Such Quiet Girls

Sage and her sister get on Bus 315 after school and do not come home. Neither do the other children on board, or Jessa, the driver on one of her first runs.

They wake up in a shipping container buried twenty feet underground. Jessa's job was to get ten children to daycare, and she holds herself responsible for what has happened to them, in the same way she still holds herself responsible for her own daughter three years ago. Above ground, the abduction of an entire school bus in daylight becomes the only story anyone is telling.

Below it, the container is running out of air. Noelle W. Ihli keeps the book largely inside that space, with Jessa trying to hold a group of frightened children together and work out what their captors actually want, and whether there is any version of waiting that ends well. The novel takes its starting point from real events.