“‘If we weren’t crazy,’ Norah was saying, almost to herself, ‘it explains why human bones were found under Wild Meadows.’ This was exactly what Jessica was afraid of.”
Darling Girls, Sally Hepworth
Looking for a domestic thriller with dual timelines, multiple unreliable narrators, and a focus on the trauma foster kids endure? Then this is a great pick for you!
This book focuses on three foster sisters, bonded together forever by the treatment they endured at the hands of their foster parent, Miss Fairchild. Over the course of the book, we learn that Jessica was the first girl to live at Wild Meadows, then was joined by Norah, and later Alicia. The three are terrified of Miss Fairchild and her unpredictable moods, but they’re more terrified of being separated and sent to new foster homes.
In the present day, local detectives are trying to determine the identity of the body found beneath the Wild Meadows home. The three women are asked to return to the small town to be interviewed. As the interviews progress, we get more and more answers about their pasts. As detectives start pulling answers out of the women, it gets harder and harder to know who to believe.
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With a balance of character-driven plot and slow-building suspense, this book kept my attention. The slow-burn feeling had evaporated by the last quarter, and I was racing to the finish line, desperate for answers.
Read with Fern 
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