By Andrea Contos

“Nora and Sophie Linden may be sisters, but they’re not friends. Not since the party last month. Not since the night Sophie’s boyfriend, Garrett, disappeared. Half the town thinks Garrett is dead, the other half believes he ran away, but Sophie knows something no one else does — Garrett left that party with Nora. And straight-A, Ivy-league-bound Nora had never been to a single party before that night. Then Nora withdraws, barely coming home anymore, right when Sophie starts receiving messages from someone who claims to be Garrett, promising revenge — for what happened to him that night, and for the lies both girls told to the police about it. With the sisters’ futures — and lives — in jeopardy, they’ll have to decide whether to trust each other again, or risk their secrets leading them to their graves.” (Goodreads).

I was not expecting this book to be as intense and crazy as it was – nor was I expecting the twist at the end. It seems that the current trend with dual POVs is for the twist at the end to involve that style choice somehow, and I’ve been really enjoying it. Contos’ writing style was both subtle and overt, and that overtness helps to disguise those things she’s hiding from the reader. Thriller fans will devour this one, and I will definitely be reading more of Contos’ work. I will try to keep this review spoiler free even though there’s so much I want to talk about! This was one out of like ten books I checked out from the library five days ago and I’ve already read five, meaning I’m waaaay behind on reviews. I might have to pick and choose which ones I review, but this one is my first pick so far. Way too good not to recommend!

The plot did not stop moving even once. Every scene was high stakes and integral to the plot. This wasn’t like some mysteries where the main character never seems to find any important evidence until the end. Instead, useful information is uncovered and keeps the pacing going from the start to the end. There were a few plot holes but otherwise the action flows nicely. Sometimes in a thriller the character development gets thrown to the side, but I loved how Contos keeps her characters engaged and the life-changing nature of the plot is actually represented in the life changes of the main characters.

Unfortunately, a few parts of the mystery did not make a lot of sense. It was hard to see where some of the evidence connected and the girls sometimes made logical jumps. By the end, I was left really confused about who had actually done the crime and what the true crime even was. Not to mention that at the end it seems that Nora was an unreliable narrator and she may have left out certain events? I really enjoyed reading the book and being confused when I thought all my questions would be cleared up at the end, but unfortunately some things did not seem clear. The way Nora stumbled upon the mystery didn’t make a lot of sense either, she discovered a business card accidentally and fell into the whole dealio.

I thoroughly enjoyed the dual POV with the twist at the end. The different timelines made it somewhat confusing, however; Nora’s chapters are a “confession” she writes close to the end of the entire book, so you are reading her perspective on events that led up to the disappearance of Garrett, while Sophie’s chapters are her present narration as she looks into the case after Garret goes missing. There wasn’t much indication of time switching, so sometimes it was tough to keep track of. It was also hard to remember what each character knew at the present time. Sometimes it felt that this was purposeful, though: it built up confusion similar to what the dissonance between the sisters must have been like. They were both uncovering things that may have been useful to the other as they solved the case on their own, but the lack of communication left them both in the dark. It also added to the feeling of isolation between the girls and everyone around them as they fell deeper into danger.

Contos perfected the art of writing with two very different personalities. Especially at the beginning when Sophie hadn’t progressed through her character arc yet, Nora and Sophie were very distinct characters in not just their dialogue, but their thought patterns and actions.

I felt the stakes were high for the crimes uncovered (I can’t say more without spoiling), but those very stakes made this a true thriller. Both Nora and Sophie had so much on the line, and for once I was left in true suspense never knowing what would happen next.

There also seemed to be a little bit of white apologizing? If you make a racist comment, please apologize and repent – but a few times the characters would mention being white in a degrading way without doing anything offensive at all. It annoyed me when this would pop up because children (especially women) centuries removed from slavery should not have to apologize for the sins of their ancestors.

My final issue was that a few times Nora would mention something that the reader would know in the future but didn’t know then, or very obviously foreshadow a bad consequence in the future to an action she takes in the present. Yes, it added to the “unreliable narrator” bit, but it was also kind of degrading for the reader.

The characters were one of my favorite parts of the book. Not just the characters themselves, but their growth and change throughout, especially in Sophie. I’ve seen other reviews claiming that she seemed flat and boring, but those same reviewers DNF’d – by the end, Sophie is just as fiery and full of feminine rage as her sister, but also with a more mature emotional intelligence. Sophie let people walk all over her before she started looking into her boyfriend’s disappearance, but what she uncovers teaches her that she cannot blindly trust and she has a right to respect. What I loved about her arc was how subtle each change was. Instead of describing outright her changing nature through internal monologue, Contos left the reader to notice the difference through her more fiery dialogue and bold actions.

Nora was my favorite character at first, but only after I finished the book did I realize there was a lot more going on with her than I thought. For one, her objections to the actions of those she is fighting against are based in self-benefit. Not a lot of what she does has any other motivation than that. It doesn’t really seem like she knows who she is though outside of her goals for college and achievement. Her goals are societally “good,” but her intentions are rarely normal for a girl like her. Secondly, she definitely follows a very consequentialist moral system. To Nora, actions are good/bad depending on their positive/negative impact on the world. Though Nora sees the actions of the “bad guys” in the book as wrong, she behaves in similar ways without a thought – breaking into places for evidence, lying and sneaking around in the name of solving the case. In her eyes, she can do whatever she wants as long as there is a “good” outcome. This is obviously not biblical, but the greater problem is that she rarely considers others in what makes something a “good” outcome. For example, *skip to the next paragraph, spoiler* A younger flashback Nora is the one who reveals to her family that her dad was cheating on her mom and stealing from the girls’ college funds. This may have been another story if she had just told her mom in private, but she turned it into a dramatic reveal involving a police visit, printed text and bank account screenshots, and a sick and very public reveal for her mom (who actually kind of already knew). Not only was this not a great way to go about such a heartbreaking confession, but her intention was mostly to save her college fund and not to protect her mom’s feelings.

The side characters were great (and there were a looot of them), but some didn’t add much to the plot, like Jude. He seemed to only serve as a foil for Garrett and didn’t contribute to the story. Nora’s boy-next-door for me really excited; they seemed perfect for each other. The twist involving him disappointed me at first but then I was happy – the more unexpected something is for me in a YA novel, the better.

This read was for sure a 4.5 star for me. The very small issues did not take away from my enjoyment while reading at all, and I truly could not put it down. The sisters’ relationship and individual personalities were so distinct and unique. If you love YA thrillers like One of Us is Lying, you’ll immediately be pulled into this one by the intense style and fascinating characters.