I love Freider McFadden books. They’re easy reads, perfect palette cleansers after heavy books, and have great twists. The Intruder was no exception! We’re wrapping up the Halloween season, but I still have some ‘scary’ or ‘thriller’ books to read. But Braden picked this as my next read, and he chose wisely!
We start with Casey, a young woman living in a remote cabin. A storm is coming, which is certainly a metaphor for the story. She’s worried about her roof and the possibility of a tree falling. Either one of them could kill her. Her landlord, Rudy, is no help. A neighbor named Lee wants to help, but Casey clearly doesn’t want to get too close to anyone.
We also get a glimpse from before of a girl named Ella who is clearly being abused. Her mother is a boarder who won’t throw anything out. There may be food in the fridge, but none of it is edible. She’s starving most of the time, experiences her mother’s wrath, and has to endure living in a cluttered home. Life for her isn’t good. When she’s not being burned with cigarettes, she’s being locked in a closet with rotten fruit.
Life at school for Ella isn’t much better. People tease her, especially the most popular girl in school. Ella befriends a boy named Anton, though, and he makes things better. He and his brother, Bradley, also experience a rough home life. Their father is extremely abusive. They quickly bond over their situations. Anton sticks up for Ella but ends up in juvie. Will she see him again?
Well, Ella has had enough. And when her mother locks her in the closet again, she picks the lock (something Anton taught her) to escape. She makes the stairs impassable by putting papers, trash, and mattresses in the way. Then lights the mess on fire. Yes, she killed her mother. Social services eventually finds her father, who treats her very well. He taught her everything she knows today.
Casey is left alone in her cabin with a storm bearing down on her when she sees a light on in her shed. It’s a young girl hiding in the corner. She lets her inside and tries to help her with warm clothes and food. She’s clearly been abused, but is also covered in blood. The way the story is written, you believe that this girl is Ella. It’s not! That’s twist number one.
Turns out that Casey is actually Ella. She changed her name after what happened at a school where she taught. Yes, the girl whose mother said was a stupid, rotten kid, turned out to be a teacher. Due to her prior abuse and being a mandatory reporter, she was upset that the parents of a girl in her class got away with abusing her. So, she took a baseball bat to the dad’s car. Let’s say it didn’t end well. Though they didn’t press charges, she was obviously fired. So, this leads Casey/Ella to where she is now.
But it also makes you realize how important it is for Casey to figure out what happened to the girl, who we now know is Eleanor. Especially when Eleanor seems to go from light to dark so quickly. She’ll act like such a little kid, but then gets so angry and mean. She even ties Casey up so she can move on to the next cabin, her ultimate goal being to kill Lee.
Casey gets away and makes her way to Lee’s house. It turns out that Lee is Eleanor’s father, someone her mom said ran out on her. The blood is from her mother, who was stabbed by her stepfather, Jax. But because Eleanor was a bad kid, Jax said the cops will believe she stabbed her mom, so she ran. She ran to Lee’s house to exact revenge, but her map led her to Casey’s cabin instead. Lee insists he didn’t sleep with her mother, it must have been his brother that died in a car crash many, many years ago.
Casey says she’s going to the cops to make sure that they check in on the condition of Eleanor’s mother, but she doesn’t. This abuse ends now. She kills Eleanor’s mother and doesn’t leave a trace.
Six months later, and Lee is taking care of Eleanor. With Casey’s help, she homeschools Eleanor, who’s really, really smart. It’s also nice that Casey gets to teach again. But when Casey sees the photo Eleanor is using as a bookmark, she starts sobbing.
The person in the photo is Anton, Eleanor’s father. Unbeknownst to Casey and Eleanor, Anton is actually in prison for the rest of his life. His crime? He ended his father’s abuse of him and his brother, Bradley, who just goes by Lee now. Where does Lee disappear to every Friday? He visits Anton in prison. Anton had told Lee to watch out for Ella. And that he does. He’s keeping Anton’s prison sentence a secret. Which is fine with Lee, who has definitely fallen for Ella.
This book was so exciting. I loved every minute of it and each little detail. I loved the main characters and how interwoven their stories were. This is a book I could definitely read again!