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"Wonderful…a book one doesn’t want to put down." —Sarah Jessica Parker

Building off the gothic tradition of Shirley Jackson, the acclaimed author of the cult-hit novel Dietland brings to life this riveting, deliciously twisted feminist tale, a gorgeous and provocative page-turner about the legacy of male power and the cost of female freedom.

It should have been the first day of the rest of their lives.
Instead it was the last.

Iris Chapel and her five elegant sisters, all of them heiresses to the Chapel firearms fortune, live cloistered in a lavish Victorian mansion. Neglected by both a distant, workaholic father and a mentally troubled mother—who believes their home is haunted by the victims of Chapel weapons—the sisters have grown up with only each other for company. They long to escape the eerie fairytale of their childhood and move forward into the modern world, but for young women in 1950s Connecticut, the only way out is marriage.

Yet it soon becomes clear that for the Chapel sisters, marriage equals death.

As soon as the eldest girl walks down the aisle, tragedy strikes. The bride dies mysteriously the very next day, leaving her family and the town in shock. But this is just the beginning of a chain of disasters that will make each sister wonder whether true love will kill her, too. Only Iris, the second youngest, finds a way to escape—but can she outrun the family curse forever?