The Lost Girls of Willowbrook: A Heartbreaking Novel of Survival Based on True History

This was such a phenomenally well researched and well written book. I did some research of my own after reading it, and I was blown away by Ellen Marie Wiseman’s detailed descriptions portraying the events that unfolded in this institution. I highly recommend The Lost Girls of Willowbrook!

Really enjoyed the plot and all the unexpected events and twists. Looking forward to more from this author.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I have to say it won’t be the last. This was definitely a page turner. Very, very interesting even though I figured out who the murderer was early on. I loved it!

I was pulled into the story quickly and was on edge about what would happen next, but then I felt like the descriptions of the horror at Willowbrook were repetitive, and the story didn't feel like it was moving along for a long while. Ultimately, I kept reading even after I had guessed how it would end, because I did have some doubt that the story could go another way. Overall, I would say it was a good book, because it was interesting to learn about the true history of Willowbrook, but I enjoyed "The Orphan Collector", by the same author, much more than this one.

As a 10 year old who cried at the horrors when they were exposed, I never stopped thinking about what went on there. This read was at times hard to continue due to its emotional impact, but it's a story that must be told and remembered.

THE LOST GIRLS OF WILLOWBROOK by Ellen Marie Wiseman is a haunting and disturbing story of the deplorable state of a real-life state institution for physically and mentally handicapped children in the 1970’s told through the eyes of the sixteen-year-old female protagonist. This is also a suspense novel with a serial killer on the loose.Sage Winters and her identical twin sister Rosemary had a happy life until the divorce of their parents. Left with an alcoholic mother and an indifferent stepfather, the twins were just surviving. Sage always knew that Rosemary was different and as they grew, her sister’s problems increased.Six years after the death of her twin and two years after the death of her mother, the now sixteen-year-old Sage overhears her stepfather telling his buddy that for the last six years her twin was not dead but institutionalized in the infamous Willowbrook State School on Staten Island from which she is now missing. Sage is determined to go to Willowbrook to help search for her twin, but when she arrives the administration mistakenly believes she is Rosemary and locks her up. As she learns the horrors of her sister’s life, will she be able to find someone who believes her before she gives up all hope or ends up dead?This book is not easy to read. It is anxiety producing and especially hard hitting when you learn that this institution was real and there were many more all over the country at that time. I worked as an aide in several nursing homes in the 1980’s and some were excellent, but many made me never want to return. Low pay, low staffing, untrained employees, and administrators trying to make the most money per person per bed made me leave that profession quickly. I had applied at an institution for children, and I was glad I did not get the job because the indifference to the seniors broke my heart enough.The plot of this historical fiction started with a well-researched true place and took the reader through the atrocities and lives of the patients through Sage’s eyes. When the serial killer secondary plot came into play about two-thirds of the way through the book, it became predictable, but still interesting. All the secondary characters were fully fleshed and believable. This is a very good reminder of the way our society dealt with physically and mentally handicapped children in the not so distant past and I hope we never go back there.I recommend this historical fiction and hope it reminds people that these types of places did exist.

Gripping and based on an actual institution. Geraldo Rivera investigated Willowbrook in the 70’s and it was so horrible they closed it down . I love this author! historical fiction is my new favorite genre

The moment I finished this book, I immediately pulled up Geraldo’s old exposé on Willowbrook. It’s chilling to realize that places like this actually existed, and even harder to process the amount of information out there about them.This is only my second book by Ellen Marie Wiseman, but I can already tell I’ll be working my way through everything she’s written. This story stirred up emotions I didn’t even know I had: confusion, fear, heartbreak, and had me on edge, terrified of how it might end.From page one, Wiseman pulls you in and doesn’t let go. Her ability to paint such vivid settings usually feels like a gift, but in this case, it was almost painful. I could see, hear, and feel everything… and sometimes I desperately wished I couldn’t. There were moments I wanted to throw the book, slam it shut, or just sit and cry.Her storytelling is powerful, her writing smooth, and her ability to evoke such raw emotion is unmatched. I’m quickly becoming a huge fan of her work.