Thank you St. Martin’s Press, #partner for the advanced copy of Mad Mabel in exchange for my honest review.
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Published: April 21, 2026
Summary:
There are two kinds of people no one ever expects to be little girls and old ladies. Meet Mad Mabel.
Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick is eighty-one years old. She’s lived on her idyllic street, Kenny Lane, for sixty years–longer than anyone else. Aside from being a curmudgeon who minds everyone else’s business, few would suspect that Elsie has a past that she has worked exceedingly hard at concealing. Because when it comes to murder, no one ever suspects little girls or old ladies. And Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick, once a little girl and now an old lady, has a strange history of people in her life coming to a foul end.
When a new little girl (talkative, curious, nosy) moves into the neighborhood and stops at nothing to befriend Elsie, her carefully-constructed life threatens to come crashing down as the secrets in Elsie’s past start coming to light. Who was “Mad Mabel” fifty years ago? Who is Elsie Fitzpatrick today? And if the past has a habit of repeating itself, who has the most to lose?
Told with Sally Hepworth’s twists, humor, charm, and heart, MAD MABEL is novel that weaves past and present together–through the power of justice and redemption, and all the way to its stunning conclusion.
My thoughts:
Sally Hepworth is one of my favorite authors and of course I dropped everything to read her latest book…even though it doesn’t come out for another 7 months. So…here’s a little teaser about what I thought and then I’ll do a full review closer to our date.
I loved this one! It’s no secret that Sally creates amazing characters and she has done this here with Mabel and all the secondary characters. And her signature wit and charm fill the pages, giving us both a heartwarming story but also a fantastic mystery. I was completely shocked when I reached the end, totally not expecting this book to go where it went…all in the best way possible, of course! But, my favorite part…all the Anne of Green Gables references. 💚💚
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