Author: Colleen Hoover · Published: 2018 · Genre: Psychological Thriller, Romantic Suspense
Verity is Colleen Hoover’s dark thriller about a struggling writer who moves into a famous author’s house and finds a manuscript full of horrifying confessions. It’s gripping, lurid and built for late-night reading, but it’s also crude in places and far more disturbing than its reputation as a BookTok favourite suggests. Read it if you like provocative suspense and can handle graphic content. Skip it if harm to children is a hard line for you.
What it’s about
Lowen Ashleigh is a writer who is broke, grieving her mother and about to lose her apartment. Out of nowhere, she’s offered a lucrative contract to finish the remaining books in a bestselling series by Verity Crawford, who can no longer write after a serious car accident. Verity’s husband, Jeremy, invites Lowen to the family’s Vermont home to go through his wife’s notes.
The Crawfords have already suffered terribly. Their twin daughters, Chastin and Harper, have both died, and their young son, Crew, is the only child left. Verity lies upstairs, silent and dependent on care. In Verity’s office, Lowen finds an unpublished autobiography in which Verity describes, in her own voice, her marriage and her feelings about her children. What it reveals is appalling. Lowen keeps it from Jeremy, even as she finds herself drawn to him.
What works
- The manuscript. The autobiography chapters, written in Verity’s voice, are the most memorable part of the book. They’re genuinely shocking, and they give the reader the same guilty compulsion Lowen feels as she keeps reading. Lowen’s own history of sleepwalking adds another layer of doubt about what she sees in the house at night.
- Gothic atmosphere. A creepy house, a wife who may or may not be aware of what’s happening, a grieving husband and a narrator who shouldn’t be there: the setup echoes Rebecca and Jane Eyre and updates them for a modern, much less restrained audience.
- Momentum. Short chapters, cliffhangers and a clear central question keep things moving. Most readers finish it in a sitting or two.
- Talkability. The ending is designed to start arguments, and it does. Whatever you think of the book, you’ll want to discuss it with someone.
The controversy
Verity was self-published in 2018, became a phenomenon on BookTok, and was republished by Grand Central in 2021. That success has made it one of the most debated thrillers of recent years.
The main criticism is content. The book pairs explicit sex scenes with graphic descriptions of violence and of harm to children, and many readers feel the erotic material sits uncomfortably close to the abuse. Critics argue that it uses trauma for shock value, and some worry that readers who know Hoover from her romance novels, including teenagers who found her online, pick it up unprepared. Defenders say it’s a deliberately transgressive thriller meant to disturb, in the tradition of Gillian Flynn, and that it is plainly written for adults.
The ending also splits opinion: some readers find it clever and unsettling, others think it’s a cheat. Beyond that, the prose is plain, the dialogue can be clumsy, and the romance between Lowen and Jeremy has more heat than depth. Lowen’s choices also strain belief at times, and the plot depends on them.
A film adaptation starring Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett is set for release in October 2026, so expect the arguments to start again.
Who should read it
Adults who enjoy dark, provocative thrillers and don’t mind explicit sex and violence. It’s a lively book-club pick if your group likes to argue. Go in knowing as little as possible. Anyone for whom child harm or sexual content is a trigger should skip it.
Rating: 3/5
Image credits — Cover image via Open Library. Cover design © the publisher, shown for review purposes.
