This is a terrifically atmospherically chilling crime thriller from Sarah Pearse, set in the snowy mountainous Swiss Alps, in the resort of Crans Montana and Le Sommet. An old disused TB sanatorium has been developed into an exclusive hotel by Lucas Caron, run by his sister, Cecile. Elin Warner, is suffering PTSD, acquired after the fallout from a case that went wrong in her work as a police officer. She has been off work for a year now, and she needs to make a decision as to whether she quits o...

Gosh. Darn. It! I really had high hopes for this one and felt like it started really well, alas the last third of it really dragged and I just wanted it to be over. Needless to say, this one unfortunately didn't work out as well as I'd hoped. Our protagonist was Elin Warner, a detective, who is on extended leave on account of a case that went south. When she receives an unexpected invitation from her estranged brother to celebrate his engagement at the remote and newly renovated Le Sommet, (loca...

Firstly, I have to say I don’t give 1 stars lightly. I’m well aware that at the other end of this review is an author who spent a lot of time and energy on creating this story, and I do not want to hurt anyone’s feelings Writing a book is torturous, and I have nothing but respect for anyone who finds themselves with their name on a front cover but, this book should not be published without a serious overhaul. (I received an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review – and you always get

So, a character has this nervous habit of chipping her nail polish, and then she’s hiding somewhere within the hotel, and they find her because they follow a TRAIL OF NAIL POLISH CHIPS.I believe this about sums this novel up.

There’s a solid chance this is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I don’t really care. It was literally 20 below and snowed for a solid 18 hours when I read this, so my disappointment is a pretty palpable thing. The story here is about a former sanatorium in the Alps which has been remodeled into a luxury hotel. Elin is supposed to be attending her brother’s engagement party, but bad weather and a little case of a dead body puts a damper on the celebration and with no ability for the police t...

Given the atmospheric, claustrophobic setting in the Swiss Alps during a blizzard I expected to like this book much more than I did – I wonder what went wrong here?Let’s start with the things I did enjoy, and the setting is definitely a treat. An old sanatorium high in the Swiss Alps that has been converted into a fancy but sinister hotel – it doesn’t get much better than this. And when a massive blizzard cuts off the hotel from civilisation, and people start dying, the stage is set for a tense

EXCERPT: She closes her eyes and hears echoed threats. 'Only babies tell, and you're a baby.''Tell tell tit, your tongue will split.'Her head is throbbing. 'Do that again and I'll kill you.'ABOUT 'THE SANITORIUM': EVERYONE'S IN DANGER. ANYONE COULD BE NEXT.An imposing, isolated hotel, high up in the Swiss Alps, is the last place Elin Warner wants to be. But she's taken time off from her job as a detective, so when she receives an invitation out of the blue to celebrate her estranged brother's re...

Elin a detective and her boyfriend Will have been invited to her brother Isaac’s engagement party. Isaac who is marrying Laura is holding the party at the luxury newly refurbished hotel Le Sommet. The hotel is set high in the alps and used to be a sanatorium. The journey to the hotel is hard as there has been heavy snow and a threat of an avalanche. Laura goes missing and a body is discovered. Elin starts to investigate what has happened. No one can travel to or from the hotel and everyone seems...

Heavy snowfall in the Swiss Alps. Elin and Will travel from the UK to attend Isaac and Laure's engagement party at a luxury hotel high up in the mountains. While the snow is getting thicker by the hour and the landscape turns more eerie, people go missing. The threat of an avalanche keeps the guests locked in and the police have no way to come up the mountain.Elin, being a detective back home, takes control and starts investigating as best she can. Missing turns into murdered and everyone become...

loved this beautifully atmospheric psychological thriller- it is often intensely creepy with an excellent central mystery element and a deeply chilly feel to it.This is one of those novels you fall into and read in great big chunks, you know the kind, the “just one more chapter” thing that keeps you up into the early hours.The characters are engaging, the setting is described pitch perfectly, it is unpredictable, edgy and clever. Proving that there is life in the psychological thriller genre an

Elin Warner and her boyfriend Will have been invited to celebrate her estranged brothers’ engagement to his fiancé Laure in an isolated hotel high up in the Swiss Alps called Le Sommet. The journey to the hotel is quite hard to get to and not only that the weather is also turning for the worst. There is a threat of an Avalanche. Elin does not happy with the situation but, she wants to be there for her brother Isaac. After been off on leave from her job as a Police detective and hasn’t decided if...

I absolutely loved this novel and it's as chilling as the location its set in. My heart was pounding just after reading the prologue and the tension and fear doesn't let up until the last page. Beautifully written and very atmospheric, with a perfect, claustrophobic setting; a remote, modern hotel that used to be a sanatorium in the Swiss mountains. Most of the guests - and the staff - had motives and I suspected everyone. The perfect chilling thriller. This would make a brilliant film. Highly r...

This should have been 5 stars, so many chilling and gruesome elements were present, but it just never delivers. The ending is a complete "this is how I did it" dump, which really sucks. Then there is another reveal (was it a twist?) on a train at the very, very end and I didn't even understand it!! If you did, feel free to explain in the comments. Quite a let down.

This was a tough one for me. On the one hand its a very atmospheric thriller with some great description and good dramatic tension. On the other its a not so brilliantly executed mystery with one of the most inept investigators I've ever seen who spends most of the book having her job mansplained to her by her incredibly horrible brother and significant other.Elin was a rising star in the London police before a botched investigation left her with PTSD and the fear that she might never be able to...

CW: Torture, description of sexual assaultI received this book from the publishers via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.High up on the Swiss Alps, a sanatorium turned high-end hotel welcomes Elin and her boyfriend Will as they arrive to celebrate Elin's brother's engagement. But tensions between Elin and her brother Isaac heighten when a snowstorm descends, and Laure - Isaac's fiancée - goes missing. When a body is discovered, Elin's left to investigate while the pool of suspects remai...

Set aside at 58%, then later decided I wouldn't be finishing it. The premise and location were both very appealing, but for me the book failed in the execution. I found it terribly slow and waited a long time for it to pick up, but it never did. I didn't care enough about any of the characters to worry about who was going to get bumped off, and I really disliked the main character, Elin, whose demeanour verged on histrionic (in the emotional sense), being constantly on the brink of tears. I hope...

Review to come, enjoyable read :)

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Viking for the ARC of The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearce. I enjoy reading locked room mysteries and this one fit the bill!I was immediately drawn into the premise of this atmospheric thriller. A grand hotel is built on the site of an old sanatorium in the Swiss Alps. Elin and her boyfriend Will are meeting her estranged brother, Isaac to celebrate his engagement. Elin hasn’t seen her brother in many years and is nervous to reunite. When a snow storm blows in

At an isolated hotel high in the Swiss Alps, cut off by bad weather and avalanches, a woman is murdered in a bizarre manner and another woman is missing. With the police unable to get to the hotel, guest Elin Warner, a detective currently on extended leave from the British police, has no choice but to start the investigation and liase with Swiss Police. Elin and her boyfriend Will have arrived at the newly opened hotel to celebrate the engagement of her estranged brother Isaac to Laure, an old c...

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, the medical community opened a new type of institution: the sanatorium. Designed to be a place where tuberculosis patients could receive treatment for their illness, these care facilities were usually built in high altitude locations in order to provide the freshest of air, as at the time, that cold and fresh air was believed to be the best treatment for diseases of the lung. They offered nutrition, sunlight, peaceful rest, and cool, crisp mountain air as t...

The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearse has all the elements of a great story. It was creepy, in a remote location, there are family tensions and people going missing. Throw in a massive snow storm to top it all off.... I could not get enough. No surprise really when it was named as Reese’s book of the month for February. If you like locked room mysteries filled with suspense then this is the book for you.Elon Warner is a police detective from the UK. She is currently on leave due to suffering PTSD after...

I’m sad to say, I didn’t enjoy this book as much as I expected. The narration style was nearly 100% tell and no show, the isolated Gothic Sanatorium had so much potential, but in the end, it felt mostly unexplored and wasted. The final show down and reveal were probably most disappointing of all - literally the remaining characters sat down together and the murderer walked everyone through all of the details and motivations step by step. Nearly the entire last hour of the audiobook was the bad g...

This was exciting and creepy from the first page. I know this area of Switzerland well having visited it awhile ago. The descriptions made this book more atmospheric talking about the snow and cold. This was a very twisty book and I kept guessing who was doing the killing a lot and getting it wrong every time. I didn’t find out who the culprit was until near the end which surprised me, this made the book even more enjoyable. I’m sure there will be a sequel, at least I hope so. My thanks to Netga...

This book was more about the journey than the destination: I loved this book all the way through, equally creepy and engrossing, but I was disappointed with the denouement. The main character Elin is actually really annoying and damaged, a detective on a break from work who gets roped in to the investigation at the sanatorium- it made me laugh a bit that every theory she came up with proved to be wrong- so obviously her break from work was a good idea! Many thanks to Netgalley for an arc of this...

Elin Warner and her boyfriend, Will Riley, are going to visit a luxury hotel in the Swiss Alps for the engagement of her brother, Isaac to Laure, who is the assistant manager. The hotel has been created from an old, disused TB sanatorium and Will, an architect, is interested in all of the design features. Elin, though, is not looking forward to the trip. Suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, on leave from her job as a detective, struggling after the death of her mother and nervous about...

I read this through my online book club Pigeonhole and admit that receiving a stave every 2nd day didn't do this story any favours. That aside, the book started off with promise and I was hoping a great plot would follow but alas this wasn't realised. The lead character, Elin, a policewoman on an extended break from her job, following a harrowing case and personal issues, seemed to stumble around like an amateur which didn't paint the police in positive colours for me. The ending was also too mu...

Booktrail the locations in The SanatoriumI know this book isn't out for ages but I'm so mixed up with times and dates and to be fair, I was just keen to get this out there as I enjoyed the book so much!Elin and her boyfriend Will are visiting her brother Isaac who is getting engaged. He’s based at the new Le Sommet hotel which used to be a sanatorium. Not long after the arrival, his fiancée goes missing….. and then a body is discovered…but is it her?Now that is a premise and a half. I start to r...

I was excited to dive into this book; the premise and atmospheric setting, a grand hotel built on an old sanatorium site in the remote Swiss Alps. And once the snowstorm arrives and bodies start to pile up, a real sense of danger and isolation. The perfect backdrop for a murder mystery. Nope. Unfortunately, this book failed to deliver. This book got off to a slow start. I had a hard time connecting with Elin. She has PTSD as a result of childhood trauma—asthma and panic attacks mostly. I found

Loved it. Perfect suspenseful book to enjoy over the long weekend. There was a creepiness to the story and at times I was really spooked. Wondering and hoping there is a sequel to this story.

Originally posted on Gobookmart Review : The sanatorium is possibly the most exhilarating debut novels that I’ve perused over the most recent couple of years. The sanatorium is a new type of institution opened by the medical community during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Intended to be where tuberculosis patients could get treatment for their disease or illness. These medical facilities were typically built on high height areas to give the freshest of air. The reason behind such considerati...