Read this in a few hours whilst in bed with some virus 🦠 which is an interesting analogy for this book.
It’s not a new concept (as others have pointed out) but it does bring it up to date with the Flower Girls now all grown up. Like a virus, this book got its claws into me and slowly got hold of me! I didn’t like it at first but as the momentum builds, it really hooked me in.
A cast of seemly unpleasant characters with not much going for them, even the worthiest characters seemed flawed and full of bile.

It’s the most horrendous thing that anyone can imagine yet this author brought it to life in a way that made it more palatable to read. By the end of the book you have an understanding of the motivations of the main characters... I felt that it was all a little rushed and could have been developed to have more of a crescendo with a longer more expansive ending.

That said, it was an “easy”, interesting read that was light on gruesome details (so much the better, in my opinion) and longer on narrative. There’s a bit too much telling and less for the reader to work out, but all in all, it’s an interesting and compelling read.
4*

My advance copy was not formatted properly but this didn’t detract from the book...

Lauren, 10, and Rosie, 6, are deemed by the courts to be complicit in the abduction, torture and murder of a toddler. Lauren is sentenced to imprisonment until at least the age of review at 18 but Rosie is too young to be felt culpable and is given a new identify … so we meet her again as a free woman, now ‘Hazel’, in her 20s at a seaside hotel with her boyfriend Jonny – the only person to whom she has ever admitted her real identity. Both Rosie/Hazel and Lauren are estranged from their family and Lauren in particular is the subject of a bitter hate campaign from the aunt of the murdered child, who is determined that she remain in prison after she passes 18.

The story takes on a new urgency when a little girl goes missing from the hotel where Hazel is staying, and the inevitable revelations of her real identity come to light. Could she be repeating the crime she got away with at the age of 6? The question that then hovers over the whole book is whether Hazel could be involved in this new abduction and also how involved she was back then, as a 6-year-old.

The story flits back and forth between 1997 when the ‘flower girls’ were children and the modern day, as we see Hazel’s life begin to unravel and we also see the traumatic surroundings of Lauren’s life in prison, a little more of each scene being revealed each time we come back to it.

The author does a pretty good job of maintaining suspense. Unusually for me, I ‘guessed it/got it’ pretty early on but that didn’t particularly spoil it for me. What did, though, was a somewhat superficial rendering of the characters in terms of their personalities and motivations. The character I connected with most was Lauren, in prison, as I found myself feeling some sorrow and sympathy for her situation, but I could not find much sympathy for or empathy with any of the other characters. Even allowing for expected grief and bitterness, the families of victims and perpetrators alike had few or no redeeming features to allow us to sympathise with them or even like them just a little bit. Even the police involvement was dissatisfying and seemed almost an added afterthought to the plot, with no follow-through towards the end. The quite basic plot had a wee twist at the end but even that final revelation was dealt with swiftly and without particular explanation, which left me not hungering for more but rather feeling plain dissatisfied.

So, for me, not a real winner. I did quite enjoy the read (if that’s the right word for a book with such a serious theme) but I didn’t find myself rushing to pick it up and keep reading.

The Flower Girls took me a few chapters to get fully into but then I couldn't put it down. I feel opinions could be divided because of the subject matter and frequent mentions of famous child murderers but I loved this book. I'll be keeping an eye out for other books by Alice as this was so good!

I have to say that I did not really enjoy this book, and I almost gave up on it around a third of the way in. I found it very slow and plodding, with not a lot happening, but I persevered.
The subject matter is disturbing and chilling, dealing with the long- ago murder of a tiny child, and the present day disappearance of a toddler. I had a real problem with the ploy of story references to previous child abductions and murder which have happened in real life, and which still remain in many readers memories, I found this unnecessary and distasteful, and felt that it was exploitative of real life tragedies, for the sake of a story.
The narrative picked up in the last third of the book, but it was evident how the story would conclude.
I was not convinced by the characters, some of whom were one - dimensional. There was very little depth to the main characters, I did not get a real sense of them at all, I’m sorry to say.
My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for my advance copy of the book.

The problem with this grim tale is that I felt it skirted too close to the notoriety of famous child victim cases which are too recent in public memory to make me feel comfortable about whether I was OK with the connections being used in a novel (the cases of the Moors murders, Jamie Bulger, Madeleine McCann, the Soham murders and more are referenced) I think I'd have preferrred to make my own links rather than worry that it was a bit exploitative. It does deal with the complex nature of media intrusion around violent crimes affecting children and the often unhinged public scrutiny of those involved, even peripherally. I finished it and was often quite engaged, but overall it left me feeling a bit itchy, as if I was somehow complicit in the very thing I've just mentioned.

With thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the book in exchange for an honest review.
I thought this book was amazingly well written and once I started I found it hard to stop reading the book. It isn’t an easy subject to write about, children who kill, but it was really well thought out and not sensationalised.
It also showed the effect of the murder of a child, not only on the immediate family but also on the wider family. In the child’s family the parents and the aunt kept up their vigil for nearly 20 years to ensure that Laurel never was released. In the Flower Girls family , the parents and Rosie never once visited Laurel and moved away and changed their names. The uncle who was a lawyer, Toby was the only family member who not only represented Laurel until his imminent death from cancer but continued to act on her behalf and by doing so his parents the Flower Girls grandparents never spoke to him again.
It was a mesmerising story and in parts quite chilling!!
Highly recommended.

Two young sisters playing games. One dead baby. One sister convicted and the other goes free.
18 years later a child goes missing.
Memories are revisited and lives are changed.
This will keep you guessing to the end and then have a final surprise.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. I had been looking forward to reviewing this book and I am so glad that I did, this was a compelling and intense read and also in parts very disturbing. 4 stars

Sorry have up on this book at only 20%. It's very unusual that I don't finish a book but I really can't seem to get interested in this and an looking for things to do instead of picking up my kindle - not good!

This had been a dark and twisted book; real, scary and dark… not for every one!
Two little sisters; Primrose and Laurel, aged 6 and 10 years old, killed a girl on 1997; their past is still with them, one is in prison and the other one is free… All the clues lead to them, but they never revealed why they did it… it was an accident or a horrible game?
When a girl is missing in the present, it will make Rosie’s life been threatened, she had been hiding her real identity all her life and now everyone will know she is one of the Flower Girls… is she ready to face the consequences? On the other side, Laurel has spend her last 20 years in prison, now she has a new court meeting, will they forgive her and allow her to be free? So many questions… the only way to discover the truth is to read this book!
I have to say I was totally captivated by this book, twisted and original it kept me glued on the story since the first page!
There are a few twists that can be seen if you are a book addict, but what made me love this book was not only the “mystery” but how the author shares with us how a crime like this not only brakes the family of the victim but the killer too. I think this was the part of the book that I liked most, how this is not a typical thriller book, it felt more real and human, is easier to read an investigation book about a murder, but when feelings are involved it always feel more personal, and in this case more interesting.
Take a chance in the Flower Girls, is not the typical book you are used to, it will arrive to your heart.

The Flower Girls is reminiscent of the Jamie Bulger murder, with all the horrors of two young children abducting and murdering a younger child. The initial scene at a country house hotel on New Year's Eve is a great opening chapter, setting the pace for the whole book, and introducing some realistic characters. Unfortunately, some of the main characters don't ring true, and ultimately I found the outcome to be improbable and disappointing. However, I kept reading the book because I really wanted to know what happened.

Sometimes you read a book and love it but you can’t pinpoint why and this was one of those books for me. It says in the blurb that ‘you’ll never forget the flower girls’ and if this were a real life case you know for sure their notoriety would make them unforgettable. A few times I thought ‘this reminds me of the a or b case’ and every time that happened the author mentioned that case in the text which I liked. It seemed that when I thought I could predict what was coming next the author surprised me by taking a less expected route. I really don’t want to overanalyse this one. It will not be everyone’s cup of tea, but I loved it.

I received an advanced reader copy of this novel via NetGalley by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

In 1997 young sisters, Laurel and Primrose, go out to play. When things go horribly wrong, a toddler is left dead, a sister convicted of murder and the other destined to spend the rest of her life hiding her past.

I'm going to be honest, this novel is everything I look for in a good thriller. Not only a fantastic, mysterious storyline but to put it simply, so well written. Told from various perspectives of character's whose lives have been impacted by an initial traumatic event, 19 years later. Each perspective had it's own intrigue and added something to the storyline. There were certain plot points that I would have loved to have been explored in more detail, but overall a great read.

A truly gripping story, The Flower Girls had me hooked from early on. Wasn't expecting one of the twists and the book ends on a fantastic point. A little bit predictable with one storyline but was absolutely made up for by the final twist!

The Flower Girls is a dark, disturbing and really rather haunting story.

Nearly twenty years ago, the brutal murder of two-year-old Kirstie Swann shocked the nation, not least because the apparent perpetrators, Laurel and Rosie Bowman, were just ten and six years old. Laurel, above the age of criminal responsibility, is tried and convicted of murder, and has remained in custody ever since; her sister, too young to stand trial, moves away with her parents and a new identity. Still, the public haven’t forgotten the girls dubbed by the press “the Flower Girls” - like other young killers, their names and photographs have become a byword for evil. But nobody knows what really happened that day... because neither Laurel nor Rosie has ever told.

Many years later, Rosie - now known as Hazel, and having successfully rebuilt her life - is staying at a Devon hotel with her boyfriend when another young girl, five-year-old Georgie Greenstreet, goes missing.

It looks like the past is coming back to haunt her.

The story is told from a number of angles - we see Laurel and Rosie/Hazel both then and now, but we also see their story through the eyes of others.

Joanna, the aunt of murdered Kirstie, has diverted her grief into anger, devoting her life to ensuring that her conception of justice is done - for Joanna, that means Laurel’s never getting out of prison, not if she’s got anything to do with it.

Meanwhile, tenacious Detective Constable Lorna Hillier is determined to uncover the truth about what’s happened to Georgie before it’s too late.

Despite the unpleasant subject matter the story is compellingly and sensitively written, forcing the reader to examine notions of guilt, responsibility and retribution, particularly through the character of Joanna. The crying out for vengeance-at-all-costs of a certain section of the general public is laid bare here during a radio phone-in involving Joanna when one caller remarks that Laurel “should’ve been hanged from the start”. “You’d have hanged a ten-year-old?” enquires the host, causing the caller to quickly backtrack... though only slightly.

There’s a strangely fairytale quality at times about The Flower Girls - but most definitely the darker kind. There’s nothing cosy or comforting here. And the ending is truly unexpected and horrifying.

An excellent read but with some dark and difficult themes.

Gripping & fast paced loved this book it is still in my head 3 days after finishing it. Wasn’t sure I was going to get into it at the start but that soon changed. I would recommend this to anyone thAnks for the preview.

An amazing, if slightly tapped, story! Such a controversial topic to write about, child murderers but it was completed in such a fascinating way that this really is a book you can't put down. I just hope there is another book with what happened next....

THE Flower Girls # Netgallery
I started the flower girls,at first I just felt I could not get into this book at all, it was reading a bit confusing and I felt it was set in the times of the Deep South where ladies where ladies waited on hand and foot. I persevered for a good few chapters and ended up putting the book down in favour of a different book. I never give up on a book. I knew at some point I would start the book again, now if we where all to be truthful and say we haven’t started a book but at that time is not always the right time. Anyhow I started again and this time I wondered where I had got my first impression from, although a still had a slight feeling it was for true and fine ladies and I am glad to say I picked the book up again, I know I say this often I just don’t like giving spoilers out, I have had many a book ruined through spoilers, I will say this it’s not the book you think it is it’s definitely worth reading it’s got its twists and turns in plenty also some minepulstions on its way through a definite must read.

Such a great read. I loved the way the story unravelled, never dragged out or tedious- there was a strong momentum and I liked the way the characters stories intertwined and played out to find out the truth. Really different approach to other crime stories I’ve read; the characters felt so familiar- this would make the most amazing TV series.

I loved reading The Flower Girls and it is the first time I have read a book by Alice Clark-Platts. It is a dark, twisted tale full of lies and deceit. I could never be sure who to trust in this deliciously dark tale and I was on tenterhooks until the final revelations were made clear at the end. It’s totally addictive and absorbing. Its ending really did give me chills, and I don’t think I’ll be forgetting about it for a while.

A storm is closing in, at a hotel in Devon, a child, Georgie, goes missing and a rising sense of panic ensues with everyone fearing that the young girl will die outside in the storm, and it is a race against the clock to find her. But what happened in the lead up to her disappearance? Who was the last person to see her? We are then introduced to two sisters, Laurel and Primrose, known to the press and the world as The Flower Girls, for the horrific crime they were both involved in when Primrose was just six, and Laurel just a few years older. Georgie’s disappearance throws them back into the spotlight again, nineteen years after their crime, and there is a lot of anger as Laurel is fighting to be released from prison as a reformed citizen, and there are people furiously campaigning to stop this from happening. But will the truth of what happened that day all those years ago finally be revealed? Does Laurel deserved to be let back out into society?

This was a very easy book to get into and I just wanted to keep reading to find out the answers as to what happened that day nineteen years earlier. I think the public become all the more fascinated by a case where young children have been involved in a crime. We really want answers as to what prompted them to commit something so horrific, are people born evil? Or is it the fault of their parents that they committed this heinous act?

The case that is at the heart of The Flower Girls is a very disturbing one, and it was uncomfortable to read about at times; as I was reading it did often put me in mind of the James Bulger case, which is still often in the news today although it happened many years ago. I never could be sure I was being told quite the whole picture of what happened as I was reading and this is what kept me reading on and Alice played this very well. There are several surprising revelations that took this book in a whole new direction. The plot was unpredictable and I could never be sure how it was going to unfold, and I had several theories running around inside my head as I was reading and Alice proved me wrong on all of them.

We have two very intriguing characters in this book in Laurel and Primrose, both of who are hiding dark secrets about what really went on in their past. This is what made this book such a compelling read and there is plenty of misdirection, I could never make up my mind about either of them. As Laurel’s hearing draws closer this brings the two sisters together again, years after they last saw each other, and it makes for some intense reading as I waited to see how they would both react to seeing each other again after all this time apart.

The Flower Girls is the author’s first stand-alone and it is an exciting, dark and an intense crime thriller. It’s very clever and I can’t wait to read more of Alice’s work. I would definitely recommend it if you love a mix of a police procedural and a psychological thriller. Top stuff!