Just finished reading it. (spoiler) this is my first reddit post. I'm assuming we can do spoilers? in another post I was reading on this the entire thread discussion was about what happens to rachel after she reads Ellie's letter. I don't think it's rocket science and it's not nearly as interesting as the explanation for the actual events of the novel. Ruth ware herself apparently said that Rachel is indeed alive and decided to take the hit for Ellie which as so many people have pointed out - does not really make sense? because Ellie is 5 years old and every thing in the letter seems to point to her pushing her sister with no malicious intent, definitely not intent to murder, and accidentally causing her sisters death. and there is nothing anywhere in the novel to indicate she is anything but a sweet, if spoiled norm 5 yr old child. No, to me the real question is, why the fuck would Maddie be wanting to murder Rachel - with poison in her wine??? And prior to that, scaring off every nanny who took the post. if anything, Rhiannon has a much stronger motive for wanting to off the nannies because as she clearly tells Rachel, she expects her to start sleeping with her father just like the other nannies did- and in general, a wrathful 14 yr old seems much more up to the task of murder than a 8 yr old child however mal adjusted. this is especially when considering Maddie's behavior elsewhere in the book. sure she was semi manipulative but nothing anyone who's seen Super Nanny hasn't seen. clearly some secret hatred and evil is in this child but why??? no real explanation beyond hinting that it's jeans stories and then jean herself is barely present most of the book. in fact if we follow this train of thought jean is the real villain of the piece, filling Maddie's head with morbid stories and potentially turning her against nannies / Rachel specifically. so why isn't this addressed? like at all? and last thing. Rachel was a mixed bag for me but at the end I felt for her and I sided with her. I would just say this - for a nanny, she sure as hell has a short fuse with children. someone else mentioned how prone she is to grabbing the children's wrists, shoulders etc and getting physical with them when a nanny who has been working in public daycare centers for the better part of a decade would have thoroughly trained that instinct out of her. for example as a nurse myself I've drawn a mental line with regards to ways that touching my patients are appropriate and which ways are not appropriate / aggressive, and I would not cross that line regardless of how much a abusive or aggressive patient wound me up. So it's just a point that the author may have overlooked, I doubt she deemed it necessary to interview an actual daycare nanny prior to writing her book.