The Burning Girls follow Reverand Jack Brooks and her daughter Flo after they move from their home in Nottingham to a small village in a very close knit community. Taking the role of vicar within their parish, Jack is quickly aware of the tradition and superstition attached to certain dealings within the village – she is blatantly aware that she’s going to have to be careful and of course, just like anyone, she has her own skeletons in the closet. Years and years ago, residents of the town were burnt at the stake and remain integral figures that are celebrated each year. When Jack and her daughter start to discover weird goings on, they can’t be sure what to think. 30 years ago, 2 young girls disappeared without a trace and just two months ago, the vicar she is replacing unexpectedly committed suicide. With so much going on, Jack and Flo unravel the mysteries that the village holds and come face to face with a terror they could never have anticipated…

I absolutely adored this story – not only was it incredibly fast-paced, the characters were immensely likeable from the offset. With so many thrillers released each year, it’s really improtant that I’m hooked from the word go – and that was definitely the case here. I loved Jack and Flo in equal measure, although I wasn’t too fond of some of the neighbours that we’re introduced to – that’s definitely what was supposed to happen though as they’re definitely not likeable or moral characters. I found myself doubting every person that we were introduced to and nothing about the climax of the story was predictable at all – some of the run ups to the end were guessable, but the final ~twist~ as it was was something I could never have predicted. I finished the book in a single sitting – which isn’t unusual of me when I’m really into a book, but with my endless fantasy books with their hundreds and hundreds of pages, isn’t something that happens all that often at the moment! I highly recommend this book to lovers of C. J. Tudor herself, C.L. Taylor and other popular thriller writers!

I've lived in the countryside for many years. In England's green and pleasant land. Without fear or unease. And then ... Along came C.J. Tudor. Now ... I've learned to lock my doors and windows and put on the security chains, because terror can lurk in the shadows, and some of those old superstitions might just be true.
Like her first three novels, C.J. Tudor's latest is tinged with horror. It simmers with the gothic. It is eerie and haunting and breath-taking. Small town England can never be the same again.
This is a touching account of flawed characters all concealing the darkness within them. In equal measures it is tender, compelling, and terrifying.

Two books down and CJ Tudor has suddenly become one of my favourite authors for her skilful talent in combining: creepy, suspenseful, funny, atmospheric and fast paced stories under the crime fiction genre.

I won’t bother repeating the synopsis because that’s not a review but it’s hard to find something to say that hasn’t already been said. With so many reviews already posted, the majority being 5 stars... I (we) can assure you that you’re on to a good book!

Tudor will probably hate me for saying this but if I had to describe this book I’d say it was The Vicar of Dibley meets Hot Fuzz. Slightly unconventional vicar moves to quaint, traditional town with a dark history and close-knit community that is hiding something.

Moving to this small village with the vicar is Flo, the teenage daughter. I loved Flo! Flo, like her vicar parent isn’t your typical teenage girl. She’s clever, funny, kind, self sufficient and very adult for her years. It was refreshing to read a teenage character that wasn’t sulky, moody and unable to communicate. The relationship between her and the vicar was a perfect pairing.

This book had me absolutely hooked from the first chapter. I love Tudor’s style of writing, she doesn’t dilly-dally all day with long drawn out descriptives. Her style is more ‘summarise and sucker-punch’ and it works! Her chapters are relatively short and each one considered so that it’s impossible to stop.

I enjoyed the supernatural twist in both Tudor’s books. It’s just enough to be creepy without turning the book into a ghost story. Her style flips seamlessly between the two worlds whilst remaining relevant and taught with suspense.

I highly recommend reading this book, it’s an absolute page turner and one everybody will be talking about.

Thanks to NetGalley for my advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

This is the best book I've read for a very long time. I was excited when I heard C J Tudor had a new one, and when I read the blurb I knew it was going to be good. The perfect mixture of creepy, spooky/ supernatural with added murder and mystery. I imagined every word as if I was watching a film.

Following a tragedy in her Nottingham parish, Reverend Jack (Jacqueline) Brooks is pressured into accepting a new post in the small hamlet of Chapel Cross in East Sussex. Along with teenage daughter Flo, Jack uses the opportunity for a fresh start. However, the village isn't quite the rural idyll she'd hoped for. With a violent history of Protestant martyrs burned at the stake, evil forces are still present today. As Jack is drawn deeper into the mystery surrounding the disappearance of two young girls thirty years earlier, she uncovers long hidden secrets; placing not only herself but Flo in unimaginable danger.

WOW, this is an amazing read! I was gripped from beginning to end. It's wonderfully dark, brooding and oh so creepy. C. J. Tudor's writing is superb. Her skill in creating complex and unique characters is second to none. I honestly believe she's one of the best British writers around today.

Whilst not a fast moving story, it simmers and slowly reveals its secrets. The plot is intricate and takes many unexpected twists and turns. I really don't know how the author pulls her incredible ideas and threads together but I'm in awe! This is such a good book and one of the best I've read this year. Top marks.

This absolutely blew me away...

In short, Reverend Jack Brooks and her teenage daughter are more or less forced into moving to a new parish after an unfavourable incident in her old parish. Chapel Croft is known for the Burning Girls...Protestant’s burned at the stake 500 years ago for refusing to denounce their faith. The village still honour them, and there are stories to be told....not least the disappearance of two young girls....and others..

Trouble begins instantly for Jack when, trying to do good, she is more or less told she’s not wanted....by numerous people....her daughter is bullied, but finds a friend who Jack is not taken with...

Oh....so so so much happens in this book...honestly! It keeps you on edge...and who is the mysterious “other narrator”? Took me a while to work that one out!! Little bits keep being revealed...you though you knew something, then you realise you’d made an assumption...

And the ending.....just what? Wow....

An absolutely fantastic book! Nail-biting, on the edge stuff...left me breathless!

My thanks, as ever, to Netgalley and Penguin Random House UK for the advance copy.

The Burning Girls is a psychological thriller and more, as it is extremely dark and horrific at times. It is packed with mysteries both historical and recent that had me trying to solve without success.
New vicar Jack and her teenage daughter Flo move from the city of Nottingham to a traditional village and both find that fitting into this new way of life challenging as the odd residents are not all welcoming and right from the off spooky events unsettle them.
Fast paced story that held my attention throughout. My thanks to Net Galley for the digital ARC of The Burning Girls. I'm sure this book will be another success for C J Tudor.

A fast paced and clever thriller where Tudor manages to deftly juggle lots of different elements that come together surprisingly well. There is a supernatural tinge, mysterious deaths, missing people, and a released from prison murderer. The plot moves from King to Coben in this novel, however, for as well as all this, Tudor manages to throw in a couple of fantastic twists and reveals that are completely unexpected.
She is a brilliant talent and one of the UK's best thriller writers in a crowded field.

I've adored all of C.J.Tudor's previous novels. She is an absolute auto-buy author for me, so imagine my excitement to be able to read The Burning Girls and this was an absolute roller coaster of a read.

This follows Reverend Jack (short for Jacqueline) who moves to a small town in Sussex with her teenage daughter Flo, after an unfortunate incident in Nottingham. In this town centuries ago two girls were martyred as witches, but their ghost remains on.. One day Flo sees their spirits. Also decades in the 1980s two teenage girls disappeared, What ever happened to them?...And what happened to the previous reverend before Jack?...

This was a page-turner of a read, with lots of threads that come together in at the end. I did find the reveal of the killer, and the killer's motivations a caricature however, and while the twist at the end was clever I also wasn't sure if I completely believed. At times it did feel like there was too many threads running and not fully explored. Nonetheless this was a gripping read, and once again Tudor creates a creepy, tense atmosphere. I devoured this in a day. 4/5.

Absolutely fantastic and bone chilling. I absolutely loved the story and the no holds bard horror. Must read. #TheBurningGirls #NetGalley

This book is so good! It is dark, suspenseful, anxiety inducing, must keep reading and turning the pages kind of fantastic. This is my first time reading any of C J Tudor’s books and I am mightily impressed. This is a genre bending type of novel that is part thriller, part horror with some historical fiction, superstition and supernatural elements. Set in the unique location of Chapel Croft, a small village in Sussex, this story follows Reverend Jack Brooks and her daughter Flo who are relocated to the Sussex parish after some scandal has occurred in her old Nottingham parish and she is asked to lie low and relocate temporarily until things settle down.

The novel then goes back and forth in time and follows Reverend Brooks experiences in Nottingham as well as in the present and it also has segments of other characters past and present that leave clues to the wider narrative. I found the tradition of The Burning Girls in Chapel Croft very interesting and I loved how the author weaved in this local history and superstition into the novel. She also explained the significance of The Burning girls well and stitched them into the narrative brilliantly.

I found the plot was constructed and executed incredibly well. There were so many layers and levels to the plot that could have made the reader confused and left the author writing themselves into a corner. But after the expertise the author used in taking you through this story as a reader. I trust this authors storytelling skills. And I will be reading her back listed titles. A very impressive thriller.

Thanks to the author C J Tudor, Penguin UK and Netgalley for a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

Absolutely amazing like all her other books.
This book is gripping and mysterious with twists throughout that will keep you up reading until the early hours in the morning because you need to know how it ends!
I highly recommend this to anyone who loves something different and completely engrossing.

A month after the vicar of the local parish died by suicide, the new vicar, a single mother with a young daughter, arrives at the village hoping for some peace and a fresh start. But this town is home to creepy traditions, mysterious disappearances, and a bloody past…while the new vicar has her own secrets to hide.

CJ Tudor has become an auto-buy author for me, it’s just the way she tells the story that keeps me turning the pages, all the while minor explosions are going off on the pages. This was no different, absolutely gripping from the get-go and interesting till the very end, filled with creepy and atmospheric imagery, and yes, sassy characters are a must. But I felt like this book was leaning more towards the YA side than Adult, what with the story mainly revolving around young characters and them at the centre of all the action. There were some questions left unanswered at the end, that I’d have liked explored further, and I think there’s a very strong potential for a sequel here, I’d be very interested to see how the story continues if ever :)

Thanks to #Netgalley, Penguin Michael Joseph UK, and #CJTudor for the opportunity to review the eARC of #TheBurningGirls. Pub date: 21 Jan 2021.

Another immersive thriller – with more than a dash of folk horror – Tudor. Enjoyed it greatly although as a Phil Rickman fan it was impossible for me to read this story about a female vicar and her teen daughter and not compare it (a little unfavourably) to the Merrily Watkins series. My bad. Overall really enjoyed this. I always like how Tudor makes the paranormal possible if not explicit.

This is great! Really fast-paced, with lots of twists and turns. I don't want to give away too much but I will say this - I read it in one go.

Another great supernaturally tinged mystery story from CJ Tudor; with plenty of twists, turns and startling revelations on the way. Told both in first person, allowing a fluidity to the narrative, and third person, allowing an insight into the other characters, the story is allowed to unspool at pace... although arguably the sheer quantity of WTF twists in the last fifth of the book are hard to keep up with!
Engaging, occasionally horrible and enjoyably twisty.

I loved this book it’s a really twisted tale about obsession and religion and a mystery of two missing children and a missing priest. This story is really dark and I couldn’t put it down.

I have read other books by this author and they have all been good. This one was terrific, really a different story and one which definitely had you reading like mad to find out what was going on.
Brilliant, well written story with loads of different and interesting characters.
The feeling of menace that pervaded was quite something.
At the start I was not sure I wanted to read about little twiggy things left in a graveyard, but boy the story swept me along. Wonderful, thank you.

I picked up the latest C.J Tudor against my better judgment. I read The Chalk Man in 2018 and I left a scathing review for it on Goodreads. I read the synopsis of The Other People and The Hiding Place and decided to skip them.

In short, I was hesitant to pick up another novel by C.J. Tudor.

Along came The Burning Girls which will be released in 2021. I have to be honest here and I was rueing my decision to request it from the publisher who kindly provided a copy to me. I was armed with apprehension and reasons why I wouldn't like it started to stack up as the novel picked up.

The novel is about Jack Brooks, a single parent and unconventional vicar who moves to a small town in the English countryside with teenage daughter Flo. Jack is escaping life in Nottingham where a whole lot has happened that we will uncover throughout the novel.

However, this isn't some sleepy town either. Jack unwittingly moves into a community where two girls have gone missing 30 years ago, and where protestant martyrs were burned five hundred years ago. The more Jack and Flo get acquainted with the town and its history, the deeper they are drawn into its mysteries.

Tana French wrote a really slow-burning novel about a small town in the Irish countryside this year called The Searcher. The Burning Girls is nothing like that. No pun intended but it burns with a passion.

C.J. Tudor tries to cram a lot of subjects into this 300 page novel. I tried to keep track but I might have missed a few: exorcism as misogyny, mental illness, addiction, child abuse, the church and its inner workings, nature vs nurture, racism, homosexuality. That's not it, because the plot also contains a lot of different mysteries and every character has a backstory which contains some kind of death.

I thought I was in this novel to dislike it. Imagine my surprise when I crossed the 75% mark and found myself enthralled by the plot while the mysteries were slowly unravelling. It turns out, the story isn't such a stretch after all and C.J. Tudor has weaved it all nicely together.

I ended up enjoying the overall experience, which goes to show that you should really give authors another try even if you disliked one of their novels. They might surprise you after all.

This novel isn't really for the faint of heart, but those who like fast-paced mysteries with a few unexpected reveals might enjoy this read.

Many thanks to the publisher Penguin Michael Joseph UK and Netgalley for providing me with a review copy!

I wasn't too sure about this book to start with but once I got into it I really enjoyed the story. Action packed and gripping this tension filled thriller is well worth a read.