3.92 AVERAGE

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes

Loved this mystery. Great characters! I can't wait to read the 2nd book in the series!
adventurous dark funny mysterious fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
medium-paced

Inspired by Agatha Christie, Alice, with help from her tutor and budding friend Iris, tries to figure out what happened to her ex-best friend Brooke. Overall, I enjoyed this book mostly for the characters. I felt that Alice and Iris were well developed not only as individuals but as amateur detectives and friends. For example, Alice realized toward the end, that Iris, with her own personal issues, is more of a friend than Brooke ever was because she wanted to help Alice with her own insecurities (232). I would recommend this book to any young adult who enjoys a mystery, maybe even one who is looking for an introduction to Agatha Christie's books. All in all, there is nothing like a good mystery to start the Fall season!

4.5
challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

This book was a lot of fun! A great amateur detective mystery. Lots of twists and turns. I actually didn’t even guess the real suspect at all even though it made perfect sense in the end. I liked the unlikely duo and how their friendship formed. I also thought the subplots added a lot of meat to the story. I hovered between a 4-4.5 for this, but went with the 4. Overall, really good. Definitely recommended for a high school classroom library.

Cute YA, easy read

I really enjoyed this dual narrative. It's rare to find a book with two voices that really use the structure to its full advantage, but The Agathas makes good use of both Iris- and Alice's secretive, prickly natures and different voices. Plus the mystery was fun! A bit predictable if you've read a lot of Christie, but the twists were genuinely twisty and there was a surprise horse!