Many thanks to NetGalley, St Martin's Press and Macmillan Audio for gifting me both a digital and audio ARC of the new novel by Rachel Kapelke-Dale, beautifully narrated by Stephanie Willis - 4.5 stars!
Saskia, a former piano prodigy, returns home to Milwaukee from NYC after her mother's death. She expected to inherit The Elf House, a mansion passed down to the women in her mother's family. However, she finds out that her mother's will left the house to someone in Saskia's past and she is both devastated and livid. She begins digging into the reasons for her mother's bequest while in turn exploring her own past and secrets.
I really enjoyed the author's debut novel, The Ballerinas, and found this one very intriguing. Each of the chapters begins with an excerpt from Saskia's mother's feminist fairy tale books, which were very relevant. We go back into Saskia's past to explain her present frame of mind. There's lots to delve into in this book - family secrets, mother/daughter relationships, how being a prodigy with all its expectations does to a child, the people who take advantage of that, and the "MeToo" movement are all explored. The narrator did a wonderful job voicing all these characters and I loved listening to this one too!
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