In her most powerful novel to date, New York Times bestselling author Ellen Marie Wiseman masterfully and viscerally evokes the real-life Willowbrook State School in Staten Island, New York, the state-run institution for children with disabilities that shocked the nation when it was exposed in the 1970s—more than a decade before it was finally shut down—for its horrendous abuses, neglect, overcrowding, unethical practices, and medical experiments. Taking readers behind the imposing doors of this notorious dumping ground for unwanted children, Wiseman’s gripping narrative conjures Girl, Interrupted meets One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by way of “Cropsey” in a harrowing yet moving story of social injustice, survival, and a young woman’s determination to find her sister…
People still search the woods for the remains of lost children.