Review by yvo_about_books - The Paris Apartment

yvo_about_books 's review for:

The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley

3.0

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Finished reading: March 18th 2025

"It’s not about where you came from. What kind of shit might have happened to you in the past. It’s about who you are. What you do with the opportunities life presents to you."

I've had mixed reactions to Lucy Foley's writing so far, but I do love a good locked room thriller so I couldn't resist giving The Paris Apartment a try. The premise sounded without doubt fantastic with the Paris apartment setting and the missing brother... But unfortunately this story didn't quite work as well for me personally. Don't get me wrong, the plot has a lot of potential and there were elements I really enjoyed, but as a whole The Paris Apartment failed to hit the mark for me completely. This partly had to to with the writing and structure of the plot: the chapters were just too short for me and the fact that they always ended in some sort of 'cliffhanger' right in the middle of the scene started to frustrate me more and more over time. I think that with longer chapters I would have appreciated the switches between the different inhabitants of the building a lot more... Although the characters themselves weren't exactly likeable or well developed; too many cliches and stereotypes. I wasn't a fan of the constant slut-shaming either to be honest, and this story had WAY too much family drama and twisted love triangles. I know these are personal pet peeves, but still... It definitely wasn't my cup of tea. Some of the twists were also quite easy to guess, which kind of put a damper on things. Sure, there were a couple of surprises as well, but as a whole I wasn't all that impressed by The Paris Apartment. I'm suspecting her writing might just not be a good fit for me?

Content Warnings