Christina Henry never fails to deliver some incredible concepts and astounding work that builds on these ideas and elevates them to new levels. Good Girls Don’t Die had an unforgettable concept, but did its execution live up to my expectations?
This review originally appeared on The Nerd Daily.
One day Celia wakes up in a house that isn’t hers with a husband she doesn’t recognise and a little girl she’s never seen before who claims to be her daughter. She tries to remember who she was before because she is certain that this life – the little family-run restaurant she owns in a gossipy small town, and a feud with a neighbour who ends up dead – is not hers.
Allie and her friends travel to a remote cabin in the woods for the weekend. The cabin looks recently assembled and there are no animals or other life anywhere in the forest. Nothing about the place seems right and then in the middle of the night a stranger is banging on the cabin door…
Maggie, along with twelve other women, wakes up in a shipping container with the number three stamped on the back of her T-shirt. If she wants to see her daughter Paige again, Maggie must complete The Maze – a deadly high-stakes obstacle course.
All three women find themselves in worlds not of their own making and must fight to escape the horrors unleashed on them.
Publication Date: 21st November
TW: death, violence, gore, murder, gaslighting, manipulation, misogyny
My Thoughts:
Christina Henry’s work is always a delight to read and this deliciously meta genre smoothie of a thriller is no exception. This is a fantastic book, always with a slightly knowing nod but also a clear love for all genres involved.
The three primary genres under Henry’s meta microscope here are cosy crime, horror and dystopian. All are blood soaked, dark and gripping. The cosy crime section was thrilling and played so well on its atmosphere of small town secrets and bitter rivalries hiding behind smiles. It was distilled perfectly. As a bit of a Henry fan, I knew she excelled in horror territory and the one here is no exception. It is a classic slasher narrative, with a few twists and turns that are well-executed and genuinely catch you off guard. Of course, there are twists throughout the entire book that left me reeling. There is a bit of a jigsaw you can start to piece together and the payoff is excellent. The dystopian section was also incredible, with more of a moral dilemma focus and a definite exploration of the cost of survival.
I absolutely adored our three central characters: Celia, Allie and Maggie. They were all so smart and perceptive, showcasing strength in a multitude of ways. Watching them develop within their own narratives and their character arcs within short sections were fantastic. From the start, you felt so connected to them and wanted them to succeed through their various trials. Their voices were distinctive and their knowledge of their genres really shone through. That was one of the best ways Henry played with the expected story beats and tropes of each genre. It was like row after row of Easter eggs that at once sent up the ridiculousness of the genres, but also felt like love letters to the little details we adore in each. Henry’s world-building is beyond. In such a short space of time, you get an immediate sense of the world and atmosphere trying to be conveyed. There is history, relationships, dynamics and more that are keenly felt in deft, effective and evocative ways.
There is this throughline about women being at the mercy of men’s power and taking back control of their own narratives, with a very knowing twist on this classic feminist slogan. I was pleasantly surprised at how empowering it was at times, though it is within an extreme pressure cooker and Henry continues to challenge this until the very end. You have to ask yourself what decisions you would make in each scenario and Henry definitively shies away from any easy answers. There is a little thread of the importance of solidarity over individual success, but it is tinged and subverted in great ways. Of course, this gets pretty tangled within essentially a book about books with five plotlines to keep on your radar. It always felt so clear and easy to follow though, as we essentially go through the three genres being adoringly pastiched with some fascinating social media excerpts to look at too. There is a lot to be discussed around the treatment of these genres, particularly how the online fandom spaces for each of them are influenced by misogyny and some horrible, nasty comments that appear. I was surprised at how empowering the book ultimately was and how it sits within that murkiness by the ending. It is an ambiguous and morally dubious book at times. Henry delights in confronting your expectations, sometimes fulfilling the tropes and sometimes undermining them.
Good Girls Don’t Die is an excellent, explosive and experimental thriller that blends genres, tropes and storylines and culminates in a fantastic final sequence that will not be forgotten any time soon.
A Short Book Lover 
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