Title: Good Girl, Bad Blood (Part 2 of “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder” Series)
Author(s) Name(s): Holly Jackson
Published in: April, 2020
Why You Might Like This Book: Read this book if you enjoy
- crime fiction,
- YA thrillers,
- small town drama, and
- amateur detective stories.
Who Should Avoid This Book: Avoid this book if you are triggered by or dislike
- kidnapping, or
- murder,
- violence,
- grief or loss.
While this sequel happens to be another well-rated book by the author of “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder”, Holly Jackson, is it the author projecting her own grudges and inability to tolerate most people around her, or is it just how the lead character, amateur detective Pip happens to be? The first few chapters are anything but interesting. It is expected that the author would give readers a summary of what happened and a small introduction of the characters and their shared relationships in Little Kilton at the beeginning of this story, for anyone who has not read the first book in the series. One thing that doesn’t seem to have changed, though is how overly Pip-centric the book is till the plot actually begins and how Pip just can’t seem to come up with nice things to say about most of the characters. Perhaps this is how the author plans to create an interesting ground for a thriller plot, by showing most people in bad light and only a few people as the good ones, but the first few chapters are so full of boring Pip-centered-ness – how she has become a star now, and how she sees everyone around her, mostly only negatively, with intense dislike. That’s a turn-off to begin with!
Please read this book only after you have read Part 1 of “A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder” –
Thankfully, after the first few chapters of Pip-centered hate-for-all, the thriller slowly unfolds: a friend’s brother Jamie has gone missing and he seeks Pip’s help because the police won’t take the case seriously given that Jamie is 24 years old, not a child, and has gone away from home without informing his family at least twice. Also, his younger brother Connor insists that Jamie was acting out of character for a few weeks, so he wants Pip to investigate because she’s already solved a murder case and is now running a popular crime podcast. We need to accept the silliness of the premise that after solving one murder case, everyone in town, even the police department senior officials treat Pip like she’s a professional detective, so that we can enjoy the rest of the story.
The first half of the book feels pretty similar to the prequel (book 1 in the A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series), with the only noticeable difference being that this time there is a podcast in the picture. This one has plenty of grammatical mistakes, too, like the earlier one. The narrative is more or less the same: information reaches the young detective through someone, whatever she finds worthy of digging, she starts probing and does interview recordings with all those who might be able to provide any useful information, and most people agree to do those interviews (remember, this is fiction!).
Similar to the last book, multiple suspects will be added one after the other to the list of suspects, while also keeping the narrative flowing smoothly. One good thing about Holly Jackson’s plots are the many interesting twists and turns that will come up at different points. Instead of keeping the plot too simplistic, she interconnects events and people in ways that are not easy to come up with and the ideas still make sense. The author also uses these opportunities to raise awareness about important social issues that matter, like sexual assault, drug abuse, misuse of social media, catfishing and online scam, and such, which I totally appreciate.
Spoilers ahead: There are smooth twists in this book as well, some we truly couldn’t have guessed, and there are also cases where you can easily connect the dots. And what could be either annoying or amusing or both is that the dots just connect themselves towards the end, as though the author is in a hurry to tell the story and go off to attend an important meeting after that! It’s like the puzzles suddenly solve themselves – Mr Green walks in on the young detective and the journalist in *an abandoned old place*, *just like that*, when they are so close to finding out the truth, he asks her if he can use her phone, and our ever-shrewd detective hands it over to him without a second thought? Hilarious.
But on the whole, if you happen to be a fan of crime thrillers, “Good Girl, Bad Blood” by Holly Jackson might not be an “unputdownable psychological thriller” or a compelling page-turner or something that could give you sleepless nights, but still is definitely worth your time. Her writing style is unique, and if you enjoy this idea of a young, bold, ambitious woman in her final years of school, someone who is passionate about solving crime, then you would enjoy this series! If you have not read the prequel yet, then start with that one first – this is an interesting series in the world of YA thriller novels. I’d give this one a 4-star rating.
