CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Leave us a Review
Copyright
Dedication
1: Darling
2: Never, Never
3: Second Star to The Right
4: Lost Boys
5: Straight On ’Til Morning
6: Hide and Seek
7: Let’s Play War
8: The Hunt
9: The Frozen Girl
10: Make Believe
11: The Forbidden Path
12: Peter’s Secret
13: Here be Monsters
14: Shadow Play
15: Home
Acknowledgments
“This book hooked me immediately with Wendy’s voice and rage and longing… what Wise does with the Peter Pan mythos here is nothing short of astonishing”
Sam J. Miller, Nebula Award-winning author of Blackfish City
“A dark and delightful retelling of Peter Pan. Wendy, Darling is a gorgeous achievement, and one you don’t want to miss”
Gwendolyn Kiste, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Rust Maidens
“Wendy, Darling is a daring, gothic re-envisioning of everything we think we know – and an important, vivid adventure”
Fran Wilde, two-time Nebula award-winning, World Fantasy finalist author of Updraft
“Richly imagined, surprisingly dark, and heartbreakingly beautiful, this daring reimagining doesn’t only revisit the myth, it brings it up to date”
Marian Womack, author of The Swimmers
“The horror-tinged feminist Peter Pan retelling I never knew I needed… a brilliant re-imagining of a classic boy’s club story”
Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam, author of ‘Mantles’
“A gorgeously imagined journey into the unfathomable depths of childhood myth”
Kelly Robson, author of Gods, Monsters and the Lucky Peach
“Neverland is more nightmare than dream… This rich tale of memory and magic is sure to resonate with fans of reimagined children’s stories”
Publishers Weekly
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Wendy, Darling
Print edition ISBN: 9781789096811
E-book edition ISBN: 9781789096828
Published by Titan Books
A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd.
144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP
www.titanbooks.com
First edition June 2021
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
© A.C. Wise 2021. All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
For everyone who has ever dreamed of flying
DARLING
LONDON 1931
There is a boy outside her daughter’s window.
Wendy feels it, like a trickle of starlight whispering in through a gap, a change in the very pressure and composition of the air. She knows, as sure as her own blood and bones, and the knowledge sends her running. Her hairbrush clatters to the floor in her wake; her bare feet fly over carpeted runners and slap wooden floorboards, past her husband’s room and to her daughter’s door.
It is not just any boy, it’s the boy. Peter.
Every inch of her skin wakes and crawls; the fine hairs all along the back of her neck stand on end—the storm secreted between her bones for years finally breaking wide. Peter. Here. Now. After so long.
She wants to shout, but she doesn’t know what words, and as Wendy skids to a halt, her teeth are bared. It isn’t a grimace or a smile, but a kind of animal breathing, panicked and wild.
Jane’s door stands open a crack. A sliver of moonlight— unnaturally bright, as if carried to London from Neverland— spills across the floor. It touches Wendy’s toes as she peers through the gap, unable for a moment to step inside.
Even though she’s still, her pulse runs rabbit-quick. Backlit against that too-bright light is the familiar silhouette: a slender boy with his fists planted on his hips, chest puffed out and chin tipped up, his hair wild. There is no mistaking Peter as he hovers just beyond the second-floor window. She blinks, and the image remains, not vanishing like every other dream stretched between now and then. Between the girl she was and the woman she’s become.
Of course, Wendy thinks, because this may not be the house she grew up in, but it’s still her home. Of course he would find her, and of course he would find her now. Bitterness chases the thought—here and now, after so long.
At the same time, she thinks no, no, please no, but too-long fingers already tap the glass. Without waiting for her say-so, the window swings wide. Peter enters, and Wendy’s heart swoops first, then falls and falls and falls.
Once invited, always welcome—that’s his way.
Peter doesn’t notice Wendy as she pushes the hall door open all the way. He flies a circle around the ceiling, and she wills her daughter to stay asleep, wills her tongue to uncurl from the roof of her mouth. Her legs tremble, holding her on the threshold, wanting to fold and drop her to the floor. It’s such an easy thing for him to enter, and yet her own body betrays her, refusing to take one step into her daughter’s room, in her own house.
It’s unfair. Everything about Peter always was, and it hasn’t changed. After years of her wanting and waiting, lying and hoping, he’s finally here.
And he isn’t here for her.
Peter lands at the foot
