“Because it was the lies that got me here in the first place. And I have to believe that it’s the truth that will get me out.”
Nominated for Best Mystery and Thriller in the Goodreads Choice Awards, The Turn of the Key is a 2019 book by serial bestseller Ruth Ware. The story follows Rowan Caine, a woman who accepts a live-in nannying post at the gorgeous Heatherbrae House in the Scottish Highlands. However, what follows is a nightmarish experience that ends with a child dead and herself writing to her lawyer from prison. Told from her perspective, Rowan recounts the troubling events that led to her incarceration. It is a story of constant surveillance, malfunctioning technology and the girls she was caring for, who turned out to be far from the model children she had initially met. If you loved Ruth Ware’s eerie setting, unreliable narrators and psychological suspense, join us for the best books like The Turn of the Key at What We Reading!
Zero Days – Ruth Ware
Kicking off our list of books like The Turn of the Key is another one of the best Ruth Ware books, 2023’s Zero Days. Jack and her husband are the best penetration specialists in the business. Together, they are hired by companies to break into buildings and hack complex security systems. But, after what was supposed to be a routine assignment goes horribly wrong, Jack returns home to find her husband dead.
Add to the horror the police are closing the net around their prime suspect – her. Finding herself suddenly on the run and fast running out of options, Jack must choose who she can trust in her life as she veers closer and closer to the orbit of the real killer.
The Girl Before – J.P. Delaney
Similar to The Turn of the Key, J.P. Delaney’s The Girl Before features a modern, high-tech house with strict rules and a dark history. After a personal tragedy, Jane is in need of a fresh start. When she stumbles upon One Folgate Street, she is instantly drawn its minimalist design and its mysterious but seductive creator. The architect of the house makes her agree to a number of bizarre rules that are designed to transform those living in it – and it does.
Moving in, Jane soon learns about the untimely death of the house’s previous tenant, a woman similar to her in both age and appearance named Emma. As Jane tries to untangle the truth from the lies, she unknowingly begins to make the same choices, crosses paths with the same people and experiences the same terror as the girl before.
The Heiress – Rachel Hawkins
When Ruby McTavish Callahan Woodward Miller Kenmore dies, not only is she North Carolina’s richest woman, but also its most infamous. The victim of a kidnapping as a child and a four-time widow, she towered over the small town of Tavistock from the grand estate, Ashby House. With her death, both the estate and Ruby’s immense fortune pass to her adopted son, Camden. However, to everyone’s surprise, Cam wants nothing to do with the inheritance, the fortune or any of the remaining McTavishes.
A decade on, Cam and his wife Jules are summoned back to Ashby House following the death of his uncle. As the estate begins to tighten its grip on the pair once more, questions about the infamous heiress come to light. Soon, Jules and Cam realise that an inheritance can entail far more than what is written in a will and that the bonds of family can extend even beyond the grave.
The Wife Between Us – Greer Hendricks And Sarah Pekkanen
Another mystery-thriller nominee in the Goodreads Choice Awards and similar to The Turn of the Key thanks to its use of rising suspense and unreliable narration, The Wife Between Us introduces readers to Vanessa and Nellie. Vanessa is the ex-wife of the wealthy and enigmatic Richard, a hedge fund manager. Nellie is his new fiance.
With Richard preparing to move on with his life with his new partner, Vanessa finds herself becoming more and more obsessed with her supposed replacement. Like with Ruth Ware’s story, The Wife Between Us is told from Vanessa’s perspective, jumping between the past and present to show how her relationship fell apart, and how she has coped with in its aftermath.
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The New Couple In 5B – Lisa Unger
Rosie and Chad Lowan are barely making ends meet in New York City when they receive life-changing news: Chad’s recently deceased uncle has left them his glamorous apartment at the historic Windermere. With its pre-war elegance and impeccably uniformed doorman, the entire building is the embodiment of high-class charm. Yet, underneath the facade, there is a dark history lurking in the shadows.
As the Lowans settle into their new surroundings, Rosie begins to suspect there may be more to Windermere than what meets the eye. Why are there cameras everywhere? Why is the doorman always present? And why have there been so many violent crimes within its walls? When one of their neighbours is discovered dead, Rosie must unlock the truth about the Windermere before she and her husband find herself under its dangerous spell.
The Hunting Party – Lucy Foley
During the lazy days of the Christmas break, a group of friends from Oxford meet to see the New Year together, a tradition they have upheld since their student days. This year, they have selected a picturesque and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands as their perfect place for getting away and unwinding. They arrive on December 30th, right as a historic blizzard knocks out the power and seals them off from the world outside.
Two days later, on New Year’s Day, one of them is found dead. After a decade in the making, the weight of secret resentments, bitter jealousies and hidden rivalries soon threatened to spill over. One of them is dead, and another of them did it. With its isolated Scottish setting and shocking series of twists, Lucy Foley’s The Hunting Party is another great follow-up thriller for any fans of The Turn of the Key.
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The Sanatorium (Detective Elin Warner #1) – Sarah Pearse
Engulfed by threatening peaks and dense forest, Le Sommet has always been a sinister place. Long plagued by troubling rumours, the former abandoned sanatorium has since been remodelled into an upscale, minimalist five-star hotel. High up in the Swiss Alps, it makes for an imposing getaway spot. One that Elin Warner isn’t keen on visiting. But, when her estranged brother, Isaac, and his fiance, Laure, invite her to celebrate their engagement, she has no real reason not to accept.
Arriving in the midst of a threatening storm, there’s something about the hotel that immediately makes Elin uneasy. And when they wake the next morning to find Laure is missing, she must rely on all of her instincts if they have any hope of finding her. Locked in, the remaining guests begin to panic. What they don’t know is that another woman has also gone missing. And she’s the only one who could have warned them just how much danger they’re all in.
The Breakdown – B.A. Paris
Cass is having a difficult time since the night she saw the car in the woods, travelling down the winding road in the pouring rain with the woman inside – the woman who had been killed. She has been attempting to put the crime out of her mind. After all, what else could she have done, really? The road was dangerous in a storm, her husband would have been furious if he learned she had broken her promise, and she probably only would have been hurt herself if she had stopped.
But, ever since, she’s found herself forgetting every little thing. From where she left her car, if she took her pills, the alarm to why she ordered a pram when she doesn’t have a baby. The only thing she cannot forget is the woman, the one she could have saved. With silent calls she’s receiving and the creepy feeling that someone’s also watching her, B.A. Paris’ The Breakdown is a chilling psychological thriller perfect for any fans of The Turn of the Key.
Lock Every Door – Riley Sager
Rounding off our collection of books similar to The Turn of the Key is one of the best thrillers by Riley Sager, Lock Every Door. The only rules Jules Larsen has to follow as an apartment sitter at the Bartholomew, one of Manhattan’s most high-profile and mysterious buildings, are no visitors, no nights away and no disturbing the other residents.
As she familiarises herself with the glamorous building and its staff, Jules encounters Ingrid, another sitter who eerily resembles the sister she lost eight years ago. Ingrid reveals there’s something dark lurking in the walls of the Bartholomew. It is only when Ingrid vanishes that Jules begins to take these warnings seriously. Once she learns Ingrid wasn’t the first sitter to disappear, she is forced into a deadly race to unmask a killer, expose the building’s hidden past and escape the Bartholomew before it is too late.
Part-time reader, part-time rambler, and full-time Horror enthusiast, James has been writing for What We Reading since 2022. His earliest reading memories involved Historical Fiction, Fantasy and Horror tales, which he has continued to take with him to this day. James’ favourite books include The Last (Hanna Jameson), The Troop (Nick Cutter) and Chasing The Boogeyman (Richard Chizmar).
