This one was a big no for me. I didn’t like the writing style at all and had such a hard time investing in any part of it. I didn’t know much about Lizzie Borden before reading this book, and as a person I still feel in the dark about her.

I was initially excited to read this based on the premise, but the very dry and simple wikipedia-retelling writing style made it impossible to go beyond 20%. Have to mark it as DNF.

This book is a fictional version of the Lizzie Borden Case, and her life after the murders. It is well researched and well written. I enjoyed the different perspectives as well as the thoughts and hints from Lizzies own mind.
I am a big true crime and history fan, so I was incredibly excited to read this one. I found that some parts of the book dragged on and took a lot of time to get through, though I do appreciate the way Diane Fanning included the way people talked in that time as well, brought a really nice authentic touch to the book.
I do feel maybe the author couldn't decide whether she wanted to do a biography or a fictional account of Lizzie's story. Some parts just seemed like she could not decide. I also was not a big fan of how feminism was such a big theme, It was so heavy on the women's rights.

Thank you NetGalley, The author and the publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read the ARC of "Lizzie".

I remember hearing the story of Lizzie Borden when I was probably a little too young to know, and I have always been fascinated by the “did she do it or not.”

Diane did a really good job at portraying the times, and she has clearly done extensive research. Overall I did enjoy it but my main points of criticism is that the characters just didn’t really come to life much for me, and I personally think the book would have benefitted from it being exclusively from Lizze’s POV. It does read somewhat as non fiction too.

"Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one."

Growing up in the Midwest, I always heard about the Lizzie Borden axe m*rders. My mother told me the story when I was quite young, and I knew the rhyme by heart. Despite my familiarity with this m*rder mystery, I have never read about, fictional or otherwise about Lizzie Borden, so when I saw this book on NetGalley, I wanted to give it a try.

On the morning of August 4, 1892, Andrew and Abbey Borden were brutally attacked in the comfort of their home with a hatchet. The only two people who were home during the crime were Andrew's daughter, Lizzie, and their live-in servant, Bridget Sullivan. It was Lizzie who found her father and called for help. Not long afterwards, the police suspected Lizzie as the perpetrator of the crime, despite a lack of evidence. A week later, she was arrested and spent nearly a year in jail before being acquitted. Although, sometimes the court of public opinion cannot be swayed.

Did she do it? Or was she innocent the whole time?

This book was a fun and informative read. The author does a really good job of bringing to life the real historical people these characters were based on. They never once felt out of place, and I really believed they were those people. The dialogue was also really well done. Although this was a fictionalized retelling of these events, each character's speech and dialect felt realistic for not only the characters but also the time period.

However, my biggest hang-up is that I personally wanted the characters to feel a little more real. They never really came off of the page for me, unfortunately. I just wanted the author to push the fictional aspect a little further, and I kind of got what I was looking for towards the end with the author's take on Lizzie's big fight with her sister, Emma, years after the trial and acquittal before she moved out. I just wish more of the book had been like that.

I also felt like the book might have been better served if it was written in first-person POV, instead of third. This is something I normally don't say, but in this instance, the third-person POV detracted from the story. It was told from almost a top-down POV, starting the day of the crime and leading up to Lizzie's death. It felt as if I was watching it like a movie, and there were multiple perspectives that the narrative followed as well.

Additionally, there was an underlying theme about women's rights, our place in society, and suffrage that was a main focus of the narrative, which also took away from the main story.

I think a narrower focus, solely on Lizzie's perspective, might have really pushed this over the edge for me. But I also haven't read any other Lizzie Borden stuff, and maybe a lot of them already do that. I commend the author for the attention to detail and creativity that gave this story new life and has reinvigorated my interest in it.

This novel is perfect for those who know about Lizzie Borden, as well as for those who might not be as familiar. However, it is important to keep in mind that it is a fictional retelling. I give this 3.5 ⭐️ (rounded up to 4). Thanks to NetGalley and Level Best Books - Historia for sending me an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

In Lizzie wirft True-Crime-Autorin Diane Fanning einen fesselnden Blick auf den berüchtigten Mordfall Lizzie Borden, der bis heute Rätsel aufgibt. Mit einem klaren, sachlichen Stil schildert Fanning die Geschehnisse rund um die grausamen Axtmorde an Lizzies Vater und Stiefmutter im Jahr 1892 – ein Verbrechen, das die amerikanische Öffentlichkeit schockierte und bis heute polarisiert.

Fanning gelingt es, sowohl die Fakten als auch die psychologische Tiefe der Hauptfigur sensibel darzustellen. Sie beleuchtet nicht nur die Beweise und das Gerichtsverfahren, sondern geht auch auf die sozialen und familiären Spannungen ein, die Lizzie umgaben. Dabei bleibt sie stets nah an den historischen Quellen, ohne in Spekulationen abzudriften.

Lizzie ist ein spannendes, gut recherchiertes Werk, das True-Crime-Fans ebenso begeistert wie Leser, die sich für historische Kriminalfälle interessieren. Diane Fanning stellt keine einfachen Antworten bereit, sondern lädt dazu ein, sich ein eigenes Bild zu machen – und genau darin liegt die Stärke dieses Buches.

I have always been fascinated by Lizzie and the Borden family. I thought this was a nice wee introduction to the story and Diane Fanning has clearly done her research. A good easy read for those interested in historical crimes. Well covered without being too fact heavy. A good interesting read.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review.

This was a fascinating novel about the Lizzie Borden murders, and I enjoyed it a lot. I am looking forward to reading more by this author.

I am a true crime fan and the Lizzie Borden case has always been fascinating. This fictional novel by Diane Fanning was well researched and gives another perspective on what may have happened that morning in the Borden household.

I really enjoyed this book. I've had a fascination with lizzy Borden for a while and have read lots on the subject. This is one of the best books I've read about her

Late one summer morning in 1892, a prominent businessman and his second wife were brutally murdered with an axe in their own home. One of the man’s two daughters was charged with his murder. The trial was a circus. The outcome was controversial. What actually happened in that home? This work of fiction imagines the thinking and fear that drove the killer to that extreme act of cruelty.

I love reading about murders and Lizzie Borden is one of my favorites to read about. This book was so so so good.

DNF. Unfortunately, this one really didn't work for me. I'm interested in the subject matter, but I found the writing style very hard to read, it felt like I was reading a textbook or a non-fiction istead of a novel. The characters and dialogues also felt very anachronistic at times, and I couldn't get into the story.

This book is an interesting fictional account of the the Lizzie Borden axe murders. Some parts definitely read as historical fiction, but other parts seem a bit fake. If you don't know much about the case, you will find this very interesting, but if you know a lot, you will find some discrepancies. Overall a good read and the cover of this book is on point.

Let’s begin with the cover. While not at all unpleasing to the untrained eye, this “Lizzie” is styled more in the Edwardian fashion (1901-1910) rather than the proper Victorian look of the time. The font choice and color, however, I greatly approve of.

On to the actual book itself. While there were some minor points of characterization of the Bordens that I personally disagreed with, this is a fictionalized version of events, and we cannot be sure one way or the other what they were truly like. It is nothing against the author’s skill as a writer, which I found to be quite to my stylistic liking, merely a difference in opinion.

As a self proclaimed Borden scholar —the case has been of special interest to me for nearly fifteen years now— it did irk me that some facts were incorrect, stating Emma was ten years older than Lizzie instead of nine, for example, and the incorrect spelling of Lizbeth as “Lisbeth” when Lizzie officially changed her name.

I will give credit where it is due, however, and say that the author did her best work in making the dialogue feel authentic of both the time period and to what we know was factually said by those involved. And her description of events that we were never privy to made for a compelling narrative that seems, at least for the most part, quite plausible. And the feminist slant, while welcome, and likely how Lizzie must have felt, began to feel a little overplayed at times.

If you read this and are not familiar with the case, I do advise you to remember that this is a fictionalized version of true events, one which does provide some missing context and enhancement to both the town of Fall River and its inhabitants, but should not be taken as a primary factual resource. However, if reading this sparks an interest in the case itself, then it will have done its job well.

For such a famous case, I had a hard time reading this book, it read more as a non fiction vs a historical fiction.

Diane Fanning, Lizzie, Level Best Books Historia, March 2025

Thank you to Level Best Books Historia and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.

Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother forty whacks
When she saw what she had done she gave her father forty-one
Lizzie Borden got away
For her crime she did not pay.

Everyone interested in American crime has likely come across this little ditty about the Lizzie Borden case. In Lizzie, Edgar Award nominated true crime writer Diane Fanning turns to fiction to examine the murders of Andrew and Abby Borden, the father and stepmother of Lizzie and her older sister, Emma Borden. On August 4, 1892 Andrew and Abby were murdered in their home. Only Lizzie
and Bridget Sullivan, the Borden's housekeeper were in or near the house at the time.

Fanning follows Lizzie from the day of the murders through her arrest, the preliminary hearing, her pretrial incarnation, trial, acquittal, and her post trial life. Throughout the novel, Lizzie, who adopts the name Lisbeth after her acquittal, seems perfectly aware that she killed her father and stepmother, but appears to believe she had sufficient reason.

It is difficult to write a suspenseful novel about so well known a case. One of the ways Fanning builds suspense is by allowing the reader to wonder when sister Emma will finally discover that Lizzie really is the guilty party. It takes rather a long time to get to this point.

In the interim, Lizzie portrayed as an early feminist, railing against a society controlled by men, who are allowed to exercise complete control over women in all but the rarest of circumstances. She has yearned for the sort of freedom that two murders and exoneration by a jury (of men) has given her. While her desire for a just society (of sorts) may be laudable, repeated ad nauseum her complaints about the opposite sex grow wearisome.

For readers who want a fresh take on the Borden murders, Lizzie may be a good choice. I would not recommend Lizzie for readers not already intimately familiar with Lizzie and the murders.

Lizzie is an interesting novelisation of the life of Lizzie Borden and I really enjoyed the opening chapters, however once the trials began the pace began to drag and the aftermath of the verdict was incredibly slow and particularly uninteresting. This is a case I've heard of in passing and somehow always assumed that Lizzie had been convicted, probably because my knowledge of it was tied to the children's nursery rhyme about forty whacks. I was therefore completely in the dark as to actual events and the novel was both informative and unexpected.

Where I think Fanning really lets herself down though is in the relaying of the unreliable narrator in Lizzie. Parts of the novel seem intended to cause doubt and leave you unsure as to whether Lizzie actually committed the crimes she was on trial for. If this tone had been kept throughout, it would have kept the reader on their toes. However at other points, Fanning makes a clear cut case - using 'evidence' that never became apparent in real life - to confirm that Lizzie was 100% responsible for killing her father and step-mother. An example of this is Lizzie's hiding place for the axe and stolen belongings - a lot is made in the novel of her hiding place under the bed, despite this never being found by the police who tore the place apart looking for evidence.

Whilst I can understand the authorial need for a clear narrative and answer to 'who done it', Fanning goes too far in this endeavour and doesn't manage to capture the uncertainty and lack of actual evidence that let to Lizzie being acquitted. It's written as a fictionalised biography, but a fictionalised biography would recognise that Lizzie may actually be as Not Guilty as the jury proclaimed her. I don't think this novel therefore does Lizzie or the case justice.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for my free review copy of this title.

The story was well written and is a historical true crime fiction. I would say going into the book, my knowledge of the Borden murders was minimal. I did enjoy a different take on the telling of the crime but did find some of the dialogue to be a bit uninteresting and parts of the story struggled to maintain my attention.

As a kid obsessed with the Borden Murders, I ran to pick this one up.

Fanning takes the axe-wielding legend and spins it into a fictionalized tale that’s both chilling and compelling. The prose is sharp as a hatchet (pun most definitely intended), slicing into Lizzie’s mind with a finesse that had me hooked from the first page. I mean, who doesn’t want to peek inside the head of a woman who maybe chopped up her folks?

Lizzie herself is a firecracker: brooding, complex, and oh-so-tempting to root for, even when you’re side-eyeing actions. Despite it's great qualities, it sometimes felt like Fanning was tiptoeing around the gore instead of leaning into it. And this left me deflated like a balloon left over from a birthday weekend.

It's good, but I just wanted more darkness, especially given the subject matter.

The premise of this book is amazing!
Parts of the writing was brilliant!

I got to 66% and the main part of the book was over.
There are some serious writing errors

I really wanted to love this book. It had so much potential, it was so well researched but writing needs work

I didn’t post a review