The Broken Girls by Simone St. James

There's an old girl's school on the outskirts of the city.  When Fiona finds out they are going to rebuild it, she's horrified.  Her sister was killed and her body was left near Idlewild.  It haunts her to think of it operating again.  She's almost obsessed with the death of her sister.  Her killer is in jail but it doesn't make Fiona feel better.  She convinces her boss to let her write an article about it and begins to do some research on it...

Berkley and Net Galley let me read this book for review (thank you).  It will published March 20th.

Fiona is dating a cop.  He tries to get her to let go of the pain of her sister's death but she can't. She talks to the son of the woman who is going to refurbish the school and he offers her a tour.  As she tours, the contractors interrupt them.  They've found a body in the well.  Now Fiona really has something to investigate.  The girl is unknown, the body has been there since the early 1950's, it's a cold cold case and the police don't have the resources to do much investigation.  There's nothing to identify the body.  But Fiona is relentless.  She's going to research and find out who it is.  She does but it doesn't help her figure out she died.

The girls that attended this school were sent because they were illegitimate, were hard to control, or had mental problems.  If you didn't fit in the box, they sent you here to a new box where you wouldn't be embarrassing.  The dead girl was an orphan.  She'd had a hard sad life and Fiona can't let her die alone.

Another thing the school and even the police had in common was secrets.  As those are revealed, the story gets more complicated and intricate.

This is a tense story with lots of drama and unexpected outcomes.  I found it intriguing and interesting.  It's well worth a read.