Little Wild

Weyward meets Atonement in a shimmering debut novel of first love, betrayal, and revenge set on a crumbling British estate.

Suffolk, 1937. As the English countryside swelters in a historic heat wave, preparations for a party at Snare House are in full swing. The Winthers' only daughter, Joanie, is returning from a summer on the Continent, a flying visit before she leaves for university at Oxford. Only Margaret, longtime ward of the family and Joanie's closest friend, knows the truth: Joanie won't be going to Oxford. Instead, the two will be leaving the stultifying society they know to live together in London, as lovers.

Then the pair is discovered, and everything goes wrong. Banished to a cabin in the nearby woods, Margaret is alone with her estranged father. As summer curdles into autumn and magpies throng the forest, Margaret begins to lose herself. Her dreams turn dark and terrifying, and she wakes from them with dirt on the soles of her feet and scratches on her back. Everything suggests that a perverse power is awakening within her--perhaps the very one that led to her mother's ostracism and eventual death. If she can harness it, Margaret may be able to secure an approximation of the love she's always crave--but at what cost?

Little Wild is at once a feminist fairy tale, a haunting meditation on the dangers of desire, and a gripping debut from a talented new voice.

Author: Laura Evans
Publisher: Henry Holt & Company
Published: 06/23/2026
Pages: 320
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.11lbs
Size: 9.57h x 6.34w x 1.15d
ISBN: 9781250415066


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 05/01/2026
Booklist 05/01/2026
Library Journal 05/08/2026 pg. 1

About the Author
Laura Evans was born in the north of England and grew up in the Midlands. She studied Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at the University of Cambridge before coming in a roundabout way to journalism, where she became a magazine editor specializing in travel and nature. A lifelong city dweller who romanticizes the countryside (but knows it would eat her alive), she spent several years in both London and Bristol before making her way to the medieval city of Norwich, where she lives with her family.