Little Darlings

by Melanie Golding

Book Overview

A Refinery29 Best Summer Thriller - An Amazon Best Book of the Month

The anxieties of motherhood take center stage in this "atmospheric and very creepy" debut psychological thriller that reinvents the changeling myth with the flair of Angela Carter (Guardian).

Everyone says Lauren Tranter is exhausted, that she needs rest. And they're right; with newborn twins, Morgan and Riley, she's never been more tired in her life...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1683319974
• ISBN13: 9781683319979
• Release Date: April 2019
• Publisher: Crooked Lane Books
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.28 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Great read!

I really enjoyed this book.. The mothers slow descent into paranoia and the detective trying to piece it all together made for a great read. my only complaint is how the story wraps but up, but everything leading up to it was great! I would recommend it

The best kind of creepy!

his dark and amazingly disturbing story is seriously creeptastic from start to finish. Ominous doesn't even being to describe the premise of the story, and having twins in my family bumped up the sinister factor even more! Lauren is so, so tired. The birth of her twins was traumatic and exhausting and her husband has not been much help getting the rest she needs. But she knows what she saw that night in the hospital. She knows the haunting figure that visited her and tried to steal her babies was real. But no one believes her. Not her husband, or the police, or her doctors - they all think she's just really, really tired. And then they really do disappear. And Lauren knows what she must do. She must do the most unimaginable thing to bring her babies back. But if she is wrong, she risks everything- including their lives. It's like your worst nightmare of a dark dreadful fairy tale come true. I felt so uneasy and unnerved reading this story and loved every single minute of it. The best kind of thriller makes you feel unsettled the entire time - and this book was eerie in the best kind of way.

Creepy and Good!

This book was creepy in a good way, with enough conflicting things to make me doubt whether Lauren was being stalked by the witchy lady and that there was something supernatural at work or if the trauma of childbirth (which was pretty graphic but helped to solidify that it was hard on Lauren) and new twins was enough to drive her crazy. It is cool how the chapters are broken up by how old the twins are. You could read this book as a straight creepy thriller about a mother slowly going insane and that would have been good but adding the fairy tale elements about changelings and a woman that wants your babies kicks it up a notch to a really good book. It probably should not be read by women that have just had a baby.

Haunting and Hair-Raising

This story was equal parts horrifying and gripping. I don’t typically read anything horror because I’m a bit of a scaredy-cat, but the Grimm element of the story intrigued me so I decided to give it a go. Once I started, I couldn’t stop. Even in spite of my fear, I knew I had to continue to see where the story led. The atmospheric writing creates an unforgettable tale, one that is sure to make the hair on the back of one’s neck stand up. The characters were a definite highlight, each unique and clearly fleshed out. It was easy to become attached to both Lauren and Harper. I loved every second of getting to follow their individual paths as they became intertwined in the same mystery. I would say this book is a definite must-read, especially if you’re a fan of all things Grimm and horror. I hear there is going to be a motion-picture in the future so I definitely look forward to that! P.S. You probably don’t want to read this if you’re pregnant, plan on getting pregnant, or have recently had a child. I know that if I was any of the three previously mentioned, I likely would have a hard attack reading this book.