Girl A, Abigail Dean (Harper Collins, 2021), A

Girl A is the daring thriller by Abigail Dean that tells the story of a girl who runs away from an abusive home – The House of Horrors – and the story that unfolds 15 years later as she revisits the path that led to the worst of her abuse.

Read our full review here.

Pick up a copy of the novel here.

Memorial, Bryan Washington (Riverhead, 2020), B

A painfully intimate examination of the crumbling foundations of a relationship.

Read our full review here.

Pick up a copy of the novel here.

One Last Stop, Casey McQuiston (Griffin, 2021), B+

The hotly-anticipated follow up to McQuiston’s cult favourite debut Red, White and Royal Blue, One Last Stop is an immensely heart-warming and charming love story between August and Jane with a  supernatural twist.

Pick up a copy of the novel here.

Accidentally Engaged, Farah Herron (Piatkus, 2021), A-

Another delightful romantic comedy novel about a woman who fakes an engagement to her neighbour in order to enter a cooking contest. It’s a charming and whimsical read perfect for a summer beach read.

Pick up a copy of the novel here.

Our Women on the Ground, Edited by Zahra Hankir (Penguin, 2019)

A devastatingly honest collection of essays from various Arab female journalists examining their experience reporting on the Arab world – it’s a necessary and important read that shines the spotlight on a relatively unexamined area of prejudice and hardship.

Pick up a copy of the novel here.

The post Everything We Read in June 2021 appeared first on off the record.

Over the past years, the obsession with true crime has become real and intense – something Rachel Monroe examines in her phenomenal book, Savage Appetites. This feeling is infused throughout Abigail Dean’s breakout hit novel, Girl A a novel that takes inspiration from the real ‘House of Horrors’ case – the Turpin family of Perris, California – and other immensely chilling real cases. The novel tells the story of Girl A or Alexandra Gracie who manages to escape from her parents’ House of Horrors to call the police and save her siblings. Years later, Lexie is assigned the role of executor of her mother’s estate, grappling with the decision of what to do with the site of her trauma and childhood abuse. 

The novel is fractured between the present and past, with flashbacks of the gradual descent into abuse and Lexie’s current state – unpacking the trauma she underwent. It is an absorbing and compelling read, demonstrating the extent of the horror that Lexie and her siblings underwent – perhaps the bleakest part of the novel is where she unpacks the role of her own brother in the abuse that she faced. Despite outward appearances of normalcy in the present time, the scars both mental and physical are indelibly planted on all of the children who were subject to the House of Horrors. As a narrator, Lexie is complicated – it is hard to work out where her memories are faulty and where she is avoiding the memories of the extensive horror in order to save herself. It is a powerful and thought provoking novel, whose only downfall is in wanting more pages in order to fully flesh out the very real complexities of the relationships between the siblings that continue into the present day. Given that this is only her debut, Dean is one of the most interesting writers to emerge in recent years.

The post REVIEW: Girl A – Abigail Dean appeared first on off the record.