My Rating: 3.5 stars
As the sequel to 2017's The Child Finder, Rene Denfeld's latest work, The Butterfly Girl, sees the return of Naomi Cottle, an independent investigator whose knack for finding missing children stems from a childhood tragedy, a kidnapping that she was able to escape from, but sadly her sister did not. Unable to let go of the guilt of leaving her sister behind, Naomi has made it her life's mission to find her sister, despite barely having any information to go off of. This time around, Naomi's search for her sister brings her to Portland, Oregon, where she discovers a growing number of homeless children disappearing off the streets, only to be found murdered days later, their bodies tossed in the dirty waters of the local river. Despite her best efforts not to get involved due to a vow she made to locate her sister before taking on any more cases, Naomi is eventually pulled into the case after meeting Celia, a twelve-year-old girl who chooses a life on the streets rather than returning home to an abusive stepfather and an oblivious, drug addict mother. Seeing Celia reminds Naomi of her own past and instills in her an urgent need to try her best to protect her, while Celia's own desire to protect her younger sister Alyssa from the abuse she herself suffered draws parallels to Naomi's relationship with the sister she is desperately trying to find.
This was one of those books that I struggle with rating, as there were enough things I appreciated about the story, but there were also things that didn't work tremendously well for me. Perhaps because I never read the first book in this series, I found Naomi's storyline about searching for her sister and the way it eventually unfolds a bit unrealistic and maybe even a tad forced — I didn't connect with her story as much emotionally and at times, even felt frustrated with the way Naomi's search becomes an obsession to the point that it takes over her life. Celia's story, on the other hand, was heartbreaking — drawing from her own personal experience of living on the streets as a kid, the way that Denfeld depicted the harsh realities of street living was both heartfelt and emotionally gut-wrenching. Her story ran the emotional spectrum for me – there was sadness and anger, but yet there was also an underlying element of hopefulness interspersed throughout the story. I think for me, I preferred more focus on Celia's story rather than Naomi's, as I found myself skimming some of the sections that dove too much into Naomi's backstory, which I felt were a bit repetitive and, in a way, dragged down the rest of the story. With all that said, one of the things that set this book apart for me was the atmospheric writing, especially in the chapters involving Celia and her friends and what their lives were like out on the streets. There was also the brilliant use of imagery in a seamless yet metaphoric way – in this instance, the imagery of butterflies and their importance to Celia's story.
Overall, I feel this was a good story that had a lot of potential and while I agree with other reviewers that this can definitely be read as a standalone, I think for me personally, I would've appreciated the story more if I had read the first one prior. I do intend on going back to read The Child Finder at some point, preferably before Denfeld's next book comes out, especially if it will be a continuation of Naomi's story.
Received ARC from Harper via NetGalley.
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