Description

A story of pain injustice love resistance and hope this glorious book will lodge inside you and make you feel everythingHelena Fox awardwinning author of How It Feels to Float

A queer YA Handmaids Tale meets Never Let Me Go about a dystopian society bent on relentless conformity and the struggle of one girl to save herself and those she loves from a life of lies

Everyone hopes for a letterto attend the Estuary the Glades the Meadows These are the special places where only the best and brightest go to burn even brighter

When Eleanor is accepted at the Meadows it means escape from her hardscrabble life by the sea in a country ravaged by climate disaster But despite its luminous facilities endless fields and pretty things the Meadows keeps dark secrets its purpose is to reform students to condition them against their attractions to show them that one way of life is the only way to survive And maybe Eleanor would believe them except then she meets Rose

Five years later Eleanor and her friends seem free of the Meadows changed but not as theyd hoped Eleanor is an adjudicator her job to ensure her former classmates dont stray from the lives theyve been trained to live But Eleanor cant escape her past or thoughts of the girl she once loved As secrets unfurl Eleanor must wage a dangerous battle for her own identity and the truth of what happened to the girl she lost knowing if shes not careful Roses fate could be her own

A raw and timely masterwork of speculative fiction The Meadows will sink its roots into you This is a novel for our times and for alwaysnot to be missed

Dystopian YA at its finestBCCB starred review
A quietly devastating book and Eleanor is a protagonist like no other The Nerd Daily
In the style of Kazuo Ishiguro details are dabbled out in tiny delicious morsels Superlative and powerful SLJ starred review
One of the best YA novels hitting shelves More necessary and timely than ever Paste Magazine
A profound story with fantastic writing A great companionread to classics like Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids Tale Teen Libriarian Toolbox
Evocative prose and worldbuilding shot through with equal parts melancholy and hope PW starred review
Timely and gripping with a new revelation always around the corner Kirkus Reviews
Atmospheric and unsettling Belongs in every collection Natalie C Parker author of the Seafire series
Extraordinary Helena Fox author of How It Feels to Float