A review by soundlysmitten
A Good Girl's Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Five years ago, a teenage girl went missing. Her body was never found... but her boyfriend’s body was. 
 
All of Fairview has accepted the narrative that Sal Singh murdered his girlfriend before committing suicide. All of Fairview, except Pippa Fitz-Amobi. Under the guise of completing her senior capstone project, Pip sets her mind to finding out what really happened. But as additional crimes are uncovered, she learns that the question of who is responsible doesn’t exactly have a simple answer. Will Pip be able to unravel the mystery before someone comes for her too?

As much as I enjoyed this book, I have two main issues with it. 
 
First is the premise. It seems highly unrealistic to me. I just don’t see a high school student being allowed to perform such a “case study.” Or people being willing to speak to one who was. 
 
Second is the fact that Pip is so bright yet she makes some frustratingly stupid decisions, it seems, for the sake of drama. In my opinion, those moments detract from the story rather than enhance it. 
 
Still, I’d say the crimes are planned out impressively well and the pacing is consistently on point. There’s something else, too. Something more to the story that made it easy for me to overlook any issues it may have. I don’t know what specifically, cause I didn’t even connect with the characters too deeply, but I still felt completely invested in seeing Pip’s investigation through.

So, if you can get over the unrealistic aspects... do!

 😽
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