Crown Publishing, March 7, 2017.
Four Stars
Lane Roanoke is only fifteen when her mother commits
suicide in their dingy New York apartment. Her mother refused to speak about
the family she ran away from as a pregnant teenager, but when Gran and Grandpa invite
Lane to live with them, she jumps at the chance to get to know her estranged
relatives. Their rambling estate in rural Kansas is also home to Lane’s cousin
Allegra, who has lived with their grandparents since she was a baby. Just like
Lane’s mother, Allegra’s ran away from home – and the Roanoke girls that don’t
run away seem to turn up dead.
When Lane arrives at Roanoke, she bonds instantly with
her exciting cousin Allegra, who is bursting with energy and loves to push
boundaries. Allegra introduces Lane to the history of the Roanoke girls – a wall
filled with the portraits of the women in the family, all of whom are now dead
or missing. Other than Allegra, the only remaining family members are Gran, who
is cold and distant to Lane, and Grandpa, whose charismatic charm may be hiding
a more sinister side. The girls are given complete freedom, and they spend the
summer with a couple local boys, Cooper and Tommy. However, Grandpa tells them
that the boys will come and go, but he will love them always – and possibly not
just in a familial way.
Lane’s relationship with Cooper is tumultuous.
Passionate and angry, he seems to know more about the Roanoke family secrets
than Lane does – but when Lane eventually finds out the truth about her dark
and twisted family, she runs without looking back. Eleven years later, Lane is
living in L.A., divorced and directionless, when she receives a call from
Grandpa. Allegra has gone missing, and Lane feels the dangerous pull of
Roanoke, calling her back to help search for her beautiful and damaged cousin.
Lane is immediately drawn back into the disturbing
patterns of her family, and the lethargy of small-town Kansas. She reunites
with Cooper and Tommy, who have remained in town – Cooper took over his dad’s
mechanic shop, and Tommy is now on the police force. Even though Tommy has been
investigating Allegra’s disappearance, Lane decides to do some searching of her
own. Tommy is now married, but his obsessive love of Allegra is still strong,
and in Lane’s mind, he is one of many suspects in her disappearance – including
the caretaker and the housekeeper at Roanoke, both of whom are complicit in the
family’s secret past.
The novel alternates between “Then” (the summer Lane
spent at Roanoke) and “Now” (her investigation into Allegra’s disappearance).
Sprinkled in between are vignettes of the other Roanoke girls, which slowly reveal
how they died or went missing. The common link between all the girls is
Grandpa, and his ability to charm and seduce everyone around him. When Lane
finds a message from Allegra that simply says Run Lane, she knows she must put an end to the dark saga of the
Roanoke girls.
The Roanoke Girls is very disturbing, showing the
extreme levels of abuse in one family and the ways it can be passed down
through generations. It’s difficult to read, but also so compelling that you
can’t look away. There is a mystery here, but it is not truly shocking – it is
more about the slow unfolding of deeply buried secrets. This is the author’s
first novel for adult audiences, and it is sometimes obvious that her style is
young adult – but overall, the novel is compelling enough to overlook its flaws
and just let yourself be pulled along for the ride, disturbing as it is.
I received this book from Crown Publishing and
NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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