Reviews with content warning for Death of parent - The Broken Girls

The Broken Girls is a historical fiction that goes back and forth between a boarding school for troubled girls in Vermont 1950 and the same town in Vermont 2014, following a journalist whose sister was murdered and dumped at the school. It's a murder mystery, it's a paranormal story, but above all, it's a story about sisterhood both biological and found.

There is so much to like about this book. First and foremost, the students at the boarding school were excellent, by far my favorite characters, Katie and Sonia especially. There were moments between them that were just so genuine and beautiful that it broke my heart. I thought the paranormal element of the story was very spooky and I loved the historical details that were there throughout. The 1950 chapters were my favorite because I loved the gothic boarding school setting and the haunting that came with it.

On to some negatives: The first 50 or so pages were a little slow and it made it hard for me to concentrate. I feel like this book would have benefitted greatly from some first person narration. I didn't like how detached the third person made me feel at times. I think that seeing at least one of the girl's from the first person perspective would have made a difference. I also thought the relationship part of the plot with Fiona and her boyfriend was annoying and took me out of the experience whenever it was being focused on. Additionally, during Fiona's investigations, a lot of things seemed to come to her very quickly and conveniently, which more than once made me, out loud, go "really?" It just seemed like she should've had to work a little harder for information that seemingly fell into her lap.

Overall, because of how much the characters overall meant to me, I gave this a 3.5. It was a perfect spooky wintry book for December!!

Content Warnings

dalmavatai's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

This book was a great mystery with memorable characters. I especially enjoyed Katie, Cece, Roberta and Sonya as characters, I really loved their friendship and how they try to navigate life in a girls' boarding school in the 1950s while also having to deal with the trauma of abandonment as well as other traumas that they gradually open up to each other about. It was such a joy to see them find friendship, love, and trust through each other, things that they had never encountered in life before.

The present timeline was also entertaining, I enjoyed Fiona's investigation and her efforts to uncover what happened to Sonya as well as her own sister Deb. I didn't connect with her or care about her as much as I did about the girls in the past timeline, but I did enjoy the amateur sleuth trope, I love when a character is investigating a mystery and has to talk to people, question them, uncover documents, etc.

The ending was a bit anticlimactic for me, I expected the twists to be more shocking and satisfying in wrapping up the story. I still liked them, though, I did not see them coming and one was especially interesting.

Overall, a dark, tense, emotional read with lovable characters and an engaging investigation. A memorable read even if I was a bit let down by the ending.

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