My thanks to Macmillan U.K. Audio for a review copy of the unabridged audiobook edition via NetGalley of ‘Fragile’ by Sarah Hilary. The audiobook is narrated by Imogen Church and has a running time of 13 hours, 4 minutes at 1x.

This psychological thriller has an intriguing start. Nell Ballard is a former foster child with a dark secret. She and her foster brother, Joe Peach, have run away from a home in Wales, run by the corrupt Meagan Flack. The night before Joe had been picked up by a glamorous woman and Nell has followed them back to a house in West London.

The house is Starling Villas and is home to the enigmatic Dr. Robin Wilder. Nell seizes an opportunity and talks him into hiring her as a live-in housekeeper. She plans to seek Joe’s whereabouts. Robin has secrets of his own and also has a list of strict rules that Nell has to follow. Then Meagan shows up at the door….and she’s not alone.

As with any good psychological thriller, there are twists and turns. Alongside events in the present we get glimpses of the earlier lives of Nell and Joe and the reasons for their running away from Meagan.

This was quite a slow burn of a novel with a focus on the various interpersonal relationships. It is also quite dark in terms of the failings of the foster care system as well as the exploitation of vulnerable individuals by those in power.

Starling Villas very much has a Gothic atmosphere despite it being smack in the middle of a built-up part of London rather than a windy moor, craggy
shoreline or forest setting. Sarah Hilary has cited ‘Rebecca’ and ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ as inspirations and there are subtle nods to each in the narrative while confidently standing on its own.

With respect to the audiobook, Imogen Church has narrated an impressive number of audiobooks across a variety of genres. She was able to voice a wide range of voices with confidence and drew me into the story quickly.

Overall, ‘Fragile’ held my attention though the nature of the subject matter was not always easy to read.

This is my first novel by Sarah Hilary and I am now interested in checking out her DI Marnie Rome series of police procedurals.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

This was a slow-burning tale of deception and kids with a gothic feel.
I struggled to engage with any of the characters, but it is a well-written tale that will appeal to people who like this kind of mystery with a slow building, dark feel.

I requested the audio version, not realising I’d previously requested the ebook. I read the book and enjoyed it so much, I’m listening to very soon after reading it. Not something I usually do, but I found Imogen Church’s narration is very well suited to this dark tale. She’s not one of my favourite narrators, but delivery of this is pitched perfectly. She’s emphasised the sense of foreboding and insecurity that comes across in the book. The different narrative points are handled well and overall, I prefer this version to the text version.

The same review applies:
This author is new to me, but based on this book, she’s certainly one whose other works I’m keen to read. This is a very unusual story, in part, quite unsettling and it explores a number of themes. It unfolds from the narrative points of the two central females. They’re very different and neither make for reliable narrators, so the reader is left not knowing what to trust and where the tale is going next. It’s complex, dark and there’s a gothic feel with some of the descriptive passages, all of which add to the complexity of the story. For me, this was a very different read and I enjoyed it.

My thanks to the publisher for a review copy via Netgalley

Fragile is told from the perspective of Nell and Meagan. Nell has run away from the care home she lived in which was run by Meagan. She lies her way into a housekeeping job in Starling Villas for the awkward Doctor Robin Wilder, in the hope of locating her boyfriend Joe who she saw entering the property. Both Nell and Joe are damaged, fragile young people, and parts of their backstory are difficult to read.
This is a psychological thriller with a gothic twist that I struggled to get into initially. The characters are quite strange and the plot is slow paced. The narrator does add another dimension of suspense to the story though.