The Year of Needy Girls

By Patricia A. Smith

"A tense story about a small town swept up in bigotry and paranoia after the brutal murder of a local boy sends the residents into a frenzied witch hunt . . . Smith's crisp prose and dedication to realistic moral ambiguity make for a provoking read." --Publishers Weekly

Bradley, Massachusetts is in many ways a typical small New England town, but a river divides it in half--on one side, the East End: crowded triple-deckers, the Most Precious Blood parish, and a Brazilian immigrant community; and on the other, the West End: renovated Victorians, Brandywine Academy, and families with last names as venerable as the Mayflower.

Deirdre Murphy and her partner Sara Jane (SJ) Edmonds have just moved to their first house--and for the first time are open in their relationship--in the West End, where Deirdre teaches at Brandywine Academy. A dedicated teacher from a working-class background, she is well loved by her students. But the murder of ten-year-old Leo Rivera from the East End changes everything--for Deirdre and SJ, for the girls at Brandywine, and for all of Bradley. And when Deirdre is falsely accused of sexually molesting one of her students, the entire town erupts.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1617754870
• ISBN13: 9781617754876
• Release Date: January 2017
• Publisher: Kaylie Jones Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.2" x 8.2"