"'The first time I saw Roanoke was in a dream [...] When I woke, I started to tell my mother about it [...]
"Did you wake up screaming?"
A dribble of milk ran down my chin. "Huh?"
She turned and glanced at me then, her skin pale, eyes red-rimmed. The bones of her face looked sharp enough to cut. "Was it a nightmare?"
I shook my head, confused and a little scared. "No."
She looked back out the window. "Then it was nothing like that."
~"The Roanoke Girls" by Amy Engel.
Okay. Listen. WOW. First off, this book should come with a trigger warning for two reasons.
1) Without spoiling anything (because I feel like that makes the shock effect that much better once you realize what's going on), if you are easily triggered by sensitive subjects involving family trauma, non-consensual relationships and the like, you may not want to read this. I read it all in one sitting and I had to put it down a few times to still my stomach.
2) WHAT THE ACTUAL HECK DID I JUST READ?!
Now, I'm all for a good twisty story. The more you make my jaw drop (even in shows) and the sooner, you know I'm going to like it. I love the twists and turns of a good story and I love when an author makes me do a doubletake, but this book... this book is going to haunt me forever.
When it first starts, you meet Lane Roanoke, a little girl with a mother who has more problems than she would ever know, but would later learn. The story progresses between "Then" and "Now." Lane is called back to the family's estate -- after leaving after one very fateful, eventful, gut-wrenching summer -- when her cousin, Allegra, goes missing.
But why do the Roanoke Girls run? Or die? And why do none of the girls know their father until they turn 14? And why are there no sons?
Those are just four of the many questions this book will give you. And when you find out that what you suspected is true with all the girls, you'll want to run away with Lane and leave Roanoke behind. But unlike the other girls, you'll go back with Lane. You'll be the first to return. Roanoke Girls don't come back. Lane breaks the cycle and, eventually, breaks the ties that bind once and for all.
"The Roanoke Girls" will make you question just how well you know your own family. How many skeletons are in your family's closet? And what are you willing to do to keep them hidden? Or. What are you willing to do to make sure more aren't added?
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