The storytelling was really ambitious although it didn't quite hit the mark for me. The first half of the book was really compelling and made me care deeply about the girls. (FYI, check the trigger warnings first because the abuse in here is really a heavy thing to read.) The time jumps and the alternating POVs mid chapter made the story hard to follow at times, so I knocked off a star for the reading experience, but the story itself was a solid 4 star tale.

When it comes to short stories, Carolyn Ferrell, author of "Dear Miss Metropolitan," is a clear winner. Her comfort with this form of writing is seen in DMM. Rather than being divided into traditional chapters, this book is broken up into several shorter sections. Each entry, whether it be a single line or many paragraphs lengthy and structured like a poem, "note to self," or calendar, will have a bolded title at the top of the page. Some of the titles contain enigmatic literary allusions or abbreviations with many possible meanings. I found these items tough and inhibited the reading experience.

Those fragmented parts are a huge triumph for Ferrell. This is good, experimental literature written in a new style. If the reader can preserve, her approach will suck you in and emulate the fragmented psyche of the three afflicted females; extremely unpleasant. The point of view (POV) shifts from one character to another (but is always clearly defined), allowing for the perspectives of many important figures to be heard. From Fern’s brother, Bud, we can see the level of dysfunction and shocking lack of family & love that colored their youth and beyond.

Somehow, Fern, Gwinnie, and maybe even Jesenia and the infant made it through such inhospitable environments and lived to tell the tale. In plain sight of the many long-term residents of the area, it took place in a modest home. How does that happen? Miss Metropolitan is one of those neighbors - an old school, practically outdated reporter for a dying daily. This news has the potential to completely alter the world.

After being rescued from 10 years of horrendous abuse by “Boss Man”, Fern and Gwinnie’s story is only half revealed. Later in the narrative, they begin to heal and integrate back into society. The narrative jumps around in time to fill up details, and modern "helpers" show up to cash in. You shouldn't assume the worst just yet. Fortunately, there is a nurse who seems to have been sent from above to fight for the girls at every turn.

If you are at all sensitive to stories of sexual or physical abuse, or to stories in which others experience such abuse, this book is not for you. Harsh language, gay shaming, and substance abuse are also present. A remarkable group of strong young ladies who you won't soon forget.

From Carolyn Ferrell, author of the award-winning short story collection DON’T ERASE ME, comes DEAR MISS METROPOLITAN, an inventive and shocking novel that unpacks the before, during and after of an unthinkable tragedy --- and the tensions of grief, rage and power that surround it.

On the night that two girls and a toddler are rescued from a dilapidated house in Queens, elderly Mathilda Marron --- Miss Metropolitan --- is bemoaning the stagnation of her career. A longtime advice columnist for the Queens Metropolitan, Marron is better suited to notetaking and typewriters than social media and emails, and her journalism tends to skew toward the literary rather than the fact-based. But all of that aside, Marron knows she is a newspaperwoman through and through, so how could she have not been aware of the horrors taking place right across the street? And how could she and her neighbors have missed two young girls taken captive so long ago that they have now emerged as women? Doubtless there were signs of their captivity --- screams, smells, an overwhelming sense of doom, something --- yet no one seems to know why they were chosen. No one, that is, except for the girls themselves.

There were once three of them: Fern, the “Soul Train”-watching daughter of a pill-popping nurse; Gwin, a devoted Prince fan held under the thumb of her church-obsessed mother; and Jesenia, a beautiful fairy-tale of a girl who is wise beyond her years. In short but telling chapters, Ferrell drops us into the life of each girl before her abduction. We see not only the unfair and often unreachable standards put upon young girls but also the dysfunction and terror already surrounding them: the drug-abusing mother; her “just like family” boyfriend whose touches don’t feel familial; the church congregation that judges as often as it redeems; and the abusive boyfriend whose punches feel like love. Though the chapters are short and often interspersed with sections about the girls’ lives in captivity, Ferrell does a remarkable job writing each one with a distinct and dynamic voice.

And then there is the girls’ captor, Boss Man. He kidnapped them and turned them into “Employees,” who were forced to clean, count, and be tortured and raped in order to make himself feel powerful. Ferrell never once shies away from the realities of Boss Man’s abuses --- the rapes that turn into pregnancies that turn into violent abortions, the torture sessions that leave the girls feeling dreamlike and brain-free --- and it is not easy to watch them be treated in such graphic, unthinkable ways.

When Fern and Gwin are finally rescued, after Jesenia has disappeared, their torture is far from over. For months they are swarmed by well-meaning visitors from social services, church groups, victim advocacy organizations and even television hosts, all of whom feel the need to tell them again and again that “what happened was not their fault.” But who ever said it was? Bound to one another by endurance and survival, Fern and Gwin shrug off these irritating visits, learn to love again through their kind nurses, and dream of Jesenia, who helped get them through their captivity by telling them stories, dreaming up delicious, rich dinners made only of water and newspaper, and pulling Boss Man’s attention and punishments onto herself instead of her “sisters.” Through it all, her whereabouts hangs over their heads, along with the mystery of the toddler who was rescued with them.

At about the halfway mark, the novel jumps into the future, with new characters entering the fold, taking up the narration and shifting readers’ focus to new avenues. Already inventive, DEAR MISS METROPOLITAN becomes outright experimental at this point, with both redeeming and head-scratching results. Ferrell’s mashup of stream-of-consciousness prose, layered dialogue, and haunting, poignant passages of isolation and victimhood works undeniably well at times, but screams “less is more!” when it does not.

At its heart, the novel does some heavy work unpacking the realities of the neglect and abuse that women suffer in everyday life --- and the ways that society, their mothers, and their schools and churches encourage them to do so silently. The fairy tales Jesenia tells the girls seem to echo this notion, reminding readers of how quickly we aim to convince girls that there is a prince under the fur of every beast, a prince ready to wake us from our nightmares, a bowl of porridge that is “just right” if only we try all the bad ones first. As Ferrell shows us, these fairy tales often play right into the hands of monsters like Boss Man. Even more powerfully, she forces her readers to question why and when it falls to us to step in and put an end to these abuses. How much, in the end, do we owe our daughters, our sisters or our neighbors? Can we ever really stop something as inevitable as abuse of gender, race or socioeconomic hierarchies?

There are other road bumps to understanding here that I feel most readers will be able to overlook: no quotation marks for dialogue, very few identifiers of who is speaking, sudden shifts in voice and time period, and even photos taken by the author that contribute to the tone, if not the facts, of the story. Each element is confusing at first, but easy to understand after about 50 pages or so. That said, DEAR MISS METROPOLITAN takes work; you’ll have to suspend your disbelief not only of what is possible in the world, but of what is possible in fiction.

Ferrell is a writer completely unafraid of risks, and her fearlessness is propulsive, even when you are not entirely sure what is going on. For those willing to put in the time, this is a worthwhile read; for those who need more structure, it is equally worth skipping. Whichever way you lean, you have not heard the last from Carolyn Ferrell. Her talent is too stunning to ignore.

I found the premise of this book fascinating, but I could not get into the format. I barely made it into the book before having to call it quits, but someone please notify me if this becomes a movie or limited series bc I am so there.

I think this was a case of wrong book, wrong time. I felt apathetic about it til the end. Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and author for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my review.

A profoundly moving and stunning story of survival. I enjoyed this book so much. It took an unspeakable crime, where three girls were abducted by Boss Man. All their Dreams and Love of Life before the incident are erased. What is left could have been horrendous and unreadable, but the author has an outstanding talent. She manages to use glimpses into the horror as the girls memory also unfolds and shows the ability of one to retain hope. I came to really love these girls and route not just their survival, but for a triumph over the unspeakable. This is a story that will long sit with you. An added element is the author uses different photographs that give a NYC vibe throughout the book.

Thank you NetGalley, Carolyn Ferrell, and Henry Holt and Company for a copy of this book.

This book speaks so loud about how the disappearance of girls of color are so often ignored. Dear Miss Metropolitan, which came out after the recent disappearance and murder of Gabrielle Petito in Florida, painfully and masterfully showcases the lack of interest shown for minority girls when they go missing.
In Ferrell's story, three girls disappear for years, kidnapped by a man only known as Boss Man. What the girls endure through the years of captivity, is the stuff of nightmares. But perhaps the worst outcome, is that no one was looking for them and the horrors the lived happened right under the nose of the community.
A book that is poetic as it is a critique of the lack of justice for Black and brown girls and women, Ferrell's book is a must read.

Unfortunately, DEAR MISS METROPOLITAN is a DNF for me at 38%. I do, however, look forward to reading DON’T ERASE ME: STORIES, also written by Carolyn Ferrell.

Thank you, NetGalley and Henry Holt and Company, for loaning me an eGalley of DEAR MISS METROPOLITAN with the request of an honest.

Three girls are captured their futures forever altered. Looking back on that time the real question is how could the neighborhood watchdog miss the obvious. Years later as two of the three come together to define a reality only they understand. Chilling . Filled with very real consequences. True to the term right before your eyes.

Thanks to Netgalley, Libro.fm, and Macmillan audio for the chance to listen to this book.

I wanted to like this book. I really did, but unfortunately it fell flat for me. Bahni Turpin is one of my favorite narrators and that’s the top reason I started it. This book is very difficult to follow on audio. It jumps all over with multiple POVs, settings and times. It was a struggle for me from the very beginning. I also should have checked into the trigger warnings. Basically this book has all of them. All the trigger warnings. It was painful to read in parts and confusing in others.

Queens, New York 2002, where three teenage girls found themselves in a modern day house of horrors. Tragically, they were kidnapped by a creature they called Boss Man and held in captivity for 10 years. Tortured, starved and brutally sexually assaulted, their impenetrable friendship willed them to survive. Based on true events. Read-alike: KISS THE GIRLS by James Patterson.

This book was hard to read for a few reasons. There are a lot of triggers here. A lot of violence. You have religious fanaticism, domestic abuse, rape, terminated pregnancies and torture.

The book has great premise. Based off the Ariel Castro case, <b>Dear Miss Metroplitan</b> is centered on three kidnapped young women whose disappearances went largely unreported. Michelle Knight was an adult. Amanda Berry was first assumed to be a runaway. Gina DeJesus was only 14 at the time of her disappearance. No Amber Alerts were issued for her or the other two women. The women went missing between 2002 and 2004 and were not rescued until May 2013. Although the titular character does not feature prominently in the book, Miss Metropolitan is a newspaper columnist who lives in the neighborhood. She cannot fathom how she missed this house of horrors when it's her business to be observant.

The book spends a lot of time in the three women's headspace giving you a voyeuristic view of the trauma they had to endure. In this way it is reminiscent of Emma Donoghue's [book:Room|31685789].

The writing style for <b>Dear Miss Metropolitan</b> was rather experimental with changing timelines, different narrators, pictures and even a freakin nurse's questionnaire. <i>(I still have no idea why this was included. It just made things more confusing for me.)</i> There were moments like this that took away from the story. It was hard to keep up with where you were with the characters and where the plot was headed with Ferrell switching gears so often. I wanted to like this book more than I did but felt that she tried to do too much with her debut.

Thank you Netgalley and Henry Holt & Company for my gifted copy.

However this book wasn't for me. It dealt with a lot of dark topics that I didn't really care to read about. It was hard to read and felt very depressing. The story was dark and talked about things like kidnapping, drug abuse, physical abuse, rape, miscarriages, abduction, imprisonment, deaths etc.

I felt like this story was a little all over the place and as someone who has ADHD it was a little hard for me to follow.

I can see someone who enjoys true crime liking this book though. I'm not one of those.

I really wanted to love this one, but I could not get into the writing style. The author is clearly a talented writer and is pushing the boundaries of traditional narrative style, which I think would be interesting to discuss in a writing or literature class. Unfortunately, I could not settle into this style enough to really enjoy the story.

Read if you like:
- stream of consciousness style narrative
- experimental/ artful writing
- themes of dealing with trauma/healing

Thank you to Henry Holt for this gifted eARC!

Dear Miss Metropolitan by Carolyn Ferrell was a difficult subject matter but I also found it hard to read an to keep up with at times. I felt lost during the middle half of this book.

Review of Uncorrected Digital Galley

“Soul Train” aficionado Fern, Prince devoteé Gwin, and precocious Jesenia have many things in common, including the decade the monstrous Boss Man holds them captive in his ramshackle house of torture. No one in the neighborhood knows any about this. And when rescue finally comes, there will be many questions . . . and far fewer answers.

Written in a style that feels largely analogous to stream of consciousness, the narrative ricochets between characters, places, and time with no warning of the switching for the reader. The result is as unsettling as the story itself.

Told largely from Fern’s point of view, the caroming story follows the three young women, showing each of their lives before and after their abduction and imprisonment at the hands of their sadistic captor. Although not explicitly described, the narrative clearly communicates the horrific torture and repeated rape endured by each of the three women.

It is not an easy story; rather, it’s one filled with trauma and cruelty laid bare before the reader. After turning the final page, readers are likely to find the women’s heinous nightmare continues to haunt them.

Loosely based on the true story of three Cleveland-area girls . . . Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, and Georgina DeJesus . . . abducted and held captive by Ariel Castro, the unfolding narrative of “Dear Miss Metropolitan” is an intransigent look at the psychological effects of the captivity and torture experienced by each of the young women as well as by the neighbors who insist they’d known nothing about the women being held captive in the “House of Horrors.”

The plot reveals the vicissitudes of before, during, and after the kidnapping; the character development is the ramifications of their captivity, shown in their will to survive, in their rapport with each other, and, ultimately, in their relationships with the wider world.

The brutal story is dark and disturbing, heart-wrenching and evocative. And, despite its baffling formatting quirks, readers will find the narrative well worth the effort.

Recommended.

I received a free copy of this eBook from Henry Holt and Company and NetGalley
#DearMissMetropolitan#NetGalley

That was quite a hard books to read. I loved the structure of the book: Carolyn Ferrell introduces us to each girls and their respective families so we can understand where they are coming from and why things will later unfold the way they do. There is a second part of the actual captivity so we can understand how they lived daily with each other and with Boss Man, their kidnapper. The third part consist of the life after they are found and resume their lives as freed beings.

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a contemporary drama. An interesting take on how one’s life can turn upside down when kidnapped, whether you are the victim, or a loved one of the victims, or even a neighbor of that « House of Horror » who had no clue what was happening next door for 10 years.

I particularly enjoyed the many POVs within the book which brought more depth to the story. My favorite. POV being the Katanya’s (Jesenia and Boss Man’s baby); how her life was forever linked to her origins and the horrific acts of her parents. No one can ever recover from such origins, no matter how many times you change your name and how hard you are trying to suppress who you really are.

Thank you Net Galley and Henry Holt & Co. for this ARC in exchange for my honest review..

I read an excerpt of Dear Miss Metropolitan in the Spring/Summer edition of Buzz Books and was very happy to get approved for an early review copy. Fern, Gwin, and Jessina all come from unhappy homes. Though their paths haven't crossed before, all that will change when they are taken by a man known to the girls at Boss Man. They spend ten years as his captives, and if the stories shared of their 'before' lives seem heartbreaking, the time they spend in his house of horrors is nothing short of horrific and soul-crushing.

Torture and abuse are the everyday norms and it seems likely that the only way out of this nightmare will be through death. Miraculously,they are discovered, and Miss Metropolitan is appalled that she missed what was happening right next door for so many years. You might expect the 'after' to be a triumphant tale of survival, but you would be wrong. This type of ordeal rarely ends with a happily ever after.

The writing I will admit was not always easy to follow. A mix of the girls' nightmarish existence with each of them providing disjointed pieces of a puzzle that will quite frankly never be solved. How can any of us understand how much evil exists in the world and what really goes through the minds of those who live with it day after day? I thought about all the cohesive stories I have read dealing with unbelievable trauma, and though I was frustrated at times trying to understand what was going on, it was an authentic view. How could anyone tell a story about something so unimaginably cruel? After all, perfect endings really only happen in fairy tales. Brutal, but overall a very sad story and one that really made me think. I didn't come close to reading this in one sitting but would read a bit and digest( or attempt to digest) this story. If you ever thought that bad things can't happen right next door, this book will challenge your opinion of what goes on behind closed doors. If I had to pick a one-word summary, it would be haunting.

Incredible. Magnificent. Truly original. Must-read.

I loved the author’s choice of narratives….jumping years and narrators - all without quotation marks.

This book was about 3 girls kidnapped, tortured, abused, raped, starved - by a man called “boss man”. Remember the Ariel Castro case? This books has similar “characters” and plot and includes photographs of places and elements within captivity and the victim’s lives.

Thick with complex, thoughtful themes including social injustice and racism and economics disparity as well as surviving as a victim as well as a member of the community who lived among the kidnapper and the victims for years.

My mind is spinning. Loved it. So impressed with author Carolyn Ferrell…brava!

Heartfelt thanks to Henry Holt publishing for this incredible book. I’m grateful.

This book is such an achievement. It's hard to read and it's got a very experimental-type style. It's not a straightforward narrative and it would be incredibly easy for this approach to make the book hard (if not impossible) to read. Instead? It's worth trying to parse based on what's said and unsaid.

It's a very good book and I respect it so much.. It's not for everyone but a lot of people are going to absolutely love it.