Blog Tour + Review: The Girls Are Never Gone by Sarah Glenn Marsh

Content Warnings: scary images, death

The Conjuring meets Sadie when seventeen-year-old podcaster Dare takes an internship in a haunted house and finds herself in a life-or-death struggle against an evil spirit.

Dare Chase doesn’t believe in ghosts.

Privately, she’s a supernatural skeptic. But publicly, she’s keeping her doubts to herself—because she’s the voice of Attachments, her brand-new paranormal investigation podcast, and she needs her ghost-loving listeners to tune in.

That’s what brings her to Arrington Estate. Thirty years ago, teenager Atheleen Bell drowned in Arrington’s lake, and legend says her spirit haunts the estate. Dare’s more interested in the suspicious circumstances surrounding her death—circumstances that she believes point to a living culprit, not the supernatural. Still, she’s vowed to keep an open mind as she investigates, even if she’s pretty sure what she’ll find.

But Arrington is full of surprises. Good ones like Quinn, the cute daughter of the house’s new owner. And baffling ones like the threatening messages left scrawled in paint on Quinn’s walls, the ghastly face that appears behind Dare’s own in the mirror, and the unnatural current that nearly drowns their friend Holly in the lake. As Dare is drawn deeper into the mysteries of Arrington, she’ll have to rethink the boundaries of what is possible. Because if something is lurking in the lake…it might not be willing to let her go. 

• Title: The Girls Are Never Gone
• Author:  Sarah Glenn Marsh
• Publisher: Razorbill
• Publication Date: September 7, 2021
• Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary, Horror, Paranormal
• Source: Publisher sent ARC (Digital ARC via Netgalley/Razorbill in exchange for an honest review)
• Targeted Age Range: YA
• Content Warnings: Mentioned death (drowning), descriptions of a dead body, animal death (not described on page, but description of how the animal was found), vomiting, murder, haunting imagery
• Representation: Bisexual main character, Half Puerto Rican love interest
• Rating: ★★★★✩

I love a good ghost story. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been fascinated by the paranormal. I grew up on shows like So Weird and Unsolved Mysteries (which probably explains a lot) and my mom and I love watching Ghost Adventures and similar shows. Because of this, I was instantly drawn to The Girls Are Never Gone.

Seventeen-year-old paranormal investigator Dare Chase is spending part of her summer helping to restore Arrington Estate. In the early ’90s, Atheleen Bell drowned in the lake on the grounds and it’s said that her spirit haunts the estate. Knowing this would be the perfect case for her podcast, Attachments, Dare is determined to find out the truth behind Atheleen’s mysterious death. The thing is, Dare doesn’t believe in ghosts; she believes that there is always an explanation for everything, but she can feel that something in the house isn’t right, and finding a logical explanation becomes harder the longer she’s there. As she begins to uncover the truth, with the help of Quinn, daughter of the estate’s new owner, and Holly, another teen helping to restore the estate, danger looms nearer and the three teens must uncover the truth before one of them becomes the next victim of Arrington Estate.

As I mentioned earlier, I’m a huge fan of ghost stories, and I think this is one of the best I’ve read in a while. The imagery was so clear; I had no problem imagining everything that was being described. Which, in this case, was both a good and bad thing, only because some of the things described were pretty terrifying. There were multiple moments while reading where I actually got chills and found myself feeling pretty freaked out – though that in part could’ve been because I thought it was a good idea to read this in the middle of the night with the lights out. 

I won’t lie, I figured out pretty early on what the mystery behind Atheleen’s death was, as well as what was going on at Arrington Estate. Even so, I was still fully invested in the story because I couldn’t wait for Dare to figure out what was going on. I was still on the edge of my seat the entire time, and I loved all of the hints that Marsh dropped throughout the story. I might’ve figured out the overall mystery quickly, but there was a plot twist that even I didn’t see coming. And I loved it! I literally said “Oh my gosh, no way!” when it was revealed because I was so surprised, but it made so much sense!

Something else I loved was that both the house and the lake were described as having emotions and feelings and intentions. I love when authors can take a location or object and really make them a character in the book. The Arrington Estate and the lake really did feel like living and breathing characters which I think added so much to the story.

I’m a big fan of books that use multiple methods of storytelling, such as interview and podcast transcripts, text messages, etc. and I was really glad that the book had some transcripts of Dare’s podcast, Attachments. Especially since the entire reason why Dare was spending part of her summer at Arrington Estate was to find out the truth of what happened to Atheleen Bell and reveal it in the podcast. That being said, I was disappointed that there were only two podcast transcriptions in the book. The podcast was discussed so much, but as an audience, you only got to experience two of the episodes. I personally think that it would’ve made more sense to have more of the transcripts because of the big emphasis on the podcast in the book.

There were a few things that I didn’t particularly love. I liked Quinn and Dare together, but I don’t think that their romance really added anything to the story. All of the events that took place would still have the same impact if they were not romantically involved, but I did like them as a couple. Some parts of the book felt a little stilled and sometimes I felt like I had missed out on something because of some choppiness. None of those things deterred my enjoyment of the story though.

Overall, I thought that The Girls Are Never Gone was a really good paranormal thriller with a great mystery. I had chills multiple times while reading and was definitely invested in the story from start to finish. I did have some issues with pacing at certain points and there were some things that I thought could’ve been explored more, or taken out without affecting the overall story, but in general, I found it very compelling. If you’re a fan of ghost stories, I would absolutely recommend checking it out.

Links for The Girls Are Never Gone: Goodreads | TheStorygraph | Bookshop | IndieBound | Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Book Depository | Indigo