Title: A Welcome Reunion
Author(s) Name(s): Lucinda Berry
Published in: August, 2023
Why You Might Like This Book: Read this book if you enjoy
- fast-paced thrillers,
- well-maintained suspense,
- short dark fiction,
- unexpected twists,
- revenge, and
- shifting perspectives.
Who Should Avoid This Book: Avoid this book if you are triggered by or dislike
- violence, assault, murder, and torture,
- psychopathic or sociopathic characters,
- child abuse or sexual abuse,
- drug abuse,
- parental neglect, or
- grief and loss.
Janie, an eighteen-year-old is released from juvenile detention, and this is the talk of the small town because Janie was one of the most violent, sociopathic children. She had gone through severe torture, abuse, and neglect during her childhood, so she herself was a victim, but she had murdered her own biological mother when she was just 5 years old. She was in a terrible, pathetic state, completely malnourished when she was found, which is why Christopher Bauer, the doctor who worked with her, was convinced that his wife Hannah and he should adopt little Janie. According to the Bauers, they adopted her and gave her all the love, but they were investigated for child abuse, so Janie and their infant son Cole Bauer were sent to live with Hannah’s sister Allison by the social services.
Now, though, Janie has published a book, detailing all the abuse she had faced throughout her childhood, and sharing her perspective that she is now a completely different person, she has even changed her name to “Hope Devonshire” and she wants to make amends and repair her relationships with several people after all the cruel things she had done to them several years before. Within a week, this newly published book had become New York’s bestseller, and that is how she has become the latest sensation in town, as she advocates for herself, that she has changed and everyone needs to be forgiven and be given second chances. The story begins with Janie’s interview with a famous TV host that is held in their town’s library. Are some people born evil? Can such people ever change? Does everyone deserve second chances? These are the questions the author has to the reader.
According to Piper, the social worker who worked with Janie when she was a kid, who watches the live interview, Janie seems to intentionally undermine the severity of her acts of violence, abuse, and torture, focusing heavily on how she is more of a victim of abuse. Piper is shocked because Janie was probably the most violent kid she has ever known. Janie had pushed Allison down the stairs, which led to Allison’s death, when she overheard Allison telling someone on the phone that she planned to send Janie away. Hannah lost her sister, Allison’s husband Greg lost his wife, and Allison’s twin boy children, four years elder to Janie, still being kids themselves lost their mother that day. Even after that, when Jamie lived with other residents at the rehabilitation center, she severely injured a fellow girl’s ear using a nail clipper, and it was no impulsive accident, but a well-planned act of violence because to avoid suspicion, she had injured her own ear before hurting the fellow resident. She had aggressively pushed another resident, and if the staff had not arrived on time, that woman would have died, too. All this has changed Piper’s views of children, that not all children are harmless or innocent, that some can be really sociopathic and violent!
Christopher also watches the interview live because he always had a soft corner for Janie from the day he met her at the hosiptal, but Hannah would be the last person to attend that live interview or even watch it on TV. While Christopher could be a kind and gentle parent, with time, Hannah lost her trust and affection with Janie, and at one point, she was genuinely afraid that Janie tried to kill her 3-month-old baby Cole, so she attempted to drown Janie in the bath tub. It was following this event that the police began investingating Christopher and Hannah for child abuse. This shattered the Bauers’ family, as Christopher almost lost his medical license and struggled really hard to keep it, Hannah spent time at a psychiatric facility, and Janie and Cole were sent to live with Allison.
While Hannah finds it impossible to forgive Janie, Christopher still believes that it was not all Janie’s fault because she was a poor victim child, which is why he actively followed Janie’s case on the Internet and attends the live interview. But he himself is shocked and looks deeply hurt when he returns home after that, when he tells Hannah a few things from what he heard her saying. One thing that shocked Christopher and Hannah was that at the end of the interview, there was a surprise guest, Caleb, one of the twin boys of Allison, and he narrated several occasions where Janie sexually and physically abused him when they both were kids, when Janie was living with Greg and Allison. All this is new information for everyone, so understandably, the Bauers are also deeply shocked. Caleb had become addicted to drugs after all that, getting in and out of therapy several times, so watching that young boy on live TV, as he shared his truths is painful. But what is worse is that Janie had stated in the interview that she is in touch with Cole Bauer for a few years now, and it was Cole who initiated the contact through Instagram. This both shocks Hannah because she was never aware of this and scares her much because she becomes worried about her only son’s safety now.
Knowing that Cole was brought into the picture, Hannah reads the entire book and watches the interview a few times. She finds that Janie accuses Hannah of being incapable of a good parent because of personality-disorder issues, blaming her, saying that she was unwilling to share her husband’s attention with anyone, telling everyone that it was her therapist who suggested all this. Piper shares her view that Janie couldn’t have changed at all and she is up to no good, that she was always evil and she will always be so. Hannah tries to find out what Janie has planned to do because she is convinced that Janie definitely has something evil in mind because why else would she choose to come out of juvenile detention after all those years and live in the same neighbourhood where her family lives? And why would she bring up Cole in the interview? The further the story goes, more twists come up. The characters are confused. This is a page-turner, leaving the reader wondering “what next?”. The only thing we know is that a mother would do anything to protect her child.
One thing you might notice in the first few chapters is that the writing is so good that it does not feel like fiction; it is as though you are listening to the narration of a real-life, true crime case. The story is narrated in the form of two perspectives, Piper’s and Hannah’s. The story is also narrated in layers, revealing only some information of what happened at a time, related to Janie’s childhood or what is going on in the present, most of which are dark events, and that way, the author maintains the suspense well. As some dark, unimaginable plot twist comes up in every few pages, the book is anything but boring. But unfortunately, the ending is super-bleak, as though it was written in a hurry, and it does not do justice to the rest of the story.
Note that this novella, A Welcome Reunion is a direct sequel to the book “The Perfect Child”. If you found this interesting, clearly, the original story of the Bauers and Janie would be equally good or even more interesting. Try that if you think this kind of story telling and dark fiction interests you. And for this book, I would give a 3.8-star rating because the ending was a bit disappointing and if not for that, I would have given this a much better rating.
If you liked this dark thriller story, you might enjoy Rock Paper Scissors, an exciting dark thriller novel!
