Really enjoyed this one. Though I did feel the ending felt kind of forced and wrapped up way too quickly.

I didn’t want to put this book down. Whispers of Dead Girls is a dark, atmospheric thriller full of trauma, guilt, and grief. A bit of a slow-burn in the middle, but really picks up at the end. If you enjoy a morally gray protagonist and unreliable narrator, I highly recommend you pick up this book.

Thank you NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

bh, I wasnt sure how to feel about this book. I felt like at times I wasn’t completely sold on what was going on and felt a bit bored but then the middle section really ramped up for me and I felt like there were some good twists and cliffhangers that kept you intrigued. The ending was a bit strange and I liked some elements and also disliked some other elements but overall I would recommend for a fast-paced twisty read.

Ten years after Ren Taylor's life was shattered by the death of her sister for which she feels much at blame she has returned to make peace with the past. Taking a job at her old high school she is quickly overwhelmed with memories and dark thoughts.. She soon becomes concerned by the actions of the handsome physics teacher Bryson Lewis. Her sister had been groomed and seduced by another charming teacher which led to the scandal and her death. Vowing that history will not repeat itself she digs into his past discovering mysterious disappearances of two students at his former school. This was a disturbing read but one which needs to be told as it addressed a serious issue that is quite prevelant in our society with devastating consequences. Ren is a morally grey protagonist fighting demons on her own. Although I enjoyed this novel I found the story line to be somewhat messy and disjointed at times. The eerie supernatural injection of her sister's ghost was not well executed and just created a distraction. I would have liked to have seen a better development of the relationship with her parents but realize that the heart breaking plight of the young girls needed to be center stage. There were unexpected twists and I was quite surprised by the conclusion and ending revelation. This was an atmospheric and thought provoking narrative.

Thank you Poisoned Pen Press for my gifted ARC!

Wow, I inhaled this book. I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough. I am a sucker for a slow burn, for long kept secrets and a slow reveal. There is something so delicious about that, and Whispers of Dead Girls absolutely delivers. This was my first from the author, and it definitely will not be my last.

Ten years have passed, and Ren Taylor is back at square one, having accepted a job at her old high school. She’d hoped to make peace with the past but now she’s thrust back into it: her murdered teenage sister is still immortalized in town, and Ren can’t stop seeing her wherever she goes. She’s dogged by the scandal that ruined her childhood and killed her sister.

Wow, I could not put this book down. I was guessing the whole time as to what happened and I would have never guessed that ending. This was the first time that I have read a book by Marlee Bush and I cannot wait to see what she comes up with next. She masterfully weaves a tale that grips you from the very beginning.

Marlee Bush writes unreliable narrators that slowly reel you into their own narrative. Ren Taylor is a complex, morally grey protagonist who is all kinds of unreliable even as she becomes more reliable the more I read. Which means you’ll actually kind of root for her as the story progresses. And perhaps that says more about my state of mind than Ren’s, though I’ve opted not to analyze that particular thought any further.

Ren lives each day in the guilt she feels over her sister Margo’s death. A complex, flawed and messy character, Ren returns to her hometown to teach a decade after the death of her own sister. As we slowly unravel what happened to Margo, Ren is in overdrive with her chaotic thoughts and concerns about a student she believes is being mistreated by the teacher across the hall. Haunted by her sister, Ren battles an emotional mine field as she seeks justice, a way forward through her grief, a relationship with her parents, and finding a footing in a town that seems to blame her for the decade-old death. “Whispers of Dead Girls” is a slow-burn story of intrigue and psychological games that will keep you on your toes until the end.

Whispers of Dead Girls by Marlee Bush
✨ Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
💃🏼 Vibes: A Haunting of My Dark Vanessa
📕 If you like ______, you’ll like this: They Never Learn; the “good for her” universe
📖/🎧 Read Type: ARC (thank you to @netgalley, Marlee Bush, and Poisoned Pen Press!)

In Whispers of Dead Girls, Ren Taylor returns to her hometown to teach at the school where her sister died ten years earlier. Haunted by the past, she suspects a fellow teacher of grooming a student. As tensions rise and her suspicions deepen, Ren becomes consumed by her own guilt and obsession. She must decide how far she’ll go to stop another tragedy.

This had me hooked from the start. I think the author’s writing absolutely embodied the same vibe as angry girl music. As a narrator, Ren’s flashbacks were immersive and her present day unreliability made the story even more compelling. The trigger warnings in this one are pretty obvious, but I appreciated how the book addressed a tough topic with the right amount of sensitivity. Frankly, the only issue I had was that the pacing accelerates in the last third of the book so the ending felt a little too open ended for me—but if you like endings that lend themselves to sequels, you may appreciate the space. It’s a haunting read and would translate very well to cinema!

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Thank you Poisoned Pen Press for the gifted digital copy

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 3.5

Whispers of Dead Girls
Marlee Bush
Publishing Date: May 27, 2025

🎧 Narrator: Jaime Lamchick 🎧

This was a highly anticipated read for me as I really enjoyed this authors debut novel last year.

Ren is a morally gray hot mess of a female main character. She has a traumatic past and has the best of intentions, and makes some seriously questionable choices as a result. Her boundaries with her students are quite blurred, not in a predatory way, but this is still something I’m not a fan of. This is on theme with the overall vibe of this book though. Check trigger warnings re: teacher/student relationships.

The pacing of this story was a bit slow at times. The atmosphere and vibes were definitely uncomfortable and icky. The twists were twisty. The ending was unexpected. Overall my discomfort with some of the content definitely got in the way of fully enjoying this one. When She Was Me remains my favorite Bush book but I will definitely keep an eye for what she does next!

🎧 I read this one with my ears compliments of Libby. The narration was good! I could really feel the chaos that was Ren shine through.

Whispers Of Dead Girls by Marlee Bush was a slow-burn suspenseful mystery. This was a dark and haunting story with a paranormal aspect. It follows FMC Ren Taylor who after 10 years comes back to her hometown where her older sister was murdered as a teen. Accepting a job at her former high school. She's hoping to make peace with the past but seeing her sister everywhere makes it impossible. Ren meets a fellow teacher, Bryson Lewis who is very likable and a favorite of the students. She starts to become suspicious after watching him with a female student, fearing the past is repeating itself. This time she will do everything in her power to keep that from happening. I really enjoyed this book. The twists were good and I cannot wait to read more from Marlee.

* Sisters
* Small Town
* Dark & Twisty
* Psychological Thriller

I received an advance review copy, and I am leaving my honest review voluntarily.

A fascinating, dark, and twisty psychological thriller that will have you not wanting to set it down after starting.
FMC is returning to her hometown, a small town that is haunted by the memory of her dead sister. Everyone seems too suspicious to FMC, seeming to hide secrets and stories she isn't privy to.
FMC is a vengeful woman who likes to punish bad men in her free time, but soon her desire for finding and avenging the truth bleeds into her every waking moment.
This thriller addresses grief, vengeance, anxiety, trauma, intuition, and fear for a wonderful read that causes you to feel tense with every word you read.
I enjoyed that my feelings toward FMC were always changing, her actions at times being questionable but justified and at other moments I wanted to yell at her.
Lots of great characters to enjoy and a variety of twists with different levels of shock to them.

I couldn’t put this down!! If you loved A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, this is one I’d recommend in a heartbeat. I was immediately hooked from the beginning. The small town setting makes everything feel more real. I would definitely read more from this author!!

That cover? Spooky perfection. 💀📘 It totally lured me in. I loved the eerie vibes, the suspenseful flashbacks, and the "is it happening again?" tension.
I really wanted to give this 5⭐️—it had me tense, anxious, and flipping pages fast. But... the FMC (main character) just drove me nuts. Maybe that was intentional? Either way, she had me shouting at the page 😤
Still, it’s a solid popcorn thriller 🍿 with chills and a twist of trauma. If you like dark small-town secrets and unhinged women hunting justice—add this to your list. 🖤

Whispers of Dead Girls is dark, atmospheric, and quietly unsettling in the best way. It’s not your typical ghost story—it’s layered with trauma, memory, and that aching pull of unfinished grief. From the first chapter, I was pulled in by the writing style: sharp but lyrical, with just enough dread simmering under the surface to keep me on edge. Marlee Bush nails the small-town Southern gothic vibe, where secrets feel inherited and the dead never really rest.

The supernatural elements are subtle but chilling, and the emotional core is what really kept me hooked. It’s as much about survival as it is about haunting—both literal and emotional. If you like thrillers that lean a little paranormal without going full horror, and that explore girlhood, silence, and buried truths, this one’s going to stick with you. It’s haunting in more ways than one.

I really enjoyed this book. I love a good ghost story! I was not expecting how it turned out! I would recommend this book to others!

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this eARC.

There’s a whisper in the thicket—a rustling not quite of leaves, not quite of breath—that guides this debut novel through its surreal and unsettling Southern Gothic terrain. Marlee Bush crafts a story that is ghost story and testimonial, as much about the dead as about the silenced.

Told through the fractured lens of a young Black girl (half-rooted in the living world, half-claimed by the dead) "Whispers of Dead Girls" unspools like a memory you didn’t know you had. Bush paints the narrative with lyrical precision, each chapter a vignette of elegy and unraveling. The prose drips with atmosphere: cicadas drone like a dirge, kudzu cloaks the bones of history, and ancestral spirits haunt the margins of a town that refuses to reckon with its past.

What makes Bush’s novel unique isn’t just the spectral mystery at its heart—it’s how it gives voice to the silenced. These aren’t merely ghosts; they are girls with stories that were never meant to surface. In a narrative landscape that shifts between the poetic and the devastating, the book functions as a reclamation and as a reckoning.

Though the storytelling might challenge linear-minded readers, its structure mirrors trauma itself—recursive, elusive, yet undeniable. The protagonist’s voice is tender yet furious, aND this debut author is one to watch.

What a great book! It is filled with twists and turns. I couldn’t put it down,
. I will plan to read other books by this author!

I don’t mind a main character that you don’t always like but then the book needs to move at a good clip. This book started out promising even if the small town setting nosy parker routine is a bit overdone but then it slows down and drags in the middle. The twist at the end wasn’t quite emoji to save it.

Very interesting read. I enjoyed it, and would recommend it to a friend. I keep seeing this everywhere so I know it’s going to be a favourite for some people!

Not everything is what it seems in this absolutely WILD ride through the dark side of humanity. I love that it took so long for this to fully be revealed because it made the twists so much more shocking. Marlee Bush really knows how to write a thriller! If you enjoy being misled and then blown over by a twist, this should be your next read!