A fantastic debut that I was unable to put down. We have alternate periods between two main characters from their respective perspectives, which add depth and intrigue. There were some questions left unanswered but I believe this was purposeful. Really enjoyable and really looking forward to more from Penny Zang!

Doll Parts is a compelling debut by Penny Zang. It is compared to The Virgin Suicides and I Have Some Questions For You. Doll Parts is told in dual timelines and it is the story of estranged best friends who attended a small, elite women's college together. In messy novel fashion, one of the friends dies and the other friend ends up with the widowed husband. Surrounded by her former best friend's things and grief, Sadie starts diving into the past and looking for answers. She just can't believe that Nikki would have ended her own life.

I couldn't put this book down and I think it did an excellent job balancing plot, atmosphere, character development, and theme. Nothing felt too heady handed for the genre and I thought it captured young female friendship so well. I highly recommend this one.

Doll Parts knocked me flat in the best way. I don’t remember the last time a book pulled me in so completely. I started it thinking I’d just read a chapter before bed and suddenly it was 2 a.m. and I couldn’t stop. The atmosphere is exactly what I crave in a novel: dark, eerie, and dripping with that mix of nostalgia and dread that feels both familiar and unsettling.

What really stuck with me, though, were the friendships. The way Zang writes Nikki and Sadie, both in the past and the present, felt so raw and real. The Sylvia Club mystery is chilling, but it’s the messy, complicated love between girls that gave this story its weight for me. I also loved the dual timeline. Usually one timeline grabs me more than the other, but here both kept me hooked, feeding into each other in a way that made the final reveals hit even harder.

This book is sharp, haunting, and beautifully written, but more than anything it made me feel the nostalgia, grief, rage, and that strange ache of girlhood you can never quite shake. Easily one of my top reads of the year.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

This book sucked me in right away. It was haunting and sweet, heartbreaking and inspiring all rolled into one. I thought I had it all figured out and I love it when I am proved wrong. The main characters are hard to love, they might even be hard to like , but you find yourself rooting for them anyway.

Book was hard to follow - felt very disjointed. I really liked the authors tone of voice but i felt like the characters were underdeveloped and not so likeable.

What an excellent debut!! The prose, the balance of past and present, the love letter to female friendship and the ways in which we grow up and grow apart all stood out to me the most. The gothic, grunge elements only added to the story.

I don’t typically love duel timelines when it comes to mysteries because I think they can slow a story down, but Penny is amazing at pacing and every chapter made me want to keep reading the next.

I did find some aspects of this to be a little expected (namely, the reveal at the end) but I didn’t mind it because I felt like I was Nancy Drew and wanted to figure the puzzle out before Sadie did 😂

4 stars instead of 5 because the Why behind the suicides was a little hard for me to wrap my head around. Not that I didn’t believe it, and I do think it’s a plausible Why, but it did take some convincing for me to get on board.

This had everything that I love. Toxic friendship. Dual timelines. Ghosts. The 90s....

BUT, I just didn't enjoy this as much as I wanted.

Nikki and Sadie are the best of friends. While at college, an all-girls college at that, the girls are drawn into the darkness of the Sylvia Club....and all the mystery that surrounds it. 20 years later, after Nikki's sudden death, Sadie is drawn back into the mystery....and finds that Nikki never let it go.

I think that closeness of Nikki and Sadie was missed. We are supposed to feel like these two were thick as thieves and it was truly like two ships in the night. Yes, they were friends, but Nikki seemed to be spending long periods of time alone on campus. Sadie, as an adult, was an odd duck, showing up at a funeral of a long-lost friend.

When using Sylvia Plath as a plot device, I expected more lyrical prose. The past timeline was like pulling teeth at points, just HOPING the plot would move.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Despite not being the type of book I typically download to read on my kindle (I have very specific preferences for my nighttime reading), the publisher comparisons of Penny Zang’s debut novel to I Have Some Questions for You, a favorite from 2023, had me hitting that “Read Now” button.

In this dual timeline literary suspense novel, we are shown the friendship of Nikki and Sadie, from Nikki’s perspective as the girls embark on their freshman year of college and from Sadie’s many years later, shortly after Nikki’s death. Loch Raven College, a small all-girls school, has a history of freshman students dying by suicide, and shortly after their arrival, Nikki becomes entangled in the stories of these members of the “Sylvia Club.” Now, Sadie is certain that, even though she hasn’t spoken to Nikki since they parted ways toward the end of their freshman year, Nikki could not have killed herself as the official report goes, and she is determined to prove her friend was murdered.

I’ll be honest, I almost set this one down. For the first significant chunk of it, I had a hard time remembering which girl was which and following their separate but overlapping stories. Interestingly, I came to find this problem a rather magical choice by Zang; As she tells about the other girl from each narrator’s perspective, we see this incredible, larger-than-life, smart, talented, shimmering person. Initially, I was like, how can this possibly be? How are they both this way, and yet, from their own perspective, not this way at all? But then I realized, that’s exactly how we feel about our best friends. We see them in the best, most glowing way possible, like they could be anything and do anything they set their mind to. We are better for being in their vicinity. She portrayed that characterization perfectly.

I came to this one for the dark academia vibes, but it was the story of this best friendship that kept me reading. Penny Zang set out to tackle a lot in this book, and while I was unsure of her ability to get there while on the journey, I needn’t have worried. I think she nailed it.

Thanks to Netgalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

Thanks to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for the eARC.

Doll Parts unfortunately was not for me. I struggled with the characters, the mystery, the decision making. I think this novel will find its way to those it is meant for, but I was not one of them.

A somewhat creepy domestic thriller about two women- Nikki and Sadie-who were besties in college but drifted apart. And then Nikki died, perhaps by her own hand. No matter that as a young woman she was obsessed, as was Sadie, with Sylvia Plath. In the present, Sadie is living with and pregnant by Harrison, Nikki's widower, And then there's Nikki's daughter. I wasn't sure where this was going and kept reading to find out. None of these characters are especially likable (that's sort of the point) but Zang manages to make them oddly appealing. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A good read.

“Doll Parts” by Penny Zang started off strong but the mystery wore off quickly. I liked the two timelines and the connection slowly weaving itself from the past to present. Ultimately, it took too long to get there and by that point, I didn’t care to solve the mystery.

Unreliable narrators. Beautiful writing. Dark academia. 90s nostalgia. Atmosphere. Sad girls. Sylvia Plath meets Virgin Suicides meets Courtney Love. This was a phenomenal debut! Totally delivers on the promise of the premise, title, and that cover.

This book combines a few of my favorite genres -- unsettling books about new moms and dark academia -- in a unique and interesting way that had me really curious to find out how it would end.

The novel follows best friends Nikki and Sadie, We see Nikki in flashbacks from their freshman year at college, and we see Sadie in present day as a new mother.

I enjoyed the present day parts of this more than the college parts -- I found the middle to drag a little bit but by the end I was really hooked. I guessed some things and didn't see others coming -- and overall felt satisfied with the ending. The entire book is very unsettling and I loved all the literary references - made me want to re-read Sylvia Plath.

I will definitely read more Penny Zang in the future! This was the right amount of creepy and compelling.

Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book!

Nikki and Sadie are best friends in college, where a group of sadness-obsessed students bond over past rumored suicides. The rumors end up tearing them apart and now twenty years later, Sadie is trying to pick up the pieces after Nikki’s death.

I loved the ambiance and atmosphere of this one. As a huge Hole and Courtney Love fan, I knew immediately I had to read it from the title and female grunge like cover. My favorite parts were the past parts from college. Grunge culture and my teenage identity was all over the past chapters. Bonus points that it took place in my state and the area I went to college in. The present day chapters paced a little slower but I liked how it all came together.

“Pretty ghosts. Ghosts without pagers and email accounts. Ghosts who didn’t know they were dead. They were walking among us, and we didn’t know it.”

Doll Parts comes out 8/26.

Doll Parts sounded really intriguing to me and I absolutely loved I Have Some Questions for You which this book was compared to.

This book was really engaging and I felt interested in the plot the entire time. However, I dislike unreliable characters where the reader can’t discern what is real and what is not and this book had not one but two unreliable narrators. The POV switches between Sadie in present time and Nikki 20 years ago and both see spirits (which is never explained) and I struggled with that aspect of the plot. It honestly didn’t add much in my opinion and I think the book would have been stronger without this aspect.

Overall, the plot just wasn’t something I enjoyed. I did like the writing and was curious where it was going but this book just wasn’t for me.

If you like unreliable narrators or dark academia, this is one you will want to pick up!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc.

Doll Parts is a haunting and evocative debut that hooked me from the first page. Told in a dual timeline, it explores the complicated intensity of female friendship, the weight of grief, and the lingering shadows of the past.

I was immediately drawn into the story of Nikki and Sadie—best friends navigating college, ambition, and identity against the chilling backdrop of the Sylvia Club, a campus legend tied to the deaths of Plath-obsessed students. Zang captures that uneasy mix of obsession, creativity, and despair in a way that felt both unsettling and authentic. The present-day timeline was equally gripping, with Sadie stepping into her estranged friend’s life after Nikki’s death, only to be confronted by ghostly echoes and unanswered questions.

What I loved most is how this book blends genres—it’s part literary gothic, part ghost story, part character-driven drama. The atmosphere is moody and immersive, and the writing is sharp and lyrical without ever losing momentum.

A beautiful, chilling debut that lingers long after the last page. Penny Zang is definitely an author I’ll be watching.

This book is pure obsession fuel. Doll Parts is a dark, intoxicating rabbit hole you willingly fall into and don’t want to crawl out of.

Penny Zang blends nostalgia, campus gothic, and raw human messiness into a story that feels both haunting and heartbreakingly real.

The dual timelines are so sharp they cut. College Nikki and Sadie pulled me right back into the chaos of being young and reckless, where friendship feels like religion and danger lurks in the shadows. Then we fast-forward twenty years, and the fallout is just as compelling, Sadie stepping into Nikki’s life after her death is creepy, emotional, and so addictive I could not look away.

The Sylvia Club legend is the kind of urban myth that keeps you up at night, but what really got me was how Zang writes about female friendship, obsession, and identity with this jagged honesty that stings in the best way.

It’s eerie. It’s tragic. It’s beautifully twisted. And it left me with chills. Penny Zang is a writer who gets it.

With beautiful prose, 90s nostalgia and a haunting Sylvia Plath flair, Doll Parts is an emotionally resonant, structurally intense story of girlhood, friendship and heartbreak.

In college, best friends Nikki and Sadie are pulled into the dark legend of the Sylvia Club, a string of mysterious deaths dismissed as suicides, until Nikki’s obsession leads to a tragedy that shatters their friendship. Nearly twenty years later, after Nikki’s death, Sadie moves into her late friend’s home and becomes convinced Nikki is haunting her—still seeking the truth about the Sylvia Club and its final victim.

I was immediately drawn in my Zang's sharp, poignant tone and the eerie vibes lurking around every corner. Nikki and Sadie felt entirely realized, and the coming of age past timeline dances artfully with the haunted present timeline.

Fans of dark academia, Sylvia Plath, sad girl summers and supernatural psychological suspense will absolutely devour this one!

Woof, the irony of clowning on a male professor who's creepily obsessed with dead women when the whole premise of this book is about the main character being creepily obsessed with a dead woman who was creepily obsessed with dead women. You parsing that sentence okay over there? I swear it's accurate!

Listen, maybe part of this is on me. I have a tendency to go in fairly skeptically to books where a dead best friend or lover Haunts The Narrative because it by nature creates a hollowness in the center of the story that needs to be filled up with something, which is often a tough challenge for writers to meet. You'd think that that something would be grief, but that's weirdly pretty absent here.

And this book ALSO has a main character with another grievance of mine, which is when a grown-ass adult is still dwelling over something that happened back when they were a teenager. I mean, it's one thing to still be hung up on a relationship twenty years later when it ended due to circumstances beyond your control or something, but this one like...didn't. Nikki just decided that she couldn't fuck with Sadie anymore because Sadie was too broke and weird I guess. There was no real reason that neither of them couldn't have hit each other up in the twenty years since Nikki bounced to go be a rich mom. Man, I don't know, Nikki just sucked so bad for this! It made it hard to really feel attached to their teenage friendship even if it had a good soundtrack and cool vintage dresses.

I think both of these timelines had some interesting ideas in them but the way they were intertwined didn't ultimately work for me. The way the friendship broke up because of some fucking guy was too much of a bummer, and the way the current timeline mystery resolved was SUCH a reach, man.

Also, what was the deal with all the scary ghosts?!

My thanks to Sourcebooks Landmark and NetGalley for the ARC.

Yes!
This is a gripping tale of girlhood, with razor sharp teeth! The writing was superb and the words will leave you hanging.