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Wilder Girls

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Wilder Girls

By: Rory Power
Narrated by: Eileen Stevens, Jesse Vilinsky
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About this listen

An instant New York Times bestseller, Wilder Girls is Rory Power's chilling and unputdownable YA debut. The Power meets We Were Liars in this compelling story of survival and the power of female friendships, perfect for fans of A Good Girl's Guide to Murder.

'Body horror meets boarding school in a moving, terrifying thriller' – Guardian


Everyone loses something to the Tox; Hetty lost her eye, Reese's hand has changed, and Byatt just disappeared completely.

It’s been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was put in quarantine. The Tox turned the students strange and savage, the teachers died off one by one. Cut off from the mainland, the girls don’t dare wander past the school’s fence where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the cure as the Tox takes; their bodies becoming sick and foreign, things bursting out of them, bits missing.

But when Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her best friend, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors that lie in the wilderness past the fence. As she digs deeper, she learns disturbing truths about her school and what else is living on Raxter Island. And that the cure might not be a cure at all . . .

'Your new favourite book' – Cosmopolitan

'Wholly original and compelling' – Observer


'A staggering gut punch of a book' – Kirkus

Difficult Situations Family & Relationships Friendship Horror LGBT LGBTQ+ Literature & Fiction Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Romance Thrillers & Suspense

Critic Reviews

Body horror meets boarding school in a moving, terrifying thriller . . . one of the year's most memorable debut's.
Your new favourite book.
Finally, Rory Power combines the challenges of dystopian survival with the dynamics of boarding school life in the wholly original and compelling Wilder Girls. (Fiona Noble)
This thrilling saga . . . is sure to be one of the season’s most talked-about books, in any genre.
Groundbreaking . . . brutal and beautiful, raw and unflinching. (Emily Suvada, author of This Mortal Coil)
Part survival thriller, part post-apocalyptic romance, and part ecocritical feminist manifesto, a staggering gut punch of a book.
Power's evocative, haunting, and occasionally gruesome debut will challenge readers to ignore its bewitching presence.
Wilder Girls is the bold, imaginative, emotionally wrenching horror novel of my dreams – one that celebrates the resilience of girls and the earthshaking power of their friendships. An eerie, unforgettable triumph. (Claire Legrand, New York Times bestselling author of Furyborn)
Wilder Girls is so sharp and packs so much emotion in such wise ways. I'm convinced we're about to witness the emergence of a major new literary star. (Jeff VanderMeer, New York Times bestselling author of Annihilation)
The perfect kind of story for our current era
A feminist, LGBT+, sci-fi-horror story with all the tantalizing elements of gore, mystery, war, and love you can ask for. Real, flawed, brave girls against a world gone mad. A shudderingly good read! (Dawn Kurtagich, author of Teeth in the Mist)
A very different boarding school tale
A New York Times bestseller, this is a story of survival and the power of female friendships. It’s part thriller and part post-apocalyptic romance, celebrating the resilience and strength of girls
All stars
Most relevant
quick read, mystery, love triangle
Grace Year meets Lord of the Flies
for fans of: House of Hollow

trigger warnings: self harm, depression, suicidal idealation

climate change body horror

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An interesting premise and a dark undercurrent throughout the book. I lost a bit of steam near the end but not sure if it was the story or my mood. Might revisit at a later time. At this point I don't feel inclined to rest the next book but that might change later.

Dark and intriguing

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I absolutely loved this female driven, girl-power-without-being-annoying-about-it story!

If the narration feels choppy and unatural for you at first, keep listening. the book is written in a very unique way, it definitely takes both narators a while to get into the swing of things. I almost turned it off because I could feel how it was meant to be read and then weren't quite getting there but it smoothed out at the quarter way mark and turned into a real enjoyable experience!

I loved that there were a few twists I caught on to and a few didn't. also great ending xx

A really great book.

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Suspenseful, unexpected and interesting at every turn, would definitely recommend. YA, Dystopian, LGBT. Really good.

Very good

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not finished, expected it to get better but it got too depressing and skincrawley. maybe the acting was too good!

Gruesome and made me anxious

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