Jessica Lovat has just finished up with a client when she receives a call she has been dreading for years. A Detective from Port Agatha is on the other end of the line, requesting interviews with Jessica and her foster sisters, Norah & Alicia. A body, just bones remaining, has been found buried at the site of the former Wild Meadows Farm homestead – the foster home of the three girls many years ago, run by a manipulative, abusive, cruel woman named Holly Fairchild. Norah & Alicia have received similar calls, and the girls convene at Jessica’s home to discuss the situation – torn between needing to know what happened at the old homestead, yet dreading return to the place that still haunts their dreams.
As they make the journey together, they soon have a confrontation with their old foster mother, quickly realizing that she still – even now, has an ability to manipulate the girls, provoking behaviors they’ve worked hard to overcome. They also meet some other children (now adults) whom were also cared for in the home, and are equally befuddled as to whom might have died there, and when…but all will be revealed, both truth and lies, in time…
Told in then and now perspectives of each of the sisters, the reader learns of how they came to be placed in Miss Fairchild’s home, the struggles they endured and the unbreakable bond they formed in the face of significant psychological and physical abuse.
This was a great read! As the story evolves, the potential identity of the body found becomes even more of a mystery – every theory I came up with was ultimately wrong – before the unexpected reveal – and even then, there’s a twist or two to go! This is my second novel by the very talented Sally Hepworth and I eagerly await her next work!!
Available from your favorite bookseller on April 23rd.
I received this book as an Advance Reader Copy from Netgalley & Random House Publishing Group in exchange for an objective review. Do you love to read?? Visit netgalley.com and start reviewing books today!!
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