Review: The Girls in the Garden by Lisa Jewell

The Girls in the Garden

by Lisa Jewell

Publisher: Atria Books

Pages: 320

Format: book

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Imagine that you live on a picturesque communal garden square, an oasis in urban London where your children run free, in and out of other people’s houses. You’ve known your neighbors for years and you trust them. Implicitly. You think your children are safe. But are they really?

On a midsummer night, as a festive neighborhood party is taking place, preteen Pip discovers her thirteen-year-old sister Grace lying unconscious and bloody in a hidden corner of a lush rose garden. What really happened to her? And who is responsible?

Kritters Thoughts:  The idyllic neighborhood with the perfect community park seems like the perfect spot for Clare to move her two daughters after a tragedy occurs at their home taking their father away from them.  She thinks the community feel may help them heal.  But tragedy can strike anywhere and in the first chapter, the reader finds out that Clare's older daughter is found in this idyllic park unconscious and in a compromising situation.  The story then goes back in time to show what events lead to the incident in the park.

I always love a book that opens with the main event and then takes the reader back in time to show all the puzzle pieces to get the characters to that conclusion.  This book not only did that, but had an end chapter to give a full story conclusion as to how the characters were 10 months after the incident - I am so glad!  I loved getting to visit the characters after the incident and see where it took them.  

If you have read Lisa Jewell, you will know that she is so good at writing each individual book and making them unique, she doesn't use a formula or follow the same steps.  I love that I know it will be a solidly good read, but will still be different from the others I have read of hers.  I haven't read everything she has written!  

Have you read Lisa Jewell?  Do you have a favorite?


Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from TLC Book Tours.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.