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A review by allingoodtime
Wayward Girls: A Novel by Susan Wiggs

dark emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? N/A
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

While this book took me longer than usual to read, it in no way reflects on the writing or the story. I can be sensitive to certain subjects, and this book was heavy for me. I had to take breaks between some chapters with another book to get out of the headspace this one put me in. Again, that is not a bad thing and shouldn’t reflect poorly on this book or its author. The book is fantastic and the storytelling is engaging. The subject matter, on the other hand, is horrific.

There are a lot of characters at play in this book, but the most prominent is Mairin. A teenager in the Buffalo, New York area in the late 1960s. She is Irish Catholic, growing up in a Catholic community where the kids all go to Catholic school, and to even utter the word sex is scandalous. Women have few rights, the Vietnam War is raging, and nobody questions what the Catholic Church or local authorities do with the so-called “criminals” in the community.

Not to give too much away, I’ll say that Mairin is sent to a home for underage girls who find themselves in trouble. Be it with the law, by finding themselves pregnant out of wedlock, or because their parents think they are on the road to ruin. These girls are sent to a home, run by nuns, to get straightened out. Yet, behind the walls of this facility, things are much worse than they seem. What hurt so bad while reading this is the knowledge that this is true. This particular book may be fiction, but it’s based on true events. It’s gut-wrenching. I was so proud of Mairin for never letting them get her down, and for Mairin’s new friends for finally fighting for themselves.

This book is separated into a few parts. The first part went by fast. Mairin’s day-to-day life and how she ended up being wrenched from her home and put in this pit of despair. The second part was the hardest part and the part that took me so long to read. The title of the book has everything to do with the second part of this story. I breezed through things once things bounce back to present day, and we see Mairin and the other ladies come together again.

Some of the characters are truly evil in this book. Others, whom I detested, had just as much trauma as the girls who were being hurt. These characters were hard to like, but I did come to understand them. From Mairin’s mom to a young nun at the facility, most of them have their reasons for how they react to the world around them.

The author did a beautiful job of weaving the stories of all the women and girls together. She did her research and took such care with the characters, the setting, and the stories.

**I received an ARC of this book courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher. All opinions expressed in this review are my own and given freely**
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