Allegedly

Received from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Mary B. Addison killed a baby.

Allegedly. She didn’t say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: A white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it? She wouldn’t say.

Mary survived six years in baby jail before being dumped in a group home. The house isn’t really “home”—no place where you fear for your life can be considered a home. Home is Ted, who she meets on assignment at a nursing home.

There wasn’t a point to setting the record straight before, but now she’s got Ted—and their unborn child—to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary must find the voice to fight her past. And her fate lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But who really knows the real Mary?

This was a really quick read, because I couldn’t put it down once I started. It was not easy to read at times, and tackles some difficult stuff, but it’s so well-written and captivating.

And that ending!

This was a dark, difficult read with complex characters in hard situations. It made me think, it made me need to know what happened, it was twisty – so many things I love in a book!

Recommended. And now I need to read more by Tiffany D. Jackson.