Book Review – The Woman in Suite 11 by Ruth Ware

This book takes place a decade after Ruth Ware’s massively popular debut novel The Woman in Cabin 10. We find Laura Blacklock, or Lo as she likes to be called, married with two kids and looking to get back into the travel writing business after having kids during the pandemic. She is offered a weekend away for media at a hotel and resort for rich people operated by an aging mogul – Marcus Leidmann – looking to leave his conglomerate to anyone but his son, not that his son is aware of that. The catch is that Carrie, the woman who dragged Lo into the mess she found herself in during the events of the first book, has been Marcus’s prisoner for several years and is looking to escape. By prisoner, I mean he uses her for sex and is often verbally and physically abusive. Carrie hatches a plan to escape that involves Lo letting her use one of her passports (Lo has two, an American one and a British one) to disappear so Marcas can’t find her.

This book is exactly what you would expect from Ruth Ware. Fast paced. Well written. Plot twists. The kind of book, much like The Woman in Cabin 10, that is great on paper but hard to adapt into a film because sometimes stories only work in one art form. I say this knowing that I had a fun time reading both of these books but….

But. Lo Blacklock is the most naive, overly trusting character I have ever seen. After everything she has been through, one would think she would question Carrie’s intentions. It is so overwhelmingly obvious that Carrie has ulterior motives and that she is manipulating Lo that it became a little frustrating for me to read. I get it. Lo is supposed to be like that. It’s part of her character. But at one point, she spends the night in a hotel with Carrie without a care in the world even though the two of them just escaped another country by sharing passports. And she blindly believes that a man is working for Interpol without ever seeing any kind of identification, not to mention that she acts in a way that local law enforcement think she is guilty when Marcus ends up dead. What a frustrating character.

That said, I did really enjoy reading this book with its imperfect characters. The plotting makes up for it even if I could see where it was headed because the main character was so oblivious. Maybe this book could have been told from Carrie’s perspective. I would have found that to be a more interesting story as she tried to escape the clutches of a rich elderly narcissist. Lo’s perspective is one we’ve seen before and it hasn’t changed much.

4 out of 5 stars for great plotting and writing of a well tread character.