The Broken Girls

The Broken Girls

By Simone St. James

Vermont, 1950. There's a place for the girls whom no one wants—the troublemakers, the illegitimate, the ones too smart for their own good. It's called Idlewild Hall, and local legend says the boarding school is haunted. Four roommates bond over their whispered fears, their friendship blossoming—until one of them mysteriously disappears....

Vermont, 2014. Twenty years ago, journalist Fiona Sheridan's elder sister’s body was found in the overgrown fields near the ruins of Idlewild Hall. And although her sister’s boyfriend was tried and convicted of the murder, Fiona can’t stop revisiting the events, unable to shake the feeling that something was never right about the case.

When Fiona discovers that Idlewild Hall is being restored by an anonymous benefactor, she decides to write a story about it. But a shocking discovery during renovations links the loss of her sister to secrets that were meant to stay hidden in the past—and a voice that won’t be silenced....

I really liked this one (as I did the last one of hers I read, The Sun Down Motel) except for one thing.  Well, two things, I guess, since I didn't really like that Sonia died.  Once I realized that Sonia was murdered, I was pretty bummed. I know it would have been duplicative, but couldn't Sonia have just gone into hiding for sixty-four years, like Viv did?

The other, more significant and more spoiler-y issue I have with the book is the crux upon which the murder hangs: how did Rose/Rosa recognize Sonia in the first place? So the first murder is based on the idea that Sonia buys a bus ticket from a former guard at Ravensbrück, where Sonia was, around 1943/44 to 1945 when it was "freed". But Sonia was 9 years old in 1944, and 15 in 1950, and not only that, she was malnourished and tiny during the war, but they mention specifically that before she died, her friends had been sneaking her more food so her hips, etc were filling out and her clothes didn't fit that well anymore. And there were over a hundred thousand prisoners at Ravensbrück.  So while Sonia might have had good reason to recognize Rosa, an adult guard, how on earth did Rosa recognize Sonia, among thousands of other children and prisoners, from the last time she'd seen her as a skinny child to the young woman she was in 1950? I mean, I guess, if we ever heard that Sonia had distinguished herself in some way, or I mean, if we ever got the narrative of the interaction between them, from either Sonia or Rosa's perspectives.  But we don't, because to know what happened sooner would spoil the mystery, and destroy the linear narrative, and as a result, I'm sitting here, spending more time than I really want, trying to figure out how the heck Rosa knew who she was. 

It's also weird that this and another relatively recent book I read, Maureen Johnson's Box in the Woods both involve Nazi war criminals being recognized in Vermont after the war and killing to save :themselves.  Was Vermont particularly attractive to Nazis? 

I do think that the three "mysteries", i.e., Mary Hand the ghost, the death and disappearance of Sonia, and Deb's murder are each well done, but in retrospect it might have been nicer if they had been tied to each other more.  The main connection to each is the location - the Idlewild woods.  Other than that, they have nothing to do with each other or in their storylines, i.e., the clues to Sonia's death don't affect Fiona's discoveries about her sister, and vice versa.  So that, I think, was done better in The Sun Down Motel.  And I think the reveal that chief Creel had tried to cover up Tim Christopher's involvement in Deb's murder could have been removed without much loss.  Think alternatively: if that whole storyline was excised, we'd still have the Sonia and Mary Hand ghost, and Tim Christopher is still in jail. If Fiona just comes to peace with that, that would have been just fine with me. 

But I did like this! I liked the characters, and I like that St. James' novels are mysteries that explore the lives and deaths of women. Men are the most common murderers and women the most common victims.  Although Christie's cerebral detectives are fun to read, and it feels a little weird to say that there should be more realistic murders in your entertaining fiction, coming to St. James is nice, because you know that ultimately the women, and justice, will prevail. 

 

09: A Book about a "Found Family"