The Girls of Summer

Katie Bishop has written a powerful novel about the abuse of power and the price of “consent.” It is a coming-of-age story that, years later, becomes a painful reckoning with trauma.
Rachel returns to the remote island where, fifteen years earlier, as a seventeen-year-old girl, she had spent the most memorable summer of her life. Behind her lie a first love with a much older man, endless parties, and a sense of complete freedom. But now, despite her happy marriage, the past pulls her back like a whirlpool.
As she reconnects with her former friends and former lover, Rachel suddenly realizes that her memories are nothing more than a vivid wrapping concealing something terrible. What was the real cause of her friend’s death? What part did the mysterious wealthy man play in it? Crimes and traumas that have been kept buried in silence for far too long begin to rise to the surface.