Good Girls is a mesmerizing look into the psychology of a controlling mother and the horrific consequences it can have. As someone who also had a drastic mother who would seclude me from the outside world for disobeying her, it was eerie and frightening. The author did a good job conveying the push-pull of wanting to rebel and exert independence while terrified of potential repercussions.

Not a thriller in a traditional sense, this book will keep you at the edge of your seat with its multiple POVs and leave you wanting more once it ends.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC of this book. This was a quick suspenseful read. I wouldn't categorize it as a thriller more of a family drama story. The characters were well done and the multiple POVs and timeline really helped the story move quickly.

Provocative and toxic, this book did such a good job of showing relationships that are controlling and the effect family can have on a person. I loved the dynamics and how they played out for each of the characters throughout the novel.
Thank you Netgalley for the read.

Unfortunately, I was unable to download this book before it was archived and so am leaving this as a review/explanation as I didn't know what else to do after finding a few books I had managed to miss in a section of my account entitled Not Active: Archived, Not Downloaded; so I thought it best to clear it up. I have already bought a copy and will leave a review on places like Amazon, Goodreads, Waterstones, etc, once I've completed it and formed my thoughts on it. Apologies for any inconvenience and thank you for the opportunity.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.
So I picked this thinking it was a thriller because that’s how it was catagorized.
However it was more of a family drama than a thriller.
I did enjoy reading it and the dynamics of a very controlled family environment.

Looking for a short, enthralling book to finish out 2023? Might want to check out GOOD GIRLS by @leesagazi and translated to English by Shabnam Nadiya. Thank you to the author, @netgalley and the publisher @amazonpublishing for the e-ARC.

🔪🔪🔪

Farida Khanam has always run her household as a very tight ship, keeping her husband and two daughters, Lovely and Beauty under her thumb and watchful eye. Her daughters are punished by being locked in their respective rooms whenever they disappoint their mother and are never allowed to leave the house by themselves. Without friends, school or anything else to call theirs alone, life is mostly confined to their household walls.

Until one day, the day of Lovely's 40th birthday, Farida tells Lovely to go on to Gausia to buy fabric on her own astonishing both Lovely and herself. The anxiety both characters undergo as the day unravels very differently than their normal, regulated routine, seeps through the words of the fretful overbearing mother and sheltered, inexperienced but middle-aged daughter. As the day spirals out of control, the fragile cracks in their delicately forgotten and constructed memories of the past start to shatter as bitter younger sister Beauty fumes at this injustice and plots to get both mother and sister back.

Switching POV between mother and each daughter, including flashbacks that reveal the truth of their past, this short book (190 pages) had me rushing through the pages - there was such a brewing tension but I could not always put my finger on why I was so nervous!

This story has drama, dark fairytale vibes, sibling rivalry, deep family secrets, scheming, intrigue and some delicious social commentary. If you need a quick, engulfing thriller this might be just the ticket for you. Bonus - this is translated from Bengali and is steeped in Indian/Asian cultural references as well - apparently the original is titled HELLFIRE based on the saying "Hellfire follows a woman of fortu who goes out to the bazaar, unaccompanied, for the first time in her life."🔥🔥🔥

💚SMASHBOT💚

I reviewed this for the All the Books podcast. This is a rough transcript.

This is categorized as a thriller–it’s right there on the front cover–but I’m not sure that’s what I’d call it.
At the same time, I’m not sure there’s a genre it would fit into better.
This is an exploration of a family that’s been under pressure for so long that it’s about to explode.
This is a short book, under 200 pages, and it all takes place over the course of a single day.
It was originally published in 2020 under the title Hellfire, but it’s been republished with a new title and cover.
We are introduced to this Bangladeshi family through Lovely.
It’s her birthday, and she’s just turned 40.
For the first time, apparently on a whim, her mother Farida tells her she can go to the market by herself.
Lovely and her sister Beauty have always been under lock and key.
When they were children, Farida would wait outside the school gate the entire day they were at school.
While both daughters had many marriage proposals, Farida didn’t consider any of them good enough, so she turned them all down.
Now, it’s uncertain what their future is, as Farida and her husband age.
Neither Lovely nor Beauty hate their lives, though.
Beauty bickers with her mother, but never really disobeys. She spends her days doing her beauty regimen and rewatching movies.
Lovely would never tell her mother off like that. She’s fine spending her days visiting with Beauty and obeying her mother, living out the same routine over and over.
But when Beauty won’t get out of bed in time to accompany her to the market, she’s stunned that Farida lets her go by herself, as long as she’s back by 2pm.
She’s overwhelmed by this sudden freedom, unsure what to do with herself.
Luckily, she has a voice in her head to guide her: a man who showed up one day in her thoughts and provides constant commentary.
This is a very internal story: we spend a lot of time in Lovely’s head.
Later, we get to know the internal lives of Beauty and their parents, including some secrets that have been kept the sisters’ whole lives.
There is a lot of animosity bubbling beneath the surface of this family living out their routine day in and day out.
When that routine is disrupted, everything comes to a head.
I was immediately pulled into this book by Lovely’s point of view, which is so engrossing.
Again, I’m not sure “thriller” is the right word for this: the tension slowly builds over the course of the book. It’s not fast-paced.
It’s an unsettling book that I flew through.
One review said it has a similar feel as We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which I think makes sense.
If you like dysfunctional family stories, pick this one up.
Content warnings for dysfunctional/abusive families and death.
And that’s Good Girls by Leesa Gazi [gauze-ee], translated by Shabnam [shab-num] Nadiya

Thank you, Amazon Crossing, for the advance reading copy.

I expected a better closure towards the end considering how close yet how distant the main female characters were to each other.

I find the writing quite accessible to read in one sitting. However, constant repetition of certain words in the entire book did dim the overall reading. Certain scenes do tend to get repetitive as well.

The story depicts a very close strict family of two sisters whose mother gets quite upset when they try to be more independent and carefree. This might sound a bit too much as is described in the book but I can understand how mothers can be specifically when it comes to the society/community we live in.

Trigger warnings for lots of slang/swear words directed towards women and domestic violence/abuse.

Good Girls by Lessa Gazi was novel that took me through so many emotions. Family secrets, expectations of how one should be treated. An excellent book about possessive mothers, toxic families, betrayal and normalization of toxic behavior. WARNING: This book is triggering. #netgalley #goodgirls

In a Nutshell: An impactful novella about some “good girls” who, guess what, might not be so good, after all. Hardhitting and honest. A bit wacky at times. Wanted more at the end.

Story Synopsis:
Lovely and her younger-by-three-years sister Beauty have never been allowed by their mother to leave their home by themselves. Be it their education or their friends or their life choices, everything has been monitored by their mother Farida.
On Lovely’s 40th birthday, no one is more surprised than Farida herself when she permits her daughter to visit Gausia market alone, with the only instruction being to return by lunchtime. Stunned by this unexpected bonanza, Lovely is determined to make the best of the day, but where should she begin? The voice in her head gives her some interesting suggestions, some bordering on rebellion.
How far will Lovely go? How will Beauty react when she hears that her elder sister was allowed to go out alone? What was in Farida’s mind that morning? Read and find out.
The story comes to us in the third person perspectives of the above three characters.


This novella was originally published as “Rourob” (Pride) in Bengali in 2020. It was first translated to English in the same year and published in India under the title “Hellfire”. This American edition has again undergone a name change, and comes out on 5th December 2023. I think this title suits the book the best.

Bookish Yays:
😍 A short read at just 190 pages, and yet I didn’t feel like zooming through it. The entire plot is set on a single day – Lovely’s 40th birthday, but we get enough of the backstory through well-written flashbacks and reminiscences.
😍 Great development of the main three characters. Farida’s overprotectiveness, Lovely’s dutifulness as an elder daughter, and Beauty’s rebelliousness as the younger daughter – all come out well. I loved seeing how the initial impressions made by the trio change over the course of the day.
😍 A few of the secondary characters are also impactful, particularly the girls’ father and the servant boy.
😍 The story is set in Dhaka, Bangladesh. As Bangladesh and India were the same nation until a few decades ago, our cultures are quite similar. As such, the description of the Gausia market as well as the regional attitude towards female children, skin colour, marriages, and parental duties – all felt genuine.
😍 The prose is amazingly vivid. Gausia market comes especially alive with the author’s (and translator’s) words.
😍 Despite the relative short length, the book goes deep and wide in its themes, handling dysfunctional families, patriarchy, psychological manipulation, and toxic parenting especially well. The genius of this is that there is nothing R-rated on paper. No sexual abuse, no violence, nothing. All we see is the aftermath; yet, it is disturbing.
😍 I am not sure if Lovely and Beauty come with the same names in the Bangla version, but I loved how apt their English names were for their respective personalities.
😍 Despite the serious themes and situations, there is enough humour in the book. One of the main sources of fun is the man’s voice in Lovely’s head, who seems to be goading her into breaking all of her constraints.
😍 I loved the translation. The prose is crisp enough to feel original, and at the same time, the content retains enough of Bangla to remind us that we are reading something from another culture. The Bangla words are quite easy to guess from context, and wherever they aren’t, meanings are provided without hurdling the flow.

Bookish Mixed Bags:
😐 Lovely’s escapades in Gausia market were quite entertaining at the start, but after a point, they started feeling dragged, and even too bizarre. The initial part of her adventure reminded me of the movie “Baby’s Day Out”, except that the “baby” this time was a forty-year-old woman experiencing her first taste of freedom. But when the proceedings became exaggerated, the realism diminished. Things improve after the narration moves to the other two women.
😐 I did like the ending. A lot. Though I could see the climax coming, it still left me speechless. But I wish it weren’t the ending. There was so much more I would have loved to know. I was reminded of how I felt at the ending of Vivek Shanbag’s ‘Ghachar Ghochar’, though that was open-ended and this one wasn’t. Both books were stunning writing efforts with endings that felt abrupt.

Bookish Nays:
😒 Why the heck is it tagged as a thriller on the cover? Luckily for me, I was already aware of “Hellfire” and it was on my agenda as a literary fiction work. So I didn’t read this edition as a thriller. Anyone who picks it up as one is bound to be disappointed. It’s thrilling, but it is not a thriller.


All in all, I relished this character-driven novella. Its themes and its characters make it a fascinating read. Recommended to literary fiction lovers interested in feminist topics as well as a novel cultural perspective.

4.25 stars.

My thanks to AmazonCrossing and NetGalley for the DRC of “Good Girls”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

Good Girls by Leesa Gazi is a wonderfully told story.
This book had me gripped from beginning to end. With realistic characters, the story moves quickly and had me flipping the pages quickly. It's very entertaining, gripping and wonderfully written read.

I would like to thank NetGalley and Amazon Crossing for the opportunity to read this ahead of its publication date in return for my honest review.

On her 40th birthday, Lovely escapes her overly-protective mother's eye to visit the bazaar. While Lovely shops (giving this reader Jasmine in Agrabah vibes), her mind wanders.

And as Lovely wanders, the reader gets a peak behind the curtain.

"Of course, Lovely had never disobeyed her mother, even unwittingly. But if you considered what went on inside her, it was different."

Somehow this book is labeled as a thriller. It's definitely a psychological journey. But a slow one. Step by step through Lovely's mind, her past and present begin to unfold, like a bolt of red fabric. And then, a few stuttering steps into Lovely's mother's thoughts - and past. And there is Beauty, the younger sister, who sees more and feels more than anyone knows.

"A kooky woman wasn't necessarily a bad thing."

This is dense writing where the oppressive atmosphere is palpable.
It is about a Bangladeshi family where Farida, the mother exercises tight control over everything in that family. Her husband has given up and just submits in order to have peace, the two daughters, Lovely and Beauty are totally controlled and must stay at home all the time and have no contact outside their family.
These two sisters hate each other, both hate their mother, while she needs to guard her big secret.
In this tightly controlled pressure cooker atmosphere, any deviation is explosive and when Lovely is on her 40th birthday allowed to go out alone for a couple of hours everything comes to a dramatic climax.
It is a fascinating read as the writer captures the oppressive and very crazy atmosphere inside this house. Definitely worth a read.