Brave Girl, Quiet Girl
Ratings5
Average rating4.1
Brooke is a divorced single mom, financially strapped, living with her mother, and holding tight to the one thing that matters most: her two-year-old daughter, Etta. Then, in a matter of seconds, Brooke's life is shattered when she's carjacked. Helpless and terrified, all Brooke can do is watch as Etta, still strapped in her seat, disappears into the Los Angeles night.
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I have read a LOT of books over the years and this one had a most unique premise.
Brooke's car is hijacked with her 2 year old daughter in the back.
When the carjacker discovers Etta in the back, he dumps her on the side of a road and she's found by Molly, a 16 year old homeless teen.
What happens after this makes for a wonderful story.
Great Storytelling With Relatable Characters. One of the best things about Hyde's books is that you know you're going to get stories of very human characters that are simply trying to do their best with the situations they find themselves in, despite several flaws (both obvious and not). Here we get an all too real story that happens far too often (in a part that would be a spoiler to reveal) and often enough that it is a documented event (in the initial conflict) while overtly getting a story of two women just trying to do their best. Hyde does an excellent job of humanizing both the strengths and the weaknesses of most characters, though the secondary characters get a bit less of this and the one-off characters get even less, by their very nature of only being shown once or twice. Still, a truly excellent work that explores at least one idea that is all too real for all too many, yet isn't discussed much in mainstream fiction. Very much recommended.
Touching from start to finish, Brave Girl, Quiet Girl is the epitome of found family.
After a carjacking, Brooke is desperate to find her little daughter that was asleep in the backseat. Twenty-four anxious hours pass without a word. Meanwhile, young Molly stumbles across a toddler abandoned in her car seat on the side of the road. Without a phone and having to protect the child from local gang members, contacting the authorities is no easy feat.
My favorite stories are those that bring unlikely people together. Both Brooke and Molly are wonderful characters made better by the presence of little Etta. I loved watching their acquaintance grow and get to know one another. There was some repetition in the story, but it was overall endearing.
