The Stillwater Girls
by Minka Kent
Two sisters raised in fear are about to find out why in a chilling novel of psychological suspense from the author of The Thinnest Air.
Ignorant of civilization and cautioned against its evils, nineteen-year-old Wren and her two sisters, Sage and Evie, were raised in off-the-grid isolation in a primitive cabin in upstate New York. When the youngest grows gravely ill, their mother leaves with the child to get help from a nearby town. And they never return.
As months pass, hope vanishes. Supplies are low. Livestock are dying. A brutal winter is bearing down. Then comes the stranger. He claims to be looking for the girls’ mother, and he’s not leaving without them.
To escape, Wren and her sister must break the rule they’ve grown up with: never go beyond the forest.
Past the thicket of dread, they come upon a house on the other side of the pines. This is where Wren and Sage must confront something more chilling than the unknowable. They’ll discover what’s been hidden from them, what they’re running from, and the secrets that have left them in the dark their entire lives.
Momma Says: 2 stars⭐⭐
Let me start by saying that I would not consider The Stillwater Girls to be a thriller. The pacing is a bit on the slow side and while it did have thriller potential during the chapters about the girls, the parallel chapters from Nicolette's point of view barely held my interest. The storylines do come together eventually, but up to that point, I was sorely tempted to skim Nicolette's chapters. There are a few hints about where those chapters might be heading, but you have to be prepared to head into dark territory. That said, Wren's chapters did keep me reading, and once the man shows up, the story started to lean in the direction of a thriller for me. Then, it fell apart again with the big twist. In fact, I can pinpoint the exact sentence where it all went wrong and I started rolling my eyes - it's roughly 61% into chapter 40. There was no turning back from that point because the whole idea was so completely over the top. I'm trying to be deliberately vague here so I don't give spoilers, so let me just say that the idea of how things happened is far-fetched, but not completely beyond the realm of possibility. However, the idea that so many people knew without saying a word, including casual people about town, is where this one completely lost me. I find it impossible to believe that this town, small or not, did not have a single gossip who would've been all too happy to share that kind of information. I realize that this is fiction, and some leeway can be given, but this one pushed way past that for me.
❃❃ARC provided by NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer
Let me start by saying that I would not consider The Stillwater Girls to be a thriller. The pacing is a bit on the slow side and while it did have thriller potential during the chapters about the girls, the parallel chapters from Nicolette's point of view barely held my interest. The storylines do come together eventually, but up to that point, I was sorely tempted to skim Nicolette's chapters. There are a few hints about where those chapters might be heading, but you have to be prepared to head into dark territory. That said, Wren's chapters did keep me reading, and once the man shows up, the story started to lean in the direction of a thriller for me. Then, it fell apart again with the big twist. In fact, I can pinpoint the exact sentence where it all went wrong and I started rolling my eyes - it's roughly 61% into chapter 40. There was no turning back from that point because the whole idea was so completely over the top. I'm trying to be deliberately vague here so I don't give spoilers, so let me just say that the idea of how things happened is far-fetched, but not completely beyond the realm of possibility. However, the idea that so many people knew without saying a word, including casual people about town, is where this one completely lost me. I find it impossible to believe that this town, small or not, did not have a single gossip who would've been all too happy to share that kind of information. I realize that this is fiction, and some leeway can be given, but this one pushed way past that for me.
❃❃ARC provided by NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer
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