Pretty Girls: A Novel

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Wow! This was one dark and disturbing story. I love dark reads, but this was pretty gruesome for me at times. I was at the edge of my seat from start to finish with this one. I even had nightmares about this book. As I start to write this review, just thinking about it is giving me the chills. It was just that messed up. The book starts with a fast pace then in between it got a little boring or tiring just a little bit because maybe it was too long to read. The compelling standalone novel from Sunday Times No. 1 bestselling author of Girl Forgotten and Pieces of Her, now a major Netflix series . Re-issued with a stunning new cover. Then throw in about a thousand times on how very beautiful our main character is...she is pretty and smart. *insert gag here*

I like how we got a lot revealed quite early on in the book, but that didn’t really make me lose interest. It just made me want more to be explained, and therefore, my eyes were glued to this one. I was somewhat confused in the beginning because of a lot of details that were given without much connection, but it all made sense in the end. Claire and Lydia had a sister who vanished twenty years ago. When Claire’s husband is suddenly killed, the two estranged sisters decided to reunite and work together to find out the connection between the murder and Julia’s disappearance. Nothing about this book is 'expected'. Even the nature of the crime itself is one that I honestly hadn't ever seen before (at least not this extreme) on any crime-fighting TV show. *shudders* The story keeps you on your toes, catching you off guard with it's surprises over and over again. There's never a dull moment.Which is too bad, because the book started strong. 24 years ago, Julia Carroll disappeared. The disappearance shattered her family. Her father killed himself (his letters to his missing daughter are the closest thing to a heart this book has). Her mother retreated inward; she stopped talking about Julia, but she kept her bedroom exactly the way the 19-year-old left it. Sisters Lydia Delgado, a single mother, owner of a pet grooming business and recovering addict, and Claire Scott, the pampered wife of a successful architect haven’t spoken for 20 years. The estrangement wasn’t because of Julia-it happened after Lydia accused Claire’s husband of something awful. A lovely audio interview with the author by Steve White of Literary Week. The sound levels are off a bit, his volume being too loud relative to hers, but it’s worth putting up with. Karin Slaughter's Pretty Girls asks all of the questions and then answers them in the creepiest way I can imagine. It's been a while since I laid in bed at night hoping that what I had just read doesn't give me nightmares, but this one had me doing just that. Add that on top of the fact that I absolutely couldn't put this book down, and we've got a real winner on our hands. So the plot? Garbage. It goes from one level of ludicrous to the next. You may even laugh at the last big 'twist' the book reveals. Because it's stupid. Soap operas have more flair. This is a paint by numbers tale. People behave in a manner that might work in a Monty Python sketch. There's an FBI agent that acts and speaks as though he's stumbled in from another goddamn dimension, and all you want to do is punch him in the face. And then the first big thing happens and then almost immediately a second. Me? I felt my heart sink. Because anyone who's seen a 90s thriller, Lifetime movie or not, should be able to rattle off the next few major plot points in easy succession.

Julia goes missing one night at age 19, following an evening out with her college friends to a local bar. Julia's 2 sisters Claire and Lydia, grow up in the shadow of her disappearance and take different paths in their lives. Amongst the world's greatest and finest crime writers' YRSA SIGURÐARDÓTTIR Read more Look Inside Details

This is also a book with absolutely no fluff. You can't skim anything because you'll miss crucial elements or reveals. It's intricate and layered. This author clearly spent a great deal of time plotting out her story before writing it because everything happens for a reason, every piece of the story has a purpose, and by the end, they all fit together. One reason I'm always wary of thrillers is I rarely find them satisfying but this book gave every single answer to every single question. I'm a fast reader and will usually breeze through full-length book in an afternoon but it took me 2 days to read this (3 technically since I read the first 10% one night, and the rest over 2 days) because there was just so MUCH going on in it... Not everyone will like the subject matter. Unfortunately things like this can and do happen each and every day. You'll probably hear a lot about characters and the literary merits (ha ha, I hope!) but make no mistake--at its heart, this book is a thriller. There are lots of twists and turns and all the stuff that folks have come to expect from me. The only thing missing is cops. Not that there aren't cops in the story (because they usually show up when there's a crime) but the narrators are just two ordinary women who are thrown into extraordinary circumstances. The real question is whether or not they can rise to the occasion (or will they make it at all?) If you want to read a high-level Psychological crime thriller then you should read this one. It’s very interesting to read. I don’t know if using enjoyable read is the right word for this because of the crimes shown in this book but still, you’ll enjoy reading the story. What I Didn’t Like About Pretty Girls Book

Pretty Girls is the story of two sisters, one whom has just found herself widowed and the other a single mother of a teenaged daughter. They've long been estranged but have recently found themselves in communication again. Little do they know that uncovering their past will uncover way more than they ever could have expected - including some new clues regarding the 20 years ago disappearance of their oldest sister. Library folk? Take off the mystery label you might place on the spine of this book. Put on a horror label instead. People deserve at least SOME sort of warning. This book is gripping and I wanted to keep writing to find out what would happen next. This is a hard book to review because I do not want to give anything away that will ruin the story for anyone. I liked the dialogue of the characters they talked as "real" people talk to each other. I found that I liked most of the characters and shook my head when some did not always act in their own best interest i.e. mouthing off or being sarcastic. All the characters seemed real, even if they are the worst kind of people you can think like yeah this type of person can exist in real life too. The disappearance of a teenage girl and the murder of a middle-aged man, almost a quarter-century apart: what could connect them? Forming a wary truce, the surviving sisters look to the past to find the truth, unearthing the secrets that destroyed their family all those years ago ... and uncovering the possibility of redemption, and revenge, where they least expect it.

The major revelation was way too earlier of course without that the story won’t go ahead but that made that took away the surprise element that most of the readers want in the second half of the book. What I Like About Pretty Girls Book chills and shivers again. How amazing is this writing?? I hate that I have to go to bed now because I want to keep reading!!