Synposis: Carly: She was sweet. Smart. Self-destructive. She knew the secrets of Brighton Day School’s most privileged students. Secrets that got her killed.
Neily: Dumped by Carly for a notorious bad boy, Neily didn’t answer the phone call she made before she died. If he had, maybe he could have helped her. Now he can’t get the image of her lifeless body out of his mind.
Audrey: She’s the reason Carly got tangled up with Brighton’s fast crowd in the first place, and now she regrets it—especially since she’s convinced the police have put the wrong person in jail. Audrey thinks the murderer is someone at Brighton, and she wants Neily to help her find out who it is.
As reluctant allies Neily and Audrey dig into their shared past with Carly, her involvement with Brighton’s dark goings-on comes to light. But figuring out how Carly and her killer fit into the twisted drama will force Audrey and Neily to face hard truths about themselves and the girl they couldn’t save. (From Goodreads)
Hi all! Sorry it’s taken until Wednesday to get a post up, I
literally spent the weekend without internet and electricity…it’s a long story.
And, while I might be YA fanatic I am also technologically illiterate so it
might take a blog post or two before I get the hang of this. Bear with me.
My first book as a temporary blogger is not a new one, and I
actually read it earlier in the year, but I constantly go back to it when
thinking about some of my favorite books I’ve read since being introduced to
YA. All Unquiet Things was
published in 2011 so it’s not old but
definitely not hot-off-the-press new either. I randomly picked it up while I
was hanging out in the Teen Lounge of my local library. For some reason the
cover just struck me so I decided to give it a try. Wow. Good move on my part!
I loooved this book! It’s set in an upscale neighborhood
where everything seems to be perfect. You can just imagine the gorgeous
mansions sitting atop manicured lawns with a BMW tucked neatly away in the four-car
garage. It even has its own expensive and prestigious private school to
complete the picture. Of course, the place is really a mess, which brings me to
the characters. They all have serious issues. Neily is dealing with divorced
parents who have different ideas on what is considered good parenting; his dad
just throws money at him hoping that will be a good substitute father-figure.
Hence, the fancy school. Audrey is living with her grandparents because her mom
is MIA and her father is in and out of jail. Carly, ex-girlfriend of Neily and
cousin of Audrey, is dead. Murdered, actually. And Audrey’s father becomes the
scapegoat. Throw in a major underground drug trade and you start to get an idea
of the situation.
What I loved most about this story is how real the characters all felt. The story
is told through a mix of present day and flashbacks, and from both Neily and
Audrey’s perspectives. It creates such a whole picture of how all these people
are hurting over the death of such a close friend and how it’s so important
that they figure out who really did kill Carly. Neily and Audrey are not
friends, but they come together to get to the bottom of the murder that rocked
their town, and end up finding out more about the person they both lost.
Lets focus on Neily. My heart goes out to him. He loved
Carly so much, almost to a fault, which led to their eventual break-up. It
breaks him, and it broke me too. I mean, I lost sleep over it. It really got to
me because I’ve been in the same situation, once as the person in the relationship
who wasn’t very interested and once as the person who was too invested. I’m not
sure which position is worse because either way you lose someone who was
important to you. Neily knows he loves Carly too much, but what makes it so much
worse is that her murder wipes her completely off the map. He can never make
things right with her or even one day just be friends. It’s extremely final.
OK, I could go on forever about how much this book stuck
with me. I had to go through a grieving period before I could move on to
something else. Anna Jarzab just has an incredible writing style. It’s so
gritty and honest. I know there’s a lot of really great stuff coming out all
the time, but if you have a chance to go back to this book I think you’ll be just as
enthralled as I was. And of course, let me know what you think!
Happy Reading :)
