I received this book for free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
A Girl Like Us by Anna Sophia McLoughlin Series: Standalone
Published by Sourcebooks Landmark on 11 February 2025
Genres: Mystery, Thriller
Pages: 302
Format: E-Arc
Source: Netgalley
Buy on Amazon
Goodreads
Succession meets Saltburn in a crackling locked-room thriller of inconceivable wealth, unchecked power, and the secrets poised to bring a powerful family down
It's 2004 and former reality TV star and party girl Maya Miller has just married the most eligible bachelor on the Colin Sterling, of the globally famous Sterling family whose history of aristocratic titles and land holdings rival a British royal and whose media empire is comparable to the Murdochs. To some, Maya represents the American dream. To others, a gold digger. But when Colin's cousin Arianna, the heiress to the family's immense fortune, is found murdered, Maya is thrust into the first as she is revealed to be the next heiress to the fortune, and then as the prime suspect.
Swiftly, the entire Sterling family goes into lockdown at Silver House, the family's ancestral estate in the English countryside. They're told it's for their own safety—but Maya becomes convinced that it's not to keep threats out, but to keep secrets in. Now, she has no choice but to find and expose the truth hidden within the Sterling family, and why Arianna, a girl she had never met, chose her to take her place. But Maya has secrets of her own. And she knows that in order to survive the Sterlings, she'll have to beat them at their own game.
It’s not so often that I read Mystery-Thriller books because it’s not just right up my alley. But when I came across this one in Netgalley, there’s something about that cover, title, and synopsis that gripped me and so I made a request. Little did I know that it would blow my mind away in the most dizzying and delicious way.
Told from two alternating point of views, A Girl Like Us has wrapped me around its pages from start to finish. Why? Because reading it made me feel like I am watching a teleserye with all the salacious secrets our characters hiding inside their closets and all the while, relentless at making me guess who killed the not-so innocent heiress.
A Girl Like Us is not for the fainthearted and for those seeking some lovable characters to cuddle with at the end of the day. The Sterlings with the inclusion of Maya Miller are one of the most hateful beings you’d prolly encounter in literature. Entitled, haughty, and cunning, these unrepentant despots shouldn’t have deserved all the wealth and extraordinary privileges that they have but unfortunately, their outstanding contribution to the global GDP made them what they are. And because of their circumstance, it cannot be helped that ordinary people like Maya Miller, the protagonist of our story, would aspire to become one of the Sterlings despite her questionable background. With her cunning and manipulations, Maya Miller actually made her dream come true, to become one of the rich despots.
When she finally tied the knot with the handsome and gentle Colin Sterling, Maya thought that she’d finally reached the pinnacle of her social climbing career. Unfortunately, instead of enjoying her newfound wealth and drowning herself in marital bliss, a mind-shattering event happened to the family. The Sterling heiress was dead, and while Maya has nothing to do with the heiress as they haven’t met as far as she knows, all evidence seemed to point to Maya as the culprit. And Maya is not exactly the model of prim and proper as her personal background is also riddled with intrigue and horrifying scandals.
There was just no room for relaxing as I devoured every page of A Girl Like Us, afraid that I would lose the trail of the culprit if I’d read slower, afraid that the hateful Sterlings and Maya will corrupt me if they ever catch up to me. While it’s easy to get lost in the sweeping setting McLoughlin has created in this book, it was difficult to ignore the bile that rose up in my throat every time one of the characters’ skeletons in the closet was revealed. Reading all the things that had happened prior to the horrific death of the heiress and the eventual actuations of the characters involved, it was hard to maintain my composure and stop myself from murdering most of the members (except for the kids and Colin, perhaps) of such loathsome and unredeemable family.
There was just so much darkness contained in this book that I found myself drained after finishing it. McLoughlin definitely knows how to craft her mystery/thriller that A Girl Like Us had me on tenterhooks as I navigated the maze that is the Sterling Park mansion and the thoughts of Maya and Arianna. If you want something dark to make you question what’s wrong with humanity, give A Girl Like Us a try.