Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra

Title: Nightwatching

Author:  Tracy Sierra

Publisher: Pamela Dorman Books

Release Date: February 1, 2024

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

Home alone with her young children during a blizzard, a mother tucks her son back into bed in the middle of the night. 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.

She sees the figure of a man appear down the hallway, shrouded in the shadows. Terrified, she quietly wakes her children and hustles them into the oldest part of the house, a tiny, secret room concealed behind a wall. There they hide as the man searches for them, trying to tempt the children out with promises and scare the mother into surrender.

In the suffocating darkness, the mother struggles to remain calm, to plan. Should she search for a weapon or attempt escape? But then she catches another glimpse of him. That face. That voice. And at once she knows her situation is even more dire than she’d feared, because she knows exactly who he is—and what he wants.

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A mother is home alone with her two children during a blizzard when she hears someone coming up the steps. She knows every sound her house makes after many sleepless nights and she knows someone who is not a child is coming up. She can tell this person wants to bring them harm and she knows she needs to try to get to her kids before he makes it to them. She makes a run for it and wakes up her son and daughter and takes them to a secret space where she hopes he can't find them. 

Who is the man? Do they know him? Why are they the targets? Or is the mother imagining it all or is she the one who is trying to hurt her children?

The story started with an intense bang and held my attention for a bit. Yet, by the middle, it lost some of its luster but the end brought the sense of urgency back which helped. The downside I would say had to do with the story being told from a third point of view and the ridiculous name given to the bad guy. 

Cliffhanger: No

3/5 Fangs

A complimentary copy was provided by Pamela Dorman Books via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.