Review - A Good Girl's Guide to Murder (Trilogy) - Holly Jackson

WARNING: this is a YA (Young Adult) book, so if you're under 13, please don't read it. I'm sure there are content and trigger warnings available online too, so best to check that out. The story deals with some serious topics.   

I wrote this out a while back haha, but never posted it. So here it is!

I'm a good girl (that's what everyone says anyway, sometimes I forget I'm a person), and I can now say that I now know a lot more about murders than I thought I would.

Well, there's nothing much to say about where I found this book and all, 'cause that's pretty boring. Moving on to a bit of the blurb from each of the three books:

AGGGTM #1: Everyone in Little Kilton knows that the popular Addie Bell was murdered by her boyfriend, Sal Singh, who later killed himself. Except Pippa Fitz-Amobi, a straight A student. She thinks otherwise, and wants to look into this case herself as her project for Year 13. Well, everyone has secrets, including Addie, who has more than a few...

AGGGTM #2 (Good Girl, Bad Blood): Pip starts a podcast with Ravi, which is called A Good Girl's Guide to Murder (I don't know why I found it so funny). She says she's done with mysteries- that is, until someone she knows goes missing. If the police don't do anything to locate Jamie Reynolds, well, Team Pip and Ravi have to take it to their own hands. 

AGGGTM #3 (As Good As Dead): Pip has been solving mysteries to find missing people, right? But what would happen if she went missing? That's the message that has been haunting her for months. This time, Pip is the one being stalked. After all, don't most things come in threes? This last mystery must tie the other two together. 

You know what tells me that this is a simply fantastic book? The fact that despite there being so many names across the books, I remembered pretty much ever one of them. Usually, I'd have to search up at least a few, to make sure (I did that here too, but that's just to make sure my info's correct), and I'd have a bunch of things missing from my memory, even if I'd read it a few hours ago. That's not something you get in every book. Especially not with series. 

The fact that some of the books still haunt me says something, too. It really makes you think, especially the 3rd book, about what the difference between good and bad is. This feels like a story I'd remember for a while. The conclusion to the stories, you guys. Not to spoil anything, but it was a really cool way how it ended, even though if I were the author I'd chose a different path. But that's just me.

The plot twists were epic, and almost always left me shocked. They were often so hard to predict. But when you go back, it's easy to see the foreshadowing. Another thing was how Pip was really smart. Either the mystery-solving person (detective, guys, detective) is either so freaking intelligent they have the entire thing figured out within like five minutes (*cough* Sherlock Holmes *cough*) or is kind of slow so you're left yelling at the book to go faster. But Pip's right in the middle, so it's easy to be at the same pace as her even if you're someone who reads a lot of thrillers (apparently mystery books are called thrillers?). 

PTSD (Post-traumatic stress disorder) is also something really addressed, especially in the last book. I don't know enough about it to say how much of it was accurate. However, it was nice to see it (it's not a nice thing to see but you know what I mean). Often books just dump traumatic event after traumatic event, and the character is somehow okay? That's just very unrealistic. No matter how strong your character is emotionally and mentally, trauma impacts everyone. 

Ok, so the characters now: all were really cool. As I said before, Pip is quick-witted and hard working. Ravi brings humor and is witty. The secondary characters are pretty well-developed too, which is really nice and not something that happens in a lot of books. The antagonists are all three-dimensional people who have understandable motives. 

Any drawbacks I found? Well, not really. I feel like Pip and Ravi's relationship might've been a bit rushed? Might be just my opinion though. Then again, at least it wasn't one of those cliched princess stories. And some of the plot twists were a bit predictable. Being predictable isn't the problem, but the fact that they weren't as enjoyable. The first book had some first person point of view, but later on it was just third-person. Kind of wished the occasional first person continued as it was really cool to actually see what Pip was thinking, you know? It made her feel more realistic, which was seen less through third person.

Something I personally realized was the uncanny similarity between book 1 and Karen M. McManus's Two Can Keep a Secret. I mean, there were obvious differences, but there were loads of things that were the same.

Ratings (by me):

Characters (in terms of development, not morality): 9/10

Plot: 9.5/10

Interest level in general: 9.25/10

So that's about it, I guess. Might be a while before I post this review, but yeah (haha I wrote this when I first wrote it). Have you read this book? If so, how was it? If you haven't, do you want to? I personally find mystery books fantastic reads as they make you think.  

Oh, and you might've noticed slight changes to the theme. More violet (I like to call the theme 'Violet Crimes' as I made a playlist containing crime-related songs in honor of it haha). Hope you like it! Any ideas on what the next post might be? Let me know, and 

That's all, hopefully I'll see you guys next time!

Note: Not sponsored and just my opinions. If I said something offensive, please let me know!