disclaimer: I received this free from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

rep: bi m/c, f/f romance, bi li who also has endo

content warnings: child abuse, domestic violence, threats of rape, sexual assault, violence, mentions of abortion

'I learn it isn't a game. I learn it's my life. Rebecca. Samantha. Haley. Katie. Ashley. The girls I've been. The perfect daughters to the women my mother has become to con her marks.'

The Girls I've Been follows Nora O'Malley, the daughter of a con artist, as she is taken hostage in a bank heist with her girlfriend and her ex-boyfriend. The situation she's in is deadly and unpredictable, but so is she. For years Nora has been playing at normal, but that isn't who she really is. Now, though, she needs to dust of those skills she ditched and try and get herself and her girlfriend and ex-boyfriend out alive.

Tess Sharpe is a favourite author of mine - I loved both Far From You and, more recently, Barbed Wire Heart. Tess Sharpe has a way of creating such a tense and brutal atmosphere - especially in Barbed Wire Heart - and she does it again in The Girls I've Been. It's non-linear, which is like one of my all time favourite things. and it's done well (which came as no surprise). It adds to the atmosphere, and the slow buildup and slow reveal really ramps up the tension and the mystery surrounding our protagonist, Nora.

The Girls I've Been takes on quite a dark tone. It's about family, survival, identity, and male violence and Tess Sharpe doesn't hold back. It's about how Nora's toxic relationship with her mother, and her relationships with her mother's marks has shaped her as a person.

What didn’t kill me didn’t make me stronger; what didn’t kill me made me a victim. But I made me stronger. I made me a survivor.”

Nora is the true star of this book, she is one hell of a protagonist. I'm very fond of morally ambiguous characters and Nora is definitely that, but she is so much more than that. She's sharp and smart, she's abused and traumatised, she's angry but also hopeful, she doesn't know who she really is - she struggles with her identity but she's learnt a lot from every single girl she's been. She struggles, and she makes mistakes, she isn't always honest, and she doesn't trust easily, but she's healing with the help of those around her - the healthy relationships she's making along the way and the love and care that those relationships bring to her life.

The Girls I've Been also has a prominent f/f romance, and the love interest, Iris, has endometriosis, which is great because I've actually never seen that featured in a book before and I could really relate. So, that was also great!

The Girls I've Been is a high-stakes, intense thriller that goes deep into the violence women suffer at the hands of men.