Girl A

A Novel

By: Abigail Dean

Narrated by: Ell Potter

An instant New York Times best seller

“Pitch-perfect ... Dean tells this story with such nuance and humanity, you’re desperate to step into its pages." (The New York Times)

“Heart-stopping psychological drama … A modern-day classic." (Jeffery Deaver, New York Times best-selling author)

“A gripping story about family dynamics and the nature of human psychology.” (Good Housekeeping)

She thought she had escaped her past. But there are some things you can’t outrun.

Lex Gracie doesn't want to think about her family. She doesn't want to think about growing up in her parents' House of Horrors. And she doesn't want to think about her identity as Girl A: the girl who escaped, the eldest sister who freed her older brother and four younger siblings. It's been easy enough to avoid her parents - her father never made it out of the House of Horrors he created, and her mother spent the rest of her life behind bars. But when her mother dies in prison and leaves Lex and her siblings the family home, she can't run from her past any longer. Together with her sister, Evie, Lex intends to turn the home into a force for good. But first she must come to terms with her siblings - and with the childhood they shared.

What begins as a propulsive tale of escape and survival becomes a gripping psychological family story about the shifting alliances and betrayals of sibling relationships - about the secrets our siblings keep, from themselves and each other. Who have each of these siblings become? How do their memories defy or galvanize Lex's own? As Lex pins each sibling down to agree to her family's final act, she discovers how potent the spell of their shared family mythology is, and who among them remains in its thrall and who has truly broken free.

For listeners of Room and Sharp Objects, an absorbing and psychologically immersive novel about a young girl who escapes captivity - but not the secrets that shadow the rest of her life.

©2020 Abigail Dean (P)2020 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

Hailed a Best New Book of 2021 by Marie Claire, Entertainment Weekly, LitHub, Good Housekeeping, O Magazine, Woman's Day, and Redbook

"Nothing short of astonishing.... Rarely does a novel offer up such unique plotting, such heart-stopping psychological drama, and such a rich portrayal of its inhabitants. A modern-day classic." (Jeffery Deaver, New York Times best-selling author of The Goodbye Man and The Bone Collector)

"Sensational...gripping, haunting and beautiful written." (Richard Osman, international best-selling author of The Thursday Murder Club)

"A haunting, powerful book, the mystery at its heart not who committed a crime, but how to carry on with life in its aftermath...the suppressed tension acts like the winding back of a slingshot, which about halfway through the novel suddenly rockets forward, propelling the story through scenes of genuine fear to its moving, pitch-perfect ending.... Dean tells this story with such nuance and humanity, you’re desperate to step into its pages." (Flynn Berry, The New York Times)

Sticks With You

How often we read and enjoy a book, then just pick up another one and totally forget the title and/or story of the former book. Not after reading, Girl A. You will not put this story out of your mind anytime soon. What a talented story teller Abigail Dean is.

Not bad

It wasn't the story I'd hoped it would be but it kept me engaged. It left too many unanswered questions.

Brilliantly written and performed

First, I'm a huge fan of Ell Potter's narrations and that is a primary reason I selected this book. She did not disappoint. Her readings capture the emotions and moods of the dialog and make the setting descriptions real. Brava!
The book is an amazing debut for Ms. Dean. The story is somewhat disturbing because of its frank portrayals of child abuse, masochistic sexual behavior, and mental illness, none of which are gratuitous. The reveal late in the book brings the whole narrative into sharp focus and skillfully brings foreshadowing and plot together.
If you find strong language and the topics mentioned above offensive, you might choose another of Ms. Potters's readings. If you like skillful and haunting debuts, I highly recommend giving Girl A a listen.

The story gets bogged down in details

I saw some good reviews on this book, so I was excited to read it. I like psychological thrillers, however this was not a psychological thriller at all. It was a psychological downer. Most of the storyline occurred in the past, and we traveled with the narrator through every depressing, mundane detail. There were some concepts that were connected tenuously by gossamer threads, but never were actually explained or tied together. This left the reader discombobulated and confused at times. The only “plot twist“ was already evident from the beginning of the book. While I thought the performance of the audiobook was very good, the writing of the book left this reader underwhelmed.

Torn out of the headlines

I am familiar with the Turpin case so this was a fictional inside look at how it could go for one of the survivors. I don't think any writer can grasp the scope of the torture in one's soul after living through abuse of this magnitude. I believe Abigail brought us as close as she could to a topic of this devastation without completely bringing the horror to life and making a book that would be to gruesome for a lot of readers. I would love to read more of this story in 10 years. I think this book was well done.

Superb

Definitely a difficult book at times, but overall a wonderful story. No spoilers, but I will say that the author does not go into graphic detail about the child abuse. I was appreciative of that.

Befuddling

This novel has a superfluous amount of extraneous information that is only mildly interesting! Even when the minute accounts of the real life situations of the children’s upbringing come about they aren’t straight forward. Very disappointing.

Hardly anything happens

Too many characters and hardly any story. What a dud. Try “if you tell” by Greg Olsen instead.

No catch

I had a hard time with this book. I wanted to set it down so bad and DNF. It was a good concept, but the writing didn’t catch. I kept setting the book down but wanting to know what was going to happen and where it was going. I’m so glad I’m finally done with this book.

deep

makes one wonder at the things humans can do to each other, and what we can survive.