Oh my, what an incredibly tense novel this is. ‘Nerve-shredding’ is a term which is often used, but I don’t think it’s been more apt than to describe this story. Whilst it’s not horror, the tense opening chapters had me wanting to sleep with the light on – it was unnerving.

This book builds up the tension and doesn’t let up. It starts with a relatively simple line “There was someone in the house.” But what does that entail? A woman, living alone with her two young children, a blizzard raging outside, suddenly realising they’re not alone in their own home. A desperate scramble to hide, to protect, a mother’s instincts driving her through the terror. And all the time, the footsteps get closer. There’s someone in the house. What does he want? How will they survive? The book leads the reader through the action moment to moment as the family is holed up in peril, and it makes excruciating reading.

Somewhere around the middle of the story, the tone and pace changes a little. As opposed to staying in the present moment, there’s a lot of looking back on how our protagonist got here, her history with her ex-husband and the personal trauma she is trying to move on from. The constant flashbacks do feel like they detract a little from the present-day action, but they do help to give context and draw a portrait of a fragile woman who may be at breaking point.

As everyone seems to be against the protagonist, the question of an unreliable narrator comes into play and I had no idea which way this story was going to go. With tension continuously building, so that even the reader doesn’t know how to trust, this makes for a clever, nuanced and multi-layered debut.

A intense creepy atmosphere kept me on the edge of my seat for this one!
Heart pounding, intricately plotted & enraging at times.

A creepy and horrifying tale, which made me so anxious...

Imagine, you're alone in your remote house with your two young children during a blizzard, creepy enough right?! Now you see a man standing on the stairs..what would you do?

This kind of thing terrifies me! The thought of something happening to my children makes me want to throw up, but to have that threat in my own home, awful!

So I probably shouldn't have started reading this when I was camping, reading in my darkened tent, every shout made me jump!

The start of this book was incredible! The writing was so good-inside the head of the mother, I could feel the terror, anger, love, sadness and doubt. I really enjoyed it, no I didn't, but I was obsessed with this book, and also didn't want to read it! The way it made me sweat, but simultaneously gave me chills...

I didn't give it five stars because of the gaslighting during the middle part of the book. I absolutely know that it's a relevant and integral part of the story, but it made me so uncomfortable. I guess the first part was really frightening, but the scariest part was the gaslighting, how easily doubt was cast, how easily sanity and mental health was questioned. The after effects, and the impact of that?!

I really liked how it ended and would recommend this to anyone looking for a suspenseful psychological thriller, with elements of horror. This author managed to scare me and fill me with panic! 👏

This is not a book to be read late at night when you are on your own. It is quite a simple storyline - a mother, alone in a remote house with her two young children during a snowstorm, hears an invader entering her house. The pace is quite slow, which helps build up the suspense and the tension, but can at times come across as long winded and frustrating.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review a copy of this book.

I struggled to get into this book at first as the way the opening scene panned out confused me a bit but as the plot unraveled I found I was hooked.
The bleak scenery painted a lonely and hopeless picture whilst the characters were well written and the build up of tension perfectly executed.

A mother is forced to the breaking point when her life and the lives of her children are threatened by an intruder.

The synopsis of this book had me hooked right away, this book was dread inducing but this isn't your typical thriller. This book is VERY slow paced. There are a lot of flashback scenes that bogged the plot down and pacing was definitely an issue with the current scenes as well, our MC would spend 4 pages contemplating what to do but only 5seconds would have passed in the story, This book is VERY inner monologue heavy, which I think also hindered the pace and my personal enjoyment of the story.

This is still a very solid debut in the suspense category.

Set in America, this book starts in the middle of the night during a blizzard when a mother is home alone with her young children. Then she realises she can hear someone walking up the stairs. The books starts with the threat of menace and the split second decisions that need to be made fight or flight to save her children. Is there someone in the house, or is it an old house creaking and where is her husband the father of the children?
This mystery thriller is full of suspense, a book that makes you hold your breath and not one to be read at bed time in the house by yourself unless you're ready for the scare that it gives you!
The suspense in the opening part of the book is thrilling and the aftermath of events leaves you questioning what really happened in a very clever way. A real page turner that get me wanting more to find out what happens. Readers of general/contemporary/mystery thrillers would probably enjoy this book.

With thanks to Penguin General UK-Fig Tree, Hamish Hamiton, Viking, Penguin Life, Penguin Business for the preview read of #Nightwatching #NetGalley.

This book was a bit slow going for me and my usual style of books, Disappointing as the storyline sounded so interesting but it didn't quite hit the spot with me.

A fast-paced thriller that grabs you right from the start and doesn't let go!

That start, with the mother alone in the house with her young son hiding from an intruder, has probably one of the best opening sequences I have read in a book in recent times. The writing was full of suspense and really pulled me into the story.

Having managed to escape, her version of events is then questioned by the people she would naturally have expected to be sympathetic and to support her, and who instead imply that she is either making it up or suffering from some sort of illusion, and I could really feel her frustration at that coming through the pages. That being said, the way the plot was woven by the author meant that there was a logic behind their cynicism, which at times lead me to wonder if the story being told by the mother was in fact genuine, or a figment of her imagination.

And therein lies the brilliance of this story for me. At a time when an experienced reader can often guess the big reveal of a story from quite early on, this book is a welcome change!

With thanks to NetGalley, the publishers, and of course the author, for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Woah. Didn't really know what to expect going into this book, the title could lead anywhere which was what drew me to it when I was browsing.

A mother is forced to the breaking point when her life and the lives of her children are threatened by an intruder. She hears a noise as she is coming out of her son's bedroom and then she sees a figure. Someone is in the house.

This book had suspense in bucketloads. I'm a late night reader anyway but I was staying up until all hours unable to put this down and then overthinking every noise in my own house as I went to sleep. Every mother's worst fear surely, a credible threat to her children, but as the book progressed its horrifying thought provoking, so many layers. I genuinely had no idea how it was going to end. Such a fantastic read.

This tale starts with a bang, a lone woman is comforting her young son in the middle of the night, when suddenly she realises a menacing stranger is in the house, what in the hell is she going to do?
I have to say, I don't think I've ever felt so tense during the first chapter of a book, my shoulders were pretty much up round my ears the whole time. The tension didn't continue at quite that pace, but I still became fully immersed in the story. It seems to go a little deeper than your average psychological thriller, and even though it's far fetched, and at times repetitive, the main character - none of the characters are named by the way - did, and said frustratingly stupid things, and never mind that without exception, every male character is an infuriating, gaslighting arseh*le, I just couldn't stop flipping those pages. Tense, immersive and entertaining, 4.5 stars. Many thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the arc.

Not an easy book to review without spoilers but here goes.
A psychological thriller where the main characters are not named, set in an old New England mansion it explores the lengths a mother will go to protect her children. The tension slowly builds to a high point as the mother’s fears grow but are these fears real or imagined only time will tell. Family relationships are explored in flashbacks as the picture of her life slowly builds and we are led to differing conclusions. Not an easy read but in my opinion a worthwhile and thought provoking one.

Nightwatching for me was a book that in the first chapter promised to be an edge of the seat read but didn’t maintain that in parts.
It’s late at night and a mother is soothing her son when she hears heavy footsteps coming up the stairs, thanks to a night light on the landing she knows he cannot see her so whilst he’s in her bedroom she creeps across the landing and gets her daughter out of her room and goes down stairs into the office where there is a hidden part of the house, she manages to find where the pull is and manages to get all of them through quietly and without being seen. She needs to keep her children quiet or he will find them but how is she going to get help? Neighbours are a mile away and school is cancelled tomorrow because of bad weather so who would know they were missing? She needs to do something before they starve or are found.
This book captured me from the first page but unfortunately the tenseness didn’t keep up throughout the book, there was some weird things that happened when she was looking after her mother in law when she was ill that were to me just strange. The book was more along the lines of horror than thriller but I did finish it and although it’s not my favourite read this year it’s not my worst.
I would like to thank NetGalley and Penguin General UK, Viking for this ARC I received in exchange for an honest review.

DNF@20% - No Rating.

‘How long had it been? Time stretched and pulled.’

The above quote pretty much sums up my experience with Nightwatching. Gosh it was painful to read, so slow moving. Eight chapters of a nameless mother and her two young children hiding in a crawlspace, while an intruder roams their house, smashing the children's toys (for some reason?), and taunting them like he's the Big Bad Wolf in a fairy tale. Also, in relation to that, the main character loves to recite nursery rhymes in her head. And when she's not doing that, she's thinking about her toxic relationship with her father-in-law, bees, how the chimney sweeper thinks the house is haunted, the history of the crawlspace they're hiding in, and pretty much everything else except for how to get her and her children out of the dangerous situation they've found themselves in. And when she's not doing that, she's moaning about how she banged her head while entering the crawlspace, and how her breast is bruised from where her terrified five-year-old son kicked her. I'm so over these weak female characters. And her husband sounds like a dickweed.

Where's the action? Where's the tension? When does it get scary? When does something happen? Maybe it gets better. Perhaps it has a whooper of an ending. Maybe everything I've mentioned above is relevant to the plot. IDK, but I just can't read any more.

I’d like to thank Netgalley, UK, Penguin UK, and Tracy Sierra for the e-ARC.

An excellent book - truly creepy. To know that someone is watching and threatening you and your children in your house but no-one believes you is a frightening premise and makes for a brilliant novel. Great characters and very compelling. I had to finish reading this before I could go to bed!

A thoroughly enjoyable read that has you guessing and second guessing throughout. Well paced with authentic characters I found this book very engaging.

Before I get into the meat of my review, let me just say that this book is utterly incredible, thoughtfully written, and best read knowing as little as possible going into it. Whilst this book will not get into spoilers for this book, I highly, highly recommend stopping reading this review here and just picking-up this book, you won't regret it.

Picture this: it is the middle of winter and you are home alone with two children when you hear a sound that shouldn't be there - footsteps - in the middle of the night and then you see him, there is a stranger in your house with you. This is exactly the situation that one protagonist of our book is faced with as she fights to find a way to keep her two children and herself safe. Sierra does an incredible job of building the tension and fear as our three characters hide as the mother attempts to form a plan to get help. The tension of the events within the house are cleverly interspersed with scenes that paint the picture of our protag's backstory and start to create a tapestry of a woman who is attempting to simply exist whilst the men in her life fill her life with micro-aggressions. I won't get into details but there is one particular flashback scene that takes place in a café that is so infuriating as it has such an insidious undercurrent...

This is a book that will make you angry but for all of the right reasons. There is a darkness at the heart of this story and it feels as though there are so many layers to the trauma that our characters face. What I think makes this book so well is that part of the horror lies not in the stranger in the house but in the responses of the people around our protag. I also really appreciate the slightly unsatisfactory nature of the ending of this book; it felt only right that this world not be a neat kind of story.

I am excited to read more from this author because this is one of the best thrillers I have read.

Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

✔️ slow burn suspense
✔️ suffocatingly atmospheric
✔️ keeps you guessing

This book has a truly horrifying premise, a mother wakes in the middle of the night and hears an intruder in her home and proceeds to hide in the house with her two young children.

The book is stiflingly scary in moments and I really had no idea how this one was going to end. I do feel the book was overwritten in parts and some flashbacks were a little too long which lost the tension in some chapters.

Overall, this novel certainly provided a physical emotional reaction for me and I couldn’t possibly stop reading until I discovered the truth of the matter. I was very scared and worried for the children so the author absolutely succeeded in that aspect. Even if you don’t agree with every action of our protagonist, there’s no doubt she’s a mother trying her very best to protect her children - something many of us can relate to - which made it difficult to read in the sense that is was sickeningly scary. If you enjoy a slow burn build of tension, this is the suspense novel for you!

Thank you to the author, publisher and netgalley for the review copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

Home alone with her young children during a blizzard, a mother tucks her son back into bed in the middle of the night. Then she hears a noise - old houses are always making some kind of noise. But this sound is disturbingly familiar; it's the tread of footsteps, unusually heavy and slow, coming up the stairs...in that split second she has three choices. Hide, run or fight!

'There was someone in the house' as the opening line is going to sends shivers down anyone's spine. We have all lived or stayed somewhere where regular house noises have sounded like something more sinister but in Nightwatching it's not creaky floorboards it is an intruder. As the protagonist spots a shadowy silhouette her first thought it how to protect her sleeping children. A real life worst nightmare coming true in fiction form is definitely scary. As we follow this mother make snap decisions you can't help but wonder what you would do in this situation. However just as the tension is becoming palpable it is cut through with recollections of the past. For me this meant that the book lost momentum as a thriller and instead became a study of a woman and how she is portrayed by everyone from her in laws to her neighbours. This is not necessarily a bad thing but it was not what I was expecting. As the book progresses, the back and forward combined with the way events unfolded left me both confused and annoyed by all the men in this story. Thankfully I did find the ending redeemed things as it was highly satisfying. Overall there were elements I really liked but I just didn't love it.

What if you wake up in the middle of the night, and hear someone in your house?

Nightwatching describes this scenario perfectly and definitely kept me up at night!