this was no exception being different again and presenting the reader with the totally unexpected. Strong writing with some childhood nightmares to add to the suspense trying to work out what is going on in the compelling plot. Complex and chilling.

Dark. Twisted. Thrilling. Sinister... got your interest yet?! This is one of those books that I was absorbed in from the get go! You are confronted by a woman who is determined, single minded and not prepared to put with anything. And now she's in the perfect position to put everything into play... and that means settling scores!

Be prepared to be led down a garden path, or school corridor!, on a number of occasions as the story flits from the now to the past and the shocking events that plagued her childhood and have made her the woman she has become.

When a body is discovered on the school grounds, Rebecca seems untroubled by the events, and more concerned with how a certain member of staff reacts to the news. Amidst the school setting we get to see the politics at play and the sexist attitudes never far from action and that really adds to the muddying of water as you make up your mind about Rebecca and her motives!

The more you find out about her childhood and the past, the more the 'now' begins to make sense and that undercurrent of darkness is forever present and storyline of her past was particularly intense and gripping!

This is a psychological thriller full of complex characters and situations and I was totally ensnared in the web of intrigue!!

As good, if not better than I hoped for

After reading Gentlemen & Players at least 5 times, Blueeyedboy and A Different Class 2 or 3 times I was really excited when I heard about A Narrow Door and couldn't wait to read it.

I wasn't disappointed it was even better than I hoped for.

I'm not a great reader meaning it took me a good 5 or 6 days for me to complete A Narrow Door, partly due to me having to dip back in to Blueeyedboy every now and then to see if I was missing anything.

It does take a bit of following and I wasn't always sure whether Rebecca was talking to her self or teling Roy the tale.

Deliberate or not, Joanne Harris drops names of characters from previous books; Emily, White, Gloria, etc. plus all the old favourites from the Malbry series including of course Roy's Brodie Boys.

As like Gentlemen & Players despite just finishing it I will start reading it again shortly, it really is that good.

Honestly I can't remember a time that I have been so captivates and engrossed by a book and given how many books I seem to consume, that is saying a lot. I should also admit that I have read the previous novels in Joanne Harris's series about St Oswald's but honestly this must be the best.

I am aware that there is a large risk of including spoilers when describing this plot so I will try to stick to the basics in this review. We join Rebecca Buckfast as she embarks on her new role as headmistress (well headmaster really) of St. Oswald's. While Roy Straitley continues to fight for some semblance of tradition as classics master, La Buckfast is bringing in a new era of girls and whiteboards. This is where the novel spins you off on a tangent that I was not quite expecting. Ms Harris carries us cleverly away into the whirlpool of a thriller. When bones are discovered, both Straitley and Rebecca are forced to delve into their pasts and examine the precarious nature of memory. Sorry but that's as much as I can say without giving anything away. Suffice it to say that this book is incredibly gripping and the twists pack a punch at every turn.

This really was a 5 star read and I feel quite bereft to have finished it. Thanks so much to Netgalley for the APC.

From the start I knew that this was going to be a novel like one of Joanne Harris’ beloved perfumes, sensual, multi-layered and with mysteries to be plumbed and divined. The tight and seemingly effortless unraveling of the mystery and the sublime use of language ensure that you always know you’re in the hands of a mistress of her craft. If anyone ever tells you that you novels are literary/character-focused or genre/plot-focused, prioritise either forward momentum or beauty of language, hand them this novel, or maybe any Harris novel. I’m not going to say anything about the plot because it will spoil it, but there’s murder and some incisive smashing of the patriarchy. And I loved the central image.

I've tried Gentleman and Players and unfortunately didn't engage with it. Not realising The Narrow Door was a sequel,I requested it.
I found the first half of the story,slow and confusing. However,the second half picked up the pace and it become more intriguing.
It can be read as a standalone novel, but the references to previous books are sketchy and are hard to understand.
I half guessed one of twists and the loose ends were met with ' Really?'.
Overall a complex and mysterious read which fans of Joanne Harris will enjoy.

A very different, twisty, psychological thriller set in the privileged world of a minor public school. The new headmistress has a story to tell which takes us back to when she was 5 and her brother disappeared. No one is who you think they are. My only niggle is that it seemed a little long in places but enjoyable, creepy and unexpected.

A Narrow Door follows the lives of pupils and teachers at St Oswald's School and therefore continues from the events of Gentlemen & Players and A Different Class. I did read Gentlemen & Players many years ago, but I have not read A Different Class. I would recommend doing so prior to reading A Narrow Door, as this will make the recurring characters (who have been wonderfully developed over the trilogy) clearer in the reader's mind.

St Oswald's is a very old fashioned institution and I loved the descriptions that made me feel as though I was walking the corridors and eavesdropping in the staff room.

Some of the teachers, including one of the central characters, Roy Straitley, are reluctant for the school to use more progressive methods of working and are disconcerted by the decision to admit female students and appoint a female "Headmaster." l loved the way that Harris used this premise to explore discrimination in society and it really gave me food for thought. The relationship between Straitley and Ms Buckfast is wonderful and at times particularly heartwarming, which added a further layer to an already interesting plot.

There are several layers in the plot of A Narrow Door, and different readers will find that different elements of the novel resonate with them. Harris has brought all these concepts together in a fascinating way. On the face of it, it is a mystery and I wanted to know what had happened all those years ago.

I’ve been reading Joanne Harris for a very long time now. I’ll go through phases when I won’t read anything for a long time, then splurge on a few at a time.

It has to be about 3 years since I bought one of her books, so I was looking forward to reading this one. Oh, how I’ve missed her! I find her writing so beautiful, it’s like a big comfy blanket, she feels like an old friend, like returning home…

As you’d expect, it’s a corker of a book. I didn’t know what to expect from the story, and it took me all over the place emotionally and plotwise. Absolutely wonderful. Just yes! Loved every second of it.

Utterly wonderful. Thank you!

My thanks to Netgalley and Orion Publishing Group for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review

I’ve only ever read one Joanne Harris books - no surprise to hear that book is Chocolat thanks to the heartwarming film - but even then I could see she has such a fantastic ability to write believable snd such human characters.

The point of view flicked around from one person to another and from one time period to another, which I did struggle to get my head round for the first quarter or so of the book, but it did become easier to recognise the “voice” each character spoke in, which then made it easier to identify the narrator and time we were in.

There are a lot of questions and a lot of mystery. It’s eery and uncomfortable to read. The characters are diverse and believable, with perfect depictions of the traditional old man who believes himself to be above the women, and also the feminist troubles the female characters have to face.

I didn’t realise this was number three in a series. Other reviews I have read say it can be read as a standalone novel, and I suppose it can, but I did become lost a few times that maybe wouldn’t have been a problem if I’d read the previous ones.

There were elements I really liked and others that I felt a little underwhelmed with. Overall, I find it twisting and turning, thrilling, questioning, entertaining, with an ending that I didn’t actually predict.

This was completely different to Chocolat, which just shows Joanne can write across a multitude of genres.

A Narrow Door is the latest novel in the St Oswalds series of books. I’ve read and loved all these psychological thrillers and wasn’t disappointed by this one. St Oswalds has finally become co-educational, a change driven by the first woman Head, Rebecca Buckfast. As the oldest member of staff, Classics teacher Roy Straitley isn’t impressed with the changes. However, when something that looks like a body is spotted in the grounds, Rebecca begins to tell Roy the story of her brother who disappeared in mysterious circumstances when she was only 5 years old.
Rebecca is a fascinating character, an unreliable witness with as much to cover up as to explain. But why is she at St Oswalds? And why is she telling Roy her story?
The book powers through with twists and turns and an excellent ending which finally reveals all. Another excellent novel from Joanne Harris.
Thank you to #netgalley and #orionbooks for allowing me to review this ARC

A gripping read that keeps you guessing right until the chilling ending. Harris has created a wonderfully unreliable narrator in Rebecca - traumatised as a child, Rebecca is unable to unlock the truth regarding her brother's disappearance. As she returns to the scene of her brother's disappearance, the creaky traditions of St Oswalds are gradually exposed and truths uncovered as the author permits glimpses of the past and present as they come crashing together in a cacophony of truth. It took me a while to get engrossed into the tale as the timeline shifts and the narrators alter, but this may be an issue with reading on a Kindle. Smart clever and engrossing I would highly recommend this book in all it's intriguing mystery, which plays on the idea of memory, idolisation, control and entitlement. Rebecca will long live in your memory and the chilling presence of Mr Smallface lurking in the shadows across the decades.

I was sent a copy of A Narrow Door by Joanne Harris to read and review by NetGalley. I have always loved reading novels by Joanne Harris and I was especially pleased that this one took the reader back to St Oswald's Grammar School for Boys, which in this book is transformed into St Oswald’s Academy, now a mixed school with a female ‘Headmaster’. I especially liked the chapters narrated by long serving Latin teacher Roy Straitley, a lead player in previous books in the series, written with a good deal of humour and wit. I did feel that there were a few too many repetitions/reiterations scattered throughout and I did find myself a little confused from time to time, however, it was still a cracking good read and I heartily recommend it.

I know that Joanne Harris is a very prolific author and I know that she writes within multiple genres. However, I think the only other book of hers that I’ve read is The Gospel of Loki many years ago. I was very excited to try a psychological thriller with dark academia vibes and it certainly didn’t disappoint. I had no idea until I sat down to write this review that it’s actually technically the third in a trilogy. So, you can definitely read this as a riveting stand-alone!

When Rebecca Price was just five years old, her older brother Conrad disappeared. Now a grown woman and mother, Rebecca Buckfast is the headteacher at St Oswald’s, a prestigious school that has historically only admitted boys but is now fully open to girls too. Through conversations with aging Latin professor Roy Straitley, Rebecca is determined to tell her story and get to the truth of what happened to her brother while dismantling the patriarchal world that has always been firmly closed to her.

Rebecca is a fascinating character. She has so much drive and wants to make positive changes. However, there is a huge cloud of darkness and danger surrounding her. Men have every reason to be afraid of her and I got the impression that she would stop at nothing to get what she wanted. Following her story made for very compelling reading and I just wanted to get to the bottom of the Conrad mystery and I could tell that she did too.

Straitley knows that Rebecca is a force to be reckoned with but not in an obvious way. Of course, Straitley comes from a world where women are assumed to be meek, submissive, unassuming creatures and he is plagued by misogyny and other prejudices which show themselves, as most men of his ilk are. Yet he can see how powerful Rebecca can be. I think he senses the darkness in her past and can see how deadly that can be.

For much of her story, Rebecca is in a relationship with a man called Dominic who adores her. She repeatedly feels that she doesn’t deserve the love that he and his family try to bestow on her, which is a very common trait in someone who has grown up in the shadow of someone else. I knew that something huge was going to happen at some point in this strand of the story but I certainly didn’t have all the answers before they were revealed. I was quite literally blown away as everything started to come together and couldn’t help but think how clever Harris is at writing these intricate plot points.

Rebecca’s parents are very traditional and even decades later, the loss of their son is still red raw. Rebecca has lived with this immense sense of grief and despair since she was five and the pressure to make her parents proud must have been a very heavy load for her to bear. She got pregnant as a teenager and it’s clear that in her parents’ eyes, Rebecca has never reached the heady heights that Conrad apparently did at just 14 years old. Of course, parents always have a rosy view of their children and this is the image of him that has been drummed into Rebecca’s head throughout her life.

There is also a lot of commentary on gender roles and the strength of women that goes largely unnoticed. These things certainly aren’t a thing of the past. There are plenty of people out there who believe that men and women are suited to certain tasks or career paths and that it isn’t a good idea for these ideals to shatter. These reminders of the reasons behind Rebecca’s professional fight give her cause more justification and makes her very easy to root for.

A Narrow Door is a page-turning, eerie mystery that also manages to celebrate a woman’s success in a patriarchal world. The setting of St Oswald's brings a dark claustrophic atmosphere to the book while the contemporary progressive themes that arise offer glimpses of light. It follows a very interesting, complex protagonist and constantly unravels twists that make it virtually unputdownable.

Rebecca Buckfast is the new head at St Oswalds Academy. It has taken her over twenty years to get this position and in her early fortys not only the youngest ever head but a woman to boot.
But Rebecca has a very good reason for wanting to be headmistress at St Oswalds and has killed to be here.
Thirty five years ago her brother Conrad disappeared just like that vanished into thin air.
No leads no sightings except that five year old Rebecca remembers Mr Smallface and a green door.
What has St Oswalds got to do with the disappearance of her brother and will Rebecca have to kill again to stop the truth from coming out?A dark and twisted thriller.

I really wanted to love A Narrow a door, in fact it’s enchanting so I should have loved it (but it’s too slow for me.)
I love suspense but I need more action from a story!

What I did manage to read I really loved, I don’t know why I didn’t progress with this one.

A dark and complex psychological thriller that once started I could not put down. I had no idea when I started it that this book was part of a series, but it stands up incredibly well as a story in its own right, reading like a standalone that tells you everything you need to know within its pages. That being said, as a huge fan of Joanne Harris, I will definitely go back and read the first two in the series as I enjoyed this one so much.

With a rich cast of characters and a storyline that kept me on my toes throughout, A Narrow Door is a book I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend. Joanne Harris is a writer at the top of her game and I eagerly await whatever she comes up with next.

My full and expanded review of this brilliant book will be posted on my blog soon.