Greenwood writes compelling characters and paints a story that falls into the “ugly” things of poor, small-town woes run by drugs. You want to root for a lot of the characters.
The problem for me is that the stewardship between a neglected child and a man in the community is leading into, as the reviews confirm, a romance story. The lines between fraternal and parental love are blurred as soon as the character hits puberty.
It becomes an uncomfortable attempt to romanticize a relationship between an adult man and a girl child. I can’t keep listening to see if the lens of power dynamics and lack of choice or provisions for the girl empowers her to be independent of the man and own her autonomy.
I have listened to / read stories with MUCH worse writing. I respect that we with any art, the written word provides a space to provoke thought and spark conversation about assumed societal norms or traditions. I just dont really think this story hits on all the layers needed to give the main girl a redemptive, much less happy ending.
There also were a few sentences in the audiobook where Marie’s narration slipped out of a character voice and into her default voice which were confusing the first few times it happened.