Four girls thrown out of bounds and out of their comfort zones in their new boarding school, far away from their families. In an ocean of people that could not care less about them. These four girls loved each other fiercely, recklessly. And for that love they would do anything, they would do everything. No questions asked.
It is seventeen years later, the burden of their lies weighing down on them every second of that time. It is now time to face the music, their adult sensibilities overshadowed by their fearsome younger selves. But the past doesn’t stay buried — not forever. And when it rises, it is muddy, it is unrelenting.
Star Rating (out of 5): ⭐⭐⭐1/2
I want to start by saying that this is probably a very unpopular opinion but I liked this book. Although the book was certainly slow paced and did lag at times, but in that slowness I saw the characters. The book doesn’t just run you through the mystery, it lingers and festers. It takes its time, and in that space, Ruth Ware gives us room to see — not just what happened, but who these women have become because of it.
Isa, always scanning for safety, carries the weight of motherhood and memory, constantly trying to protect her daughter from both the world and her past. Thea, rootless and restless, seems to have no anchor — her detachment a kind of armor that she wears against the world. And Fatima, with her unwavering faith and family, feels like the only one who’s built something stable — a life where she can be fully, unapologetically herself.
When a bone washes up near the school where they once studied — and lied — the carefully compartmentalized lives they’ve built begin to slowly fall apart. The call from Kate brings them back to Salten, to the tide-muddied house where it all began. And suddenly, seventeen years of silence feels like nothing.
Ware’s storytelling doesn’t rely on plot twists alone. Instead, the tension comes from watching how these women — once inseparable — shift under the pressure of shared guilt. Their friendship is both their salvation and their burden.
I was far more invested in the present narration than the flashbacks to their trysts at Salten because I felt the depth that came with the story was in looking at it through their adult lenses. While the childhood flashbacks were important in setting the stage, I wasn’t all here for it. Personally, the beauty of the book for me lay in the messy characters, in their flaws and their shortcomings.
What truly stayed with me wasn’t just the mystery, it was their ache of living with a lie so long it became a part of them. It was when they built relationships on shaky foundations borne of half truths. It was in the absolute unrelatability of their characters to me, but in itself that’s what made them so authentic.
Beyond the Semicolon 
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