The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchinson
The Butterfly Garden
by Dot Hutchinson
He
called her Maya, but that wasn’t her name. That was the name he gave her, after
he tattooed the butterfly on her back. He gave all the girls names. That would
make them his after all. They would be his from now on. They would stay with
him in his garden, preserved in all their beauty. She knew him as the Gardener,
as did the rest of the girls. That’s what Maya is trying to explain to the FBI
agents now that they have been set free. She tries to explain how they were
kept, how their lives were taken away from them, how they all wore the
butterflies on their backs, how no one had ever left, how they had been abused,
how it was they continued to live. How they were all Butterflies in his
Butterfly Garden.
I’m not
sure where to begin with this review. Do I start with the extremely haunting
and unsettling tone of this novel? Or do I begin with the incredible world
building and eerie imagery? What about the main character who brought this
story to life and made this such an intense mystery? I just honestly don’t know
because this novel was amazing on so many different levels. Imagine what could
come of kidnapped young women forced to become a family in order to survive, in
order to live through the rapes and the abuse. Imagine a man who loves each of these girls in
a sick and perverted manner, so demented that he literally preserves them so he
can treasure their beauty forever. That’s what this novel is and Hutchinson
does this so well. It is told in three different parts with the narrative
changing from third person, to that of Maya, the girl who could be considered
the Gardener’s favorite. She was so full of depth and had an overwhelming
presence. It was obvious that she wasn’t broken regardless of the pain the
passing years had dealt her. Her strength and her courage juxtaposed with her
acceptance of her dire circumstances was unnerving and yet said so much about
the plight of these young women. All of the characters had depth and seeing
these people and their lives through Maya's eyes was alarming and revealing. I
loved the way the story was told. The change in storytelling kept me aware of
how dire the circumstances were and continued to be for these women.
The
imagery in this novel was so vivid. Hutchinson did something amazing and yet so
painful by naming the butterfly each woman had tattooed on her back. I found
myself looking up the images and imaging the pain that came with each tattoo
and the knowledge of what those butterflies meant regarding their fate. It was
heartbreaking. The descriptions she provided about their day to day lives. And
the wait. The counting down. The knowing. It was painful and there was no
reprieve from this knowledge for them. Then there was the garden itself, which
was really their home and their cage.
I
finished this book in one sitting. I genuinely could not stop reading this
story. The tone of this story was so unbelievably disturbing that I couldn’t
look away. I had to know what happened. There was no way to predict what was
happening in the story. The only thing the reader knows is true is that the
butterflies somehow escaped the garden as a result of a fire. The rest is a
mystery. I was trying to understand that mystery. I was trying to understand
how these girls could live in these conditions, how they could become a family,
how they could survive the never ending abuse and psychological damage.
Hutchinson just did an amazing job in every aspect of this story. It is a
thriller in every sense. I’m unsettled after reading this. I am physically
jarred and my reality is shaken. This is a book that I will definitely
recommend to anyone in the mood for an amazingly eerie thriller. I give this 5 out of 5 stars. Well done.
Thank you Netgalley for this book in exchange for an honest review.
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