It’s 1950, and as the French Quarter of New Orleans simmers with secrets, seventeen-year-old Josie Moraine is silently stirring a pot of her own. Known among locals as the daughter of a brothel prostitute, Josie wants more out of life than the Big Easy has to offer.
She devises a plan get out, but a mysterious death in the Quarter leaves Josie tangled in an investigation that will challenge her allegiance to her mother, her conscience, and Willie Woodley, the brusque madam on Conti Street.Josie is caught between the dream of an elite college and a clandestine underworld. New Orleans lures her in her quest for truth, dangling temptation at every turn, and escalating to the ultimate test.
With characters as captivating as those in her internationally bestselling novel Between Shades of Gray, Ruta Sepetys skillfully creates a rich story of secrets, lies, and the haunting reminder that decisions can shape our destiny.
If you read my reviews then you know I’m a sucker for historical fiction. Big time. The setting always clinches it for me, so when I read the synopsis of this book, 1950s New Orleans jumped out at me like an un-scary jack-in-the-box and I knew I had to read it.
There are so
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Plot wise, nothing turns out quite how you’d expect, a feature that is both devastating and uplifting. I’m still not certain exactly how I feel about the ending, but one thing I can say is that beneath all the drama and flourish, this book has a very grounded quality to it. The end resonates in the message that plans for life don’t always go the way you want them to, and you just have to keep living. Sepetys writes New Orleans as a net that Josie must escape from, and watching a girl who according to Willie is “cinderella on the outside and evil witch on the inside” was thrilling. I thought Josie was wonderfully cunning, in a way that felt necessary for someone at the very bottom with such big