A review by ravensandlace
The Debutantes by Olivia Worley

4.0

Title: The Debutantes

Author: Olivia Worley

Genre: YA Thriller

Format: eARC

Series: NA

Star Rating: 4 stars

tw: fake blood, alcohol, teen death, underage drinking, racism, real blood, assault, misogyny, infidelity, underage relationship

A special thank you goes to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for providing me with a copy of this book. Please know that this does not influence my rating or thoughts on the book itself.

I wasn’t too sure about this book when I first started. There were quite a bit of characters, both main and side characters, to keep up with and only one of them had a somewhat original voice. I’m also not familiar with New Orleans or a lot of the traditions they have. And while the book does explain the traditions, it was a little hard to keep up with. 

While I did end up giving this book four stars, it took a little bit for me to get there. One of the problems that I had was the plot itself. It wasn’t presented right away so I wasn’t sure where it was going to go. I wasn’t sure if the girls were trying to find out who killed a debutante and their friend, who kidnapped their other friend, or both. After a bit, the smoke cleared and I was able to figure things out and enjoy the book more. 

Let me talk about the characters. There were four POVs but there were three main ones. We had April, Vivan, and Piper with Lily having a POV at the beginning and end of the book. While I didn’t mind these characters, I was not in love with them. Piper and Vivan were pretty similar and if their names hadn't been on the top of the chapter pages, I wouldn’t have known who they were. April was the POV who I recognized but that was because she had a camera and an “I am better than everything who participates in this” attitude. 

Overall, despite my complaints, this was a great book. It has made me pretty terrified of teenagers. Maybe My Chemical Romance was on to something. They can be so terrifying! But besides that, I think this was great. The twists and turns kept me guessing until the very end. I highly recommend this book.