Where Sleeping Girls Lie by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
I recently dived into the mind-bending, plot-twisting, extraordinary world of this novel, Where Sleeping Girls Lie by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, and all that I have to say is wow. It had been a while since I picked up a mystery-horror book and I was looking for a book that could fill the empty void I had, and this novel did it’s job.
To begin with, the novel describes the story from the point of view of Sade, a new student at Alfred Nobel Academy, an international boarding school in England. After the sudden death of her father, she enrolls at the school and meets her mysterious roommate, Elizabeth. Before she even has the time to get acquainted with her, Elizabeth goes missing, and Sade begins to work together with Elizabeth’s best friend, Baz, in order to figure out what happened to her. They soon discover that the school has been hiding secrets about Elizabeth’s whereabouts and discover hidden connections between Elizabeth’s past and the current students at the school.
Honestly, it was so amazing to see this novel’s plot come together and reveal such a fascinating story. I did not expect for the story to expand from Elizabeth’s disappearance, to the secrets of the ultra-rich, popular students at the school. The main character, Sade, herself is such an interesting character because as we dig deeper and deeper into the story, we find out about her past, and her older sister Jamila, who is the reason for Sade wanting to come to the school in the first place. The book is filled with little anagrams throughout the chapters that hint to the story and plot and the best part is that you don’t understand how it’s all connected until the very end. In fact, there were times I had to go back and reread some of the chapters to figure out what exactly they were alluding to!
To put simply, this book was an incredible read and kept me on the edge of my seat until the very end, I am not kidding. I would definitely 10/10 recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good, good, mystery book and I wish I could read it all over from start to finish to experience how good it was to read this book again.
Reviewed by Teen Volunteer, 8/27/25.