The Maid follows the story of Molly, a maid at the Regency Grand Hotel. She loves her job and
does it well. Molly is organized, tidy, direct, and usually completely naïve. Her lack of social
intelligence makes it hard to make friends and so she relies on her Gran, the woman who she
loves and respects more than anyone else in the world, to help guide her through her problems.
So when her Gran passes away she is left lonesome and miserable. She dives deep into her
work with “gusto”, but still longs for human connection.
In her search for feeling loved and accepted once again, she turns to the few people who
acknowledge her at all, there’s Giselle Black, the young second wife of Charles Black a
well-to-do businessman and frequent guest at the hotel, Rodney, the good looking and
seemingly friendly bartender with a sly smile, and Juan Manual, an illegal immigrant who works
in the kitchen washing dishes.
During one of her shifts, Molly goes to clean Mr. and Mrs. Black’s suit where she finds Mr. Black
dead in his bed. Being the first person to find him, she goes with Detective Stark for questioning.
Her lack of reading people’s expressions and intentions makes her seem rather suspicious.
When Molly helps Rodney with a “favour” and afterward there are traces of cocaine in her
cleaning cart, she is suddenly the prime suspect of a murder and drug running.
When her maid uniform goes on she becomes practically invisible, but now all eyes are on her.
How will she get out of this mess?
Personal Opinion:
Personally, I was very disappointed with this book. Nine different magazines chose as one of the
Ten Best Books of the Year the Maid, a Good Morning America Book Club pick, and a Finalist
for the Edgar Award, just to name a few. Yet I don’t think it deserves any of these.
So when I found a copy at the Friends of Newport Beach Public Library bookstore, I was elated
and bought it immediately.
When I first started reading, I thought it was set in the 1930s because the Regency Grand Hotel
is described as art déco, and Molly has a short black bob. Perhaps the author was going for a
classic Agatha Christie-type mystery? But to my surprise and disappointment, Molly pulled out
an iPhone.
One could argue that the current-day setting was necessary to the plot but a time setting like the
30s would have made the story more enjoyable.
Molly’s character is very unlikeable. She’s frustratingly oblivious to important things yet
somehow she pays close attention to the tiniest of details which at no point in the story prove
useful. She seems to have the mental capacity of an overly simplistic child.
I wanted to like her - I really tried, but she’s literally the young adult version of Amelia Bedelia.
The plot is uninteresting, and fillers like illegal immigration, drug running, abuse, and too many
stereotypical characters were thrown in to “spice things up”. It didn’t help. There is a dull twist
thrown in at the very end that makes no difference whatsoever to the story and only makes me
dislike Molly all the more!
The author, Nita Prose, is an editor in the book business and I believe this was her first book.
So, I’ve got to give her some credit because obviously writing a book isn’t easy and she did well
in the sense that it compelled me enough to finish the book. Her style of writing is (although not
great plot-wise) good enough to pull you into the book and make you forget you live in a much
better world than Molly does.
Although she overuses the “gusto” way too much in The Maid, I don’t think I can ever use that
word again without thinking about Molly’s enthusiasm for cleaning bathroom counters.
In the end, I could only endure by imagining Molly as a person like Sandra Bullock on All About
Steve and trying to pretend that she was supposed to be comical.
Molly is always cleaning but reading this book makes you feel grimy and I definitely wish I could
unread it.
I really wanted to like this book, but it was just too appalling, and I procrastinated writing this
review for months.
Read The Maid at your own risk but if you’re looking for a real mystery, try reading any of
Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot books.

Check out the Maid at NBPL!