When She Returned

When She Returned is a psychological thriller written by Lucinda Berry and published in 2019. Berry is a USA Today bestselling author and a former psychologist with experience researching childhood trauma. Her bestsellers include Saving Noah, Keep Your Friends Close, and The Perfect Child. Berry’s works often use her professional experience in psychology to inform her writing, and When She Returned fits neatly into Berry’s area of expertise as a psychological thriller. The novel specifically deals with the psychology of cults, survivors of abuse, and family dynamics, including childhood trauma, and explores themes of the challenges of marriage and parenting, The Struggle for Identity Among Conflicting Loyalties, and Manipulation, Deception, and Abuse Within Cult Dynamics. 

This guide uses the Kindle 2019 edition of the text, published by Thomas & Mercer.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of mental illness, sexual violence, child abuse, self-harm, animal cruelty and death, addiction, graphic violence, death, physical abuse, and emotional abuse.

Plot Summary

When She Returned has dual timelines, delineated in the text as “NOW” and “THEN.” The “NOW” timeline takes place in the present and is told from alternating first-person points of view of a woman, Meredith, and her stepdaughter, Abbi. The “THEN” timeline is told from the first-person point of view of another woman, Kate Bennett, and details her past life, from just before her disappearance to when she returns.

The novel opens with a Prologue showing Kate’s escape from a cult, Love International, with her baby, Shiloh, and her eventual rescue.

Police alert Kate’s husband Scott Bennett (who had believed that she was dead) and his new wife, Meredith, to the fact that Kate is alive and recovering in Montana. They drive to the hospital there from Arcata, California, where they live with Abbi, Scott and Kate’s daughter. Scott is shocked, and Abbi is distant, leaving Meredith to take control of the situation. 

In Montana, the lead investigator, Marcus, explains that Kate was likely kept in captivity and tortured based on her injuries, and she has an infant daughter, Shiloh. Abbi is excluded from these conversations, which frustrates her. Scott and Abbi greet Kate with tears, even though they can barely recognize her. Meredith is unsure of how she fits into this family now that Scott’s former wife has returned, but Scott insists that Kate come home with them. They bring her back to their house in Arcata, where Kate used to live with Scott.

At home, the FBI sets up a base of operations in Scott and Meredith’s home, led by Dean, the lead investigator on Kate’s case when she initially disappeared. Dean brings in Camille and Brian, experts in Kate’s situation, who begin daily interviews with Kate. Though Kate is reluctant to talk at first, Camille and Brian gradually uncover that she voluntarily joined a cult, Love International, following her interviews with Ray, the group’s leader. Some of the details Camille and Brian learn are only from recordings of Kate talking to herself and someone named “Abner” under her breath.

In the past timeline of the narrative, Kate’s story unfolds, beginning with her initial interview with Ray. Kate is dissatisfied with her marriage, and she feels that Scott is unwilling to grow and explore with her. Since their daughter Abbi is five years old now, she decides to go back to work as a journalist. Her boss offers her an article on Love International and its leader, Ray Fischer, telling her that Ray requested her. Interviewing Ray, whose activities in Arcata have earned Love International a negative reputation, seems like the perfect opportunity for her to reenter journalism. 

At first, Kate is not impressed with Ray, finding his story and insistence on asking her personal questions both irritating and uninteresting. However, she starts attending meetings and comes to realize that she is unhappy with her life, seeing Love International as a way to leave her marriage and explore herself. At the grocery store one day, Kate spontaneously decides to run away and join Love International, creating the mysterious circumstances of her disappearance.

In the present timeline, Scott spends most of his time with Kate after her return, and Meredith and Scott start to argue. In a heated moment, Scott refers to Kate as his wife, forcing Meredith to realize that she loves Scott more than she loved her deceased first husband James, while Scott loves Kate more than Meredith. Meredith’s frustration increases when she catches Kate using the phone at night, which Kate denies, and both Scott and Abbi side with Kate. 

In the meantime, Abbi tries to foster a closer connection with Kate and Shiloh, playing the violin for them and letting Kate use her phone. Abbi uses her phone to browse social media related to Kate’s disappearance and return, while Kate mostly looks for photos of Ray. Abbi decides that when Kate moves out of the house, she wants to move with her.

In the past timeline, Ray locks Kate in a basement for 40 days to emulate Jesus’s 40 days in the desert. Kate struggles but sticks with the process when Ray doubts her ability to become a disciple of Love International. After Kate joins as a disciple, Ray gathers the disciples and moves them to a secluded campground. The group almost starves at the camp when they fail to grow food, but Ray provides food by hunting. 

Ray claims to undergo a new baptism, in which he takes the new name “Abner” and claims to lead the group into the “kingdom.” He forces everyone else to undergo a baptism ritual, during which one disciple, Willow, dies. Shortly after the baptisms, another disciple, Bekah, dies during childbirth when Abner refuses to allow them to take Bekah to a hospital, and he shoots and kills Bekah’s partner, Sam. He then orders the disciples to burn down the camp, moving the group to another campground in Montana.

Abner decides the group needs to breed an army of children, so he begins sleeping with all the women in the camp, telling them their marriages are nullified. Kate becomes pregnant, as does her friend, Margo, even though Margo is married to Abner’s friend Will. Margo and Kate notice Abner’s abusive relationship with Miles, Bekah’s son, and they fear Abner will abuse their children, as well. They decide to leave the camp, but Margo backs out at the last minute. Kate escapes with Shiloh.

In the present timeline, as tensions come to a head, Meredith catches Kate using the phone with a hidden camera, expecting the evidence to sway Scott and Abbi. However, Scott and Abbi see Meredith’s “spying” as a breach of privacy, ignoring the evidence and further pushing Meredith out of the family. 

Kate decides to move out, though she struggles to find an apartment, and Abbi insists on going with her. Abbi and Kate go to stay at a hotel, and Meredith, feeling spurned by Abbi and Scott, also leaves the house to stay in a hotel. During the night, Kate rushes Abbi out of the hotel and into a van with two men. The police stop the kidnapping, killing one man and arresting Kate and Abner. Scott apologizes to Meredith, who offers to support Scott and Abbi. In jail, Abbi confronts Kate, who is obsessed with Abner, even after Abbi reveals that Ray’s real name is Harold and he is a millionaire. Abby, realizing that she cannot change her mother, says goodbye to her and leaves the past behind.