Secrets

I’ll admit, I approached *Secrets* skeptically—another ‘plucky orphan’ story? But within 20 minutes, Sophie Ablett’s narration had me hooked, and not just because her Adele sounds like a real, exhausted child. Ablett’s real talent is in the *subtleties*: the way her voice tightens before a lie, the hollow laugh she deploys when Adele mimics the matron’s cruelty. It’s a performance that makes you forget you’re listening to a single narrator, especially in dialogue-heavy scenes where she pivots between Cockney lads, predatory adults, and Adele’s own shifting personas. The story’s first act is almost unbearably tense, with Pearse writing the children’s home like a dystopian microcosm—think *Lord of the Flies* with fewer rules and more sexual menace. I winced through Adele���s early strategies for survival (stealing, manipulation, a chilling moment where she *chooses* not to intervene in another child’s abuse), but the brilliance is how Pearse makes these acts feel inevitable, not sensationalized. That said, the middle sags slightly when Adele’s adult life takes center stage. The pacing stumbles as Pearse introduces a romantic subplot that feels obligatory rather than organic, and Ablett’s narration—so electric in the grimier sections—struggles to sell the sudden shift to swooning passion. I also wished for more historical texture; the 1930s-40s setting often feels like a vague backdrop rather than a living, breathing world (a missed opportunity, given the era’s rich class tensions). But the final act redeems it with a twist that’s both shocking and *earned*, a rare payoff in a genre that often trades in cheap revelations. This isn’t a cozy listen—it’s a flinty, sometimes brutal audiobook that lingers like a bruise. If you love morally complex heroines and narrators who *disappear* into their roles, it’s worth the time. Just don’t expect to feel warm and fuzzy after.