Initially published in 2013 The Woman Upstairs received rave reviews by Dwight Garner of The New York Times. He said: The Woman Upstairs is an intelligent, beautifully written novel that is also fierce and unyielding. It’s a novel that makes you feel deeply, both for its narrator and for the world she inhabits. It’s a novel that leaves you feeling, in the end, a little wrung out, a little exhilarated, a little changed.” The Washington Post added: "The Woman Upstairs is an intense and powerful novel. Messud deftly explores the many ways in which we are held captive by our own desires, hopes, and regrets and how we can break free.”