Wow! I was so drawn into Jessica, Alicia, and Norah’s story. And when we got to the end I was like yeah it all turned out the way I wanted. It was twisty and fun but not unexpected. And then i read the final chapter and the plot twist I didn’t see coming flipped the world upside down! A whole book to foreshadow a single chapter! It was amazing!
* I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.*

What a wild ride! I thought multiple narrators plus duel timelines was going to be confusing, however the characters were all so well developed and distinct enough that it was easy to understand the story. This was my first Sally Hepworth book and it will not be my last. Every time I thought I knew the twist, I was almost always wrong!

Wow! Darling Girls is a book that pulls at the heartstrings. There are hardships, misfortune, struggles, but also true friendships and loyalty. It centers around the Wild Meadows foster home and the lives of three girls who spent time growing up there. After facing loss and tragedy in their personal lives, they were "lucky" to be placed together at Wild Meadows with the caring Miss Fairchild ... or were they???

Jessica, Norah and Alicia faced some incredibly difficult and troubling challenges and obstacles growing up. And now at Wild Meadows, they are confronted with lies, secrets, abuse, betrayal and maybe even murder ... Although this book could be depressing and at times horrific, I was glued. Why do some people do bad things? What makes a true sister? Why do people stay devoted to each other? How do people survive in tough situations? How does childhood trauma affect someone the rest of her life? Darling Girls is a compelling and engrossing read, and I'm glad I picked it up. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the digital ARC.

In the 1990s, Miss Fairchild, an owner of the foster house, appeared to be a kind and caring person who was happy to be a mother to girls who had lost their parents. She was also unpredictable, and it was difficult to determine her mood. And then she became a monster to her Darling Girls.

Three sisters who are not related by blood, but by the foster house where they lived, return to Wild Meadows, where bones were found during excavations. What happened in the foster home many years ago?
 
During the investigation, everything began to get complicated, and it was difficult to guess who was telling the truth and who was lying. At the top, everyone had their own secrets that added adrenaline to the story. At one point in this book, everyone seemed suspicious to me. The most traumatic moment was the end. Just when I thought everything was resolved, the last two pages changed everything again.
 
This is what I like most about thrillers. Unpredictable plot twists and a shocking ending.
 
It’s a great book that I thoroughly enjoyed reading and didn't want it to end.
I highly recommend this book to everyone.

First and foremost: ***Content warning*** for intense child abuse and neglect
I couldn't put this book down and really connected with the three sisters. The very end was shocking and disconcerting and I'm not sure it fit with the rest of the story as much as it maybe would have without the final twist, but that's just my opinion.

I always enjoy reading books by Sally Hepworth and Darling Girls did not disappoint! This is the story about 3 young girls, Jessica, Norah, and Alicia, who are all in foster care and are placed at Wild Meadows Farm in Port Agatha. Their foster mother is Miss Holly Fairchild. Although the girls are not related to each other, they grow up to be very close and consider themselves sisters. This is because of the horrible treatment they experienced while under the care and supervision of Miss Fairchild. Fast forward approximately 25 years and the police have called the girls back to Port Agatha because a child’s remains have been found buried under the house where they had lived. This was a great read, I liked how each chapter was about a different character and how they were sometimes told in the past and then sometimes during the present. It made the story really easy to follow. I found it interesting how the abuse they suffered caused them such differences in their personalities. One turned to drugs, one to violence and one was afraid to show her feelings. This was a story that kept me turning the pages because I couldn’t wait to see who those human remains belonged to and who was responsible. But just when I thought everything had been explained and that there wasn’t going to be anymore surprises, the author decides to end the book with the biggest shocker of all! Did it all stem from jealousy, craziness or pure evil? This is a book you don’t want to miss! I’d like to thank St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the arc. I’m giving it a 5 star rating and highly recommend reading this book.

Darling Girls by Sally Hepworth is the story of three women brought together by circumstance as children, and sisters by choice going forward to adulthood.

Told from multiple points of view, and with dual timelines we follow these women through their childhoods in the foster care system, as they are placed with a sadistic, manipulative woman, Holly Fairchild, who should never have been given the responsibility of caring for any child.

Jessica, Norah, and Alicia spent years under the thumb of Miss Fairchild, and they bear the trauma of her actions into their adulthood. The only good thing about their time with her is the close knit bond that developed between the three.

Now, twenty-five years after leaving her care they are called back to the place they were forced to call home for so many years, and are forced to face the traumas inflicted on them. Trauma inflicted on them not only by Holly, but also by those who should have been looking out for their best interests as children, and instead questioned their integrity solely because they were foster children.

This was not a light read, and given the topic and events in the book, it feels strange saying how much I enjoyed it, but I did. At times I felt joy, sorrow, and frustration for the characters as we saw the events of their lives as children, and their lives in the present day.

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Nobody, and I mean nobody, writes a sinister psychological mystery quite like Sally Hepworth!

Once again she’s given us a compelling and intriguing plot with characters who are flawed but ultimately hopeful. I couldn’t put it down.

I love the multiple points of view and the dual timelines as she peeled the story back layer by layer. I was hooked from the first page till the very shocking finale.

I will read anything she writes! Congrats to Sally and her whole team on this propulsive new release.

Sally Hepworth is the master of crafting such interesting characters. In this book we have foster sisters Jess, a home organizer who steals pills from her clients, Norah, an aggressive 👊🏻 single woman who sleeps with men so they'll do odd jobs around her home, and Alicia who grew up to be a social worker. Norah also has dogs named Couch, Converse, and Thong because they're named after the first thing they chewed 🤣

The story centers around the sisters' lives in their foster home, Wild Meadows, 25 years ago. Of course as we learn more about their childhood, the secrets begin unraveling. Who is the body under the house? And who buried it there?

Without giving too much away, I'd say this was suspenseful but not overly thrilling. I figured out who Dr. Warren was speaking with so that twist didn't get me, BUT there was a big twist in the last five minutes.

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

Darling Girls - Sally Hepworth

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"How do you deal with your feelings in the real world?" Norah had asked. "You bury them," Jessica replied.
"Good and deep."

Jessica, Norah, and Alicia grew up as foster sisters with the seemingly idyllic foster mother, Miss Fairchild. After they finally broke free from the not so perfect world of the foster system, they thought they were free from her forever. That is until a body is found under their childhood foster home 20 years later. The sisters return back to the small town to confront their traumatic childhood and uncover the truth.

I got this as an ARC from St. Martin’s Press! I think is may be my favorite Sally Hepworth book yet! I found the cycle of abuse in the foster system and families to be intriguing and for wrenching. I truly enjoyed reading about the bond of sisterhood without blood relation between these three. Each sister brought their own unique sub storyline but I always enjoyed when they were all together the most. Female friendship like this is always one of my favorite aspects in any book, but especially thrillers where life is not always portrayed as perfect. I highly recommend this one!

Jessica, Norah, and Alicia are all sent to Miss Fairchild's home as foster children. She mistreats them, but nothing obvious or egregious enough to get noticed by others. Then something happens, and they do manage to leave.
The book goes back and forth between the time the girls lived with Miss Fairchild and present day, when they are back in town and trying to help with the investigation into the body that is discovered. Chapters also go between each of the three sisters, and then therapists notes.
At times the book was difficult to read, especially seeing the impact that their time with Miss Fairchild still has on each of the sisters. I might have rated the book a bit higher if not for the very last chapter - the book could have ended before that twist, which explained a different level of terrible event that I found unnecessary. Things were tied up before that.

Thank you Netgalley and St. Martin's Press!

Sally Hepworth is one of the author's that I will always read one of books. The Good Sister is still my favorite, but this was very good. Full of plot twists and it kept me trying to figure everything out.

This was only my 2nd book by Sally Hepworth and it was good! I liked getting to know the main characters and understanding what they had been through as children. There were some tough parts as there was child abuse, but it was written well and was not too much for me. I was very curious to figure out what was going on and there were some surprises, along with a final twist at the end! I will definitely keep reading her books!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Parts of this book I really enjoyed, like the relationship between these adoptive sisters and the lengths they were willing to go to protect each other, as well as the past-timeline snippets of what they went through as children. Unfortunately the present-day timeline didn’t capture my attention in the same way, and the way the “twists” were revealed felt more like withheld information than true twists or reveals. Unfortunately I don’t think Sally Hepworth is the author for me but I hope this resonates with some other readers!

4 stars!

If Sally Hepworth is going to write something, I'm going to read it. I think that where this book really soars, as with many of her other novels, was in the sisterly relationship. The three main characters of this book felt so real. I was continuously rooting for them, and overall I kept turning the pages.

I was really hooked as the chapters switched from present to the past, and also as the mystery unfolded. I would say that this definitely reads more like a slower family drama than a thriller.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Sally Hepworth is an autobuy author for me and I have never given one of her books less than 4 stars. The author's gift is being able to make her characters so authentic, they don't feel fictional. I think her books are classified mostly as thrillers, but really, to me they are more like character-driven dramas with some mystery thrown in. Always, the plots are fast-paced enough I can't put the book down, which makes it all the more amazing that I feel the characters so deeply and personally. My two favorite Sally Hepworth novels are The Good Sister, and The Mother-in-Law. Those were hard-hitting, and beautiful and extremely enjoyable to read. Darling Girls is so well written, but I just couldn't give it the same rating as I gave The Good Sister and The Mother-In-Law because it was a much more uncomfortable reading experience. Reading about child-abuse, whether active or passive, is extremely difficult for me. I was invested in all three "sisters" the book followed, but so disturbed by their childhood stories, especially Alicia's for various reasons. Seeing innocence be robbed intentionally and maliciously was painful to read. However, the mystery felt very realistic and I enjoyed the sisters' relationships so much. As always, I finished this latest book of Ms. Hepworth's and had to just take a break before starting another book so I could really think about it. How does the author knock it out of the park every time? I can't think of a bad book she has written...or even one I was "meh" about!

They survived traumatic childhoods in the foster care system….but their past won’t stay in the past.

Three young girls spent much of their childhood as foster children on a farm property in Fort Agatha, about two hours outside of Melbourne. Their foster parent, Miss Fairchild, seemed to be an ideal choice, pretty and warm….but it was not the idyllic place that it appeared to be from the outside. Jessica, Norah and Alicia formed a close bond and became, in their minds, sisters in order to survive. Years later, after an abrupt end to their stay at Wild Meadows, each has gone on to build a life: Jessica, using her compulsion for structure and order to create a successful home organization business; Alicia, becoming a social worker to help other children find happier placements than she did herself: and Norah, forging a more unconventional career as the taker of employment tests for others. They each bear the emotional scars of their time with Miss Fairchild, and fault lines are beginning to show in their lives. Then each receives a phone call from a police detective asking them to return to Fort Agatha to aid in an investigation. As the farmhouse at Wild Meadows was demolished to make way for a fast food restaurant, human bones were found buried underneath. Whose bones are they, and what connection if any do three damaged women have to them? Will their return to Fort Agatha heal their wounds, or will it destroy their lives?
Darling Girls grabbed me from the opening pages and kept my interest until the very end. The characters, these three young women whose childhood was horrific, are each fully imagined and distinct, and the mercurial Miss Fairchild is also strongly defined. Shared secrets, buried resentments, latent guilt over something unknown and fears that have never gone away are all brought to the surface by the discovery of the human remains. The three “sisters” are afraid that they know exactly who it is, but the reader has only suspicions. Is it Miss Fairchild, the unstable woman who terrorized them for years? Is it another of the children who lived at Wild Meadows? What happened that resulted in the girls being removed from the abusive home situation? Many questions and plenty of plot twists kept me entertained and guessing till the end, and even then there were some surprises. With chapters alternating between the narration of each of the three women as well as an unidentified someone during sessions with a therapist, Darling Girls will pique the imagination of fans of authors Liane Moriarty, Mary Kubica and Lisa Jewell. I thoroughly enjoyed the read, and would pick up a copy of other Sally Hepworth books based on how much I liked this one. Many thanks to NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for allowing me access to an early copy of this addictive novel!

I had read four books by Sally Hepworth and liked them all so I was very excited to read her newest book. It did not disappoint and is now my second favorite after The Good Sister. I felt Darling Girls was a bit different than Sally’s other books but still her at the same time. We follow the lives of Jessica, Norah and Alicia in two timelines. In the past we learn about their experience in foster care with their foster mother Miss Fairchild (yikes). In the present, 25 years later, a body is discovered under their foster home and they must return to a place they thought they left behind. It started a little slow but I enjoyed reading this book and recommend it!

A big thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for an ARC of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Sally Hepworth knows how to pen a suspenseful book. Like her other novels, DARLING GIRLS is well-written, thought-provoking, and gut wrenching read.

Alicia, Jessica, and Norah are not biological sisters, but their bond is just as strong for having shared so many years together living with Miss Fairchild, their foster mother. And although they come from different backgrounds, they all suffer equally from the trauma and narcissism of their caregiver.

There is a mystery and several twists, but most of the narrative is serious and moving, with parts that, to me, were disturbing. The past, and often the secrets hidden there, rarely stay hidden.

Hepworth is an autobuy author for me after reading The Mother-In-Law! I love the complexity of the families she writes about. Although some call her a women’s fiction writer I would say she’s more of a domestic thriller writer. She was also the first famous author to follow me on bookstagram !!

About the book,

Jessica, Alicia, and Norah have considered themselves sisters after spending time together at Willowbrook Meadows with their foster mother Miss Fairchild. The book is told from all of the sisters' perspectives from the past and the present. There is also someone talking to a therapist but the reader is not told plainly who that is and must infer until it’s revealed at the nearly end of the story.
The treatment these girls were given was all the worst things that goes through a person’s mind when thinking of foster care.

Years later when the women have moved on with their lives but still remain close there are infant bones found under the house. The three are summoned to the town of Port Agatha for the police to conducti their investigation.

My thoughts:
I loved all the idiosyncrasies of each of the sisters. Norah really stood out to me with her brazen personality and take no crap attitude especially when dealing with men. Jessica is the mother hen to the other two with her successful business of organizing other people’s homes. Alicia has become a social worker, to help bring some good to the foster care system. Each of them have found different coping mechanixms to overcome the trauma of their childhood. I was able to guess some of the secrets before they were fully revealed but tI didn’t see the big twist at the end coming! This is probably my favoirite book from Hepworth if not right up there with The Mother in-Law!