I had a tough time with this book. The characters were portraying stereotypical high schoolers at their worst, and there seemed to be several plot oversights (to the point where some events seemed so incredibly unlikely that it took me out of the story). There should also be some sort of trigger warning, due to the several traumatic experiences that two characters undergo.

Finally, the author uses the ableist slur "spaz," and also uses the term "pow-wow." I could not in good conscious recommend this book to any of my students, nor would I keep this book on my classroom shelf. While the premise had promise, the execution was lacking.

At the beginning someone is being murdered, but we do not find out who until later.....I thought i knew who the murderer was but i was completely wrong!.
Scarlet is the queen bee of Craven Falls High. When her BFF Rachel starts hanging out with Laura, all the drama unfolds. I cannot say too much without giving any details away.
I really enjoyed this book. It kept me guessing until the end. This definitely gave off a mean girls vibe. Thanks to NetGalley for providing me a complimentary copy of THE DEAD GIRL UNDER THE BLEACHERS by Donna Zadunajsky in exchange for my honest review

I received this ebook from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Have you ever heard of the sandwich method? It's used for giving a constructive criticism when you "sandwich" negative things between two positive things. This sandwich will be made of two super thin slices of bread and a lot of ingredients between them. Buckle up.

So, for the first slice of bread: It's the first book I got from NetGalley! Yay!

Okay, moving on. Now for the middle part.

Let's start with the basis for this part, the butter, that will, hopefully, help keep this neat and thick stack of ingredients together: I ABSOLUTELY REFUSE to believe that this book was touched by a competent editor. I just refuse. I'm not saying this because of things like "There was barely any suspense" or "The characters were cliche and unlikeable" (both of these things are true, BTW) but because of the staggering amount of grammatical mistakes and weird syntax gymnastics going on in the book. I won't list all of them here, but on my Kindle I have marked 152 (one hundred fifty-two) fragments that made me lose it just a little. Please keep in mind, that these are just fragments that I felt absolutely compelled to highlight. There were more that I didn't mark because I just didn't feel they were as atrocious as the others or because I wasn't 100% sure they were grammatically incorrect, but they just looked clunky and awkward.

- switching the subject in the middle of a sentence but not putting a new pronoun: "I tapped the end of my pencil on the notebook sitting in front of me while perched at my desk in my bedroom". So, the notebook was perched at her desk? "There was movement behind the curtains and knew someone was home". ??? "grateful that the weather had been cooler lately and could wear a sweater" I didn't know that weather could wear clothes.
- using two 'but' in one sentence: "I chuckled over this idea, but I've never killed someone, but Laura deserved everything she had coming" "but I wasn't sure if I had heard her right, but it sounded like 'whatever'" "but I wasn't part of the Sawyer family, but could I be?"
- narrator contradicting herself in the span of one sentence: "I couldn't be living this but I was." "She knew that it was best not to talk to me unless I acknowledged her first, but I guess she didn't get the memo". So did she knew it or not??? "Maybe I had imagined it all, but I hadn't".
- sentences that SCIENTIFICALLY don't make any sense: "[Books] scattered around me as if the gravity was sucked out of room". If the gravity was sucked out of the room, wouldn't the books stay, you know... afloat? But what do I know, it's just a Science 101. "After Monday had passed, Wednesday arrived" Ma'am, you seem to have lost one day. Where is Tuesday??? I'm not even sure if it qualifies as scientific, but holy fox! "It was as if there were no moon in the sky, not even stars. I didn't know what that meant. I wasn't into astronomy or anything like that". I mean, I don't have a degree in astronomy, but no moon and no stars visible might mean that the sky is overcast??? Just an idea. "JJ always carried a flask with him filled with vodka, which was odorless". Listen, I'm not a drinker, but even I know that vodka does indeed have a smell and it's quite a strong one.
- double negatives: "I don't say nothing to him". Yeah, I know double negatives are a thing in AAVE, but this book is not written in AAVE.
- wrong usage of words and phrases: "Out of this small, unpopulated town". According to Merriam-Webster, unpopulated means: "not populated, not occupied or settled, not inhabited". I'm pretty sure that Craven Falls is inhabited, based on the fact that, you know, the main characters live there and that's where the plot takes place. "This was my queue to find out who she liked". Honey, you meant 'cue', not 'queue'. "it felt good. Rejuvenated" You meant 'rejuvenating'? "zipper hidden from the naked eye". 'Naked eye' means that you're not using any magnifying glass, microscope, etc. I doubt Laura had to use any of these instruments to find the zipper.
- bizarre usage of continous form: "I gathered my things and stood, walking out of the classroom". So she stood and walked out of the classroom at the same time? Because that's what this kind of continous form used here would imply. "'I enjoyed being with Laura last night, but she doesn't want to hang out with me.' Wondering why this bothered me so much. 'Give her some time". This kind of continous form was much more prevalent and was bothering me SO much. You can't just stick a sentence with a verb in continous form with no pronoun and no 'to be' particle.
- purely nonsensical sentences: "Dead was an understatement" I mean, being dead is pretty zero-one situation. Either you're dead or not. "If it were my house, which I'd never throw a party" I have literally no idea, what does it mean.
- overexplaining: "Scarlet to me was the Wicked Witch of the West, like in Wizard of Oz". You don't explain your references. Also, I'm pretty sure almost all of the readers will know who Wicked Witch of the West is. "she sometimes beat me home, but not always." Ummm... yeah, that's what 'sometimes' means.
- just purely grammatical mistakes: "What I should do?" It's 'What should I do?'. "I treated her bad at school today". For goodness' sake, 'bad' is an adjective, so it cannot describe a verb. What should be used is 'badly', which is an adverb.
- switching from past tense to present tense and vice versa; it only happened a few times, but still. Control your tenses. "A blast of cool air pushes me back and I almost lost my grip on the door handle". "I go to shake my head but stopped myself".
- tautologies: "Yes, granted, it was dark outside". In this case, 'yes' and 'granted' are interchangeable, you don't need both. "Hoping with all hope" I mean, seriously? "evil villain" Villains are, by definition, evil.
- weird interpunction: "Damn' it!" "Do you know where Appleton's live?" "I looked over at Scarlet, she seemed oblivious to everything around her, including what Kyle had just done?" Why the question mark at the end??? "We were, mostly a happy family"
- nonsensical similes: "'Shit, shit, shit!' I said, swearing like a comedian on stage". ??? "Minutes seemed to tick by slower than a snail on speed" ???????
- sentences that just are all over the place: "Had I been too blind to see beyond my popularity at school, which would end as soon as Scarlet told everyone that I'd been hanging out with Laura, but I didn't care anymore" "she's friends with the daughter of the two people she killed". Yeah, good luck deciphering this one. The first 'she' refers to Scarlet, the second 'she' refers to Scarlet's mother and the two people that were killed are Laura's father and... brother, so don't ask me why Laura is called here their daughter.
- wrong collocations: "He's hot looking". You can be either hot, or good-looking, but not 'hot looking'.
Furthermore, sometimes the writing looked as if the author was desperately trying to meet a word count - describing every single action of the characters and repeating the information we already had, also look: 'overexplaining' and 'tautologies' above.

Okay, now for some other elements of the book
- the plot is salvageable, it was interesting in some places and had some nice plot twists, but the book would need to be rewritten in its entirety in order for the plot to shine.
- the characters are very cliche. Mean girl, a poor outcast, former best friend who now is best friends with the mean girl, the mean girl's douchebag of a boyfriend. Oh, and the evil stepmother and the father who cannot see how the stepmother is manipulating him - these two tropes were pushed to extreme, with both of these characters killing their (step)daughter. Seriously, did the author's father remarried and she still has trauma or...?
- the 2/3 of the MCs are unlikeable
- we get barely any thought process of the MCs, even though we get a 1st person narration from all of them. They say many things that make no sense and they jump to conclusions faster than you can shout "Worms for brains!" Laura wants Scarlet dead because she thinks that Scarlet knowing the truth about her dad and brother's death is just as bad as Scarlet's mother killing them. Scarlet wants Laura dead, because she thinks that Laura killed Kyle, despite having literally no evidence to support that claim. Worms for brains, I'm telling you, worms for brains.
- the setting is super basic. Your typical high-school-in-a-small-town drama.

My advice for the writer? Read books in the same genre, e.g. books by Karen McManus or even the Truly Devious trilogy by Maureen Johnson (even though I gave only 3 stars to the latter) to see how to write books in this genre. Or just to see how to WRITE books.

Okay, so now for the upper super thin slice of bread. I've been recently wondering what constitutes a book bad enough for me to give it a 1 star rating. Now I know!

Whilst I liked the idea of this book, I found it difficult to read and think maybe the author's writing style is not for me. The plot flips between the girls being friends and enemies with such quickness that it was difficult to follow. Other readers may prefer this to me.

So first off, this is not a mystery its more of a drama filled book. The characters dont really have any depth to them and the story gets boring during most of the book.

Rachel and Laura are the most relatable characters. Then Scarlet, her stepmom, and her dad are over the top in everything they do.

The writing style was very flat and it didn't flow well. The only reason I gave it 2 stars is the ending. I had one person pinned down on the murderer, but the 2nd person involved i wasn't expecting.

This book starts right off with a murder, but the reader isn't told who was killed or why. The dead girl is supposedly the nice girl, the mean girl or the outcast. I think the author could have done a better job with developing these characters, as they were very stereotypical. However, I must say that it was nice to have theories I came up with as I read to be proven wrong. I like when I am surprised at what happens in books.

The Dead Girl Under the Bleachers starts at the end, with a girl being pursued across an empty playing field to the bleachers - this leaves you with the entire story trying to work out who will be the girl and why.

Laura and Rachel were friends from childhood however this ended when Scarlet, the narcissistic popular daughter of the Mayor, claims Rachel as her best friend. Scarlet decides that she wants to punish Laura for being an outsider and schemes to underhandedly put Laura in a compromising position which is photographed and shared around the school. The book then follows the story as it develops, with a hesitant Rachel, a lonely Laura and a hateful Scarlet.

There is a number of trigger warnings in this book: parental abuse, alcoholism, bullying and rape.

This book was well written enough to keep me reading until the end as I did want to know which character was killed. The two main characters are likeable and their rekindling friendship was pleasant.

SPOILER ALERT
My main criticism of this book was how the characters shrugged off incredibly significant and disturbing events as though they were nothing.
Scarlet finds out her boyfriend has been raping incapacitated females and taking photos whilst he is dating her as well as sleeping with her stepmother. A few chapters later he then dies and she tells her friend they were supposed to be together and she loves him. This is not a normal reaction but you could maybe link it her to self obsessed attitude if in isolation.

The main character Laura is physically beaten by her alcoholic mother, her father and siblings died before the book timeline, and then she goes to a party where she gets drunk and is raped by the boyfriend of Scarlet. Within a chapter or two of a) her mother dying and b) her being raped she is seemingly fine (even where the narrative is from her perspective otherwise you could assume she is hiding it when being observed). Alongside the fact that she finds out her father and sibling were not killed by a truck but by Scarlets mother who was a secret addict and Laura finds out but again barely reacts.

As a result the story was not believable due to the lack of human reaction from the main characters to crippling events in their lives at a young age.

2 out of 5 stars,

***I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review***

The Dead Girl Under the Bleachers opens with a murder, enacted by two people. We know that much- but we don't know who, or why, or anything that lead up to the murder. The rest of the novel is split between three points of view: Laura, who mostly flies under the radar and has a very difficult home life; Rachel, skyrocketed to popularity by Scarlet and formerly friends with Laura; and Scarlet, the vicious Queen Bee. When we meet the characters, Scarlet has come up with a plan to 'get revenge' on Laura, with Rachel as her semi-unwilling accomplice. However, after an evening at Laura's has violent consequences, she and Rachel begin to rediscover their friendship: angering Scarlet.

I really liked the use of three different points of view, especially as they were all very different; Scarlet and Laura were on two very separate sides, with Rachel in the middle. At times I found myself wondering why Rachel was ever friends with Scarlet, or why she continued that friendship, but at other times I thought that that was better explained and I could see her 'side'. I also really liked that the book opened with the end, which made for an ominous read, knowing what was inevitable, and trying to parse out the clues as to why might be the victim, and who might be the culprits.

I think the main issue with the book was that it was overly dramatic- in particular, I couldn't see the way Lianne and Scarlet spoke to each other as being anything like realistic. It was a bit like reading a soap opera at times. That's not to dismiss the plot points as pure drama though, there were some really important topics explored, such as familial abuse, and the different but equally awful natures of emotional and physical abuse. At the same time, I think there was room to explore this a lot more- for example, Scarlet and Laura are both grieving, and there is a surface-level reference as to how grief has had different effects on them. I think this could have been given a lot more focus! I also definitely didn't understand a lot of the character's motivations- Scarlet was almost hopelessly evil, and I didn't really know why; as I said before, I didn't understand why Scarlet and Rachel were friends at times, and I definitely didn't understand why Rachel let Laura go home when she realised what her home life was like!

As the blurb says, there are three deaths in this book; one of them, to me, felt pretty superfluous and a bit pointless. I think the whodunit nature was good, it definitely kept me on my toes for half of the book, but once I worked it out, I wasn't so interested anymore. Then my attention was on who the third person might be- the reveal of which I found completely unbelieveable and ridiculously farfetched.

All in all, it was a fun read, but not always a great one.

I kept trying to guess who would be “the girl under the bleachers” and why and I kept getting one of the two or both wrong!! The story between Laura, Scarlett & Rachel take you through a twisted tale, you never know as the reader who is quite telling the truth and you end up second guessing yourself the deeper you get into the story.

I really enjoyed it and you don’t see the killer till it’s revealed!!!

Thank you to net galley and the publisher for this book! Wow so if gossip girl, mean girls and scream had a baby this would be it! The book started slow for me in the beginning we meet scarlet your all around mean girl her best friend Rachel and loner Laura. It all starts with Scarlett wanting to humiliate Laura, Scarlett makes Laura invite over her and Rachel and this starts a crazy chain of events! Once the plot got going it was insane, I enjoyed the book overall it does have some heavy themes in it but give it a chance. You won’t see what happens coming!

DNF'd at 25% I felt no connection to the plot or characters it felt like the story started in the middle and wasn't very well thought out

This book kept me up all night because I just couldn’t stop reading.

I really enjoyed the story and was completely enthralled by it. The mystery kept me guessing and I just needed to know what was happening.

I liked all of the characters but they did definitely make some silly decisions at times but I think that’s normal for a thriller.

Overall it was a solid thriller and I would definitely recommend it.

This author has a great imagination and some great descriptions.

The characters were a little too cliched for me to like or sympathize with them, which kept me from being as vested in the story and the outcome as I might have been.

I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This had me gripped from the very beginning!! I loved the fact the story was told in the different views of three girls and for most of the story these views were told in order which made reading so much easier. The friendship that came within this story was something I admired and thought was a lovely touch and really made the storyline blossom. However there are trigger warnings within the story which are for: abuse, rape and loss. The suspense had me throughout the entire book and I was on the edge of my seat the whole time to find out what was happening and the ending...!! The ending was so so good! This was one of my favourite reads this year so far!

The book’s description and even the series name ‘Craven Fall Mystery’ seems to imply that the book will be a mystery novel, it is not. For me, it felt like I was reading a parody of a mystery book because everything is so dramatized and because of the various plotlines, I expected some drama because it was about 3 teen girls and there is a mention of a ‘game’ but I felt like the book was nothing like I expected.

I did not like any of the characters; Laura was the misfit one but she had the ‘I’m not like other girls’ personality, Rachel had no personality and I felt her chapters/POV was unneeded and Scarlet was just a manipulative person. Their interactions with each other were so weird because it was obvious that Scarlet was planning something for Laura and yet Laura and Rachel always seemed to give her the benefit of a doubt and go along with what she said. Also, the interactions with the side characters were so overexaggerated. I also did not like the writing style of the book and how certain plot points were used and not dealt with well in the book.

The book starts off with a girl being attacked and left for dead and it is no mystery to who this character is, regarding who the murderer is they are described as the character’s enemy or along those lines so its not hard to figure out who it is. There is also another character who is part of the murder and that part surprised me however the justification for their involvement was mehh. I also did not like the ending of the book.

I liked the pacing of the book and although I did not enjoy the book it was a easy to read book.

1/5

Unfortunately I did not enjoy this book at all. I was initially really drawn in by the title of the book, and was expecting a mystery. It’s not a mystery, it’s more like a drama. In fact, it read like a soap opera. There was no nuance to this book, the plot is predicable and dull, the characters are one-dimensional and all had incredibly cliché motivations. The writing itself was also pretty poor, lots of grammar and syntax errors, and I really hope that some serious editing happens before it’s published.

All of the characters in this book are awful. The story is told from the point of view of the three main girls. However, none of them had their own voices and each POV sounded exactly the same. All the characters were uninspired, and none were fleshed out enough to make this a pleasurable reading experience.

This book really did not read well. The tenses kept switching between past and present which was incredibly jarring. It was also very much a “tell”, not a “show” book. Scenes seemed to cut prematurely and then we’d only find out what happened later when the character thought about it. I found myself skim reading it just so I could finally get it finished.

Overall, this is not a book I would read again or recommend to anyone.

I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to netgalley for this ARC.

I did not enjoy this novel at all, unfortunately. The title drew me in but the story was not engaging nor was it interesting.

The prologue bit served as a way to keep intrigue but other than the book fell quite flat.

I didn't connect with the characters - their personalities seemed a bit all over the place - and the friendship between the girl whose Mum abuses her and the middle friend (I can't even remember their names anymore) doesn't seem plausible since they've had such a huge gap in their friendship. The third girl, the villain essentially, was too over the top, as was her stepmother.

The murder itself seemed very unlikely but crazier things have happened.

Not my cup of tea quite frankly.

This was not very good. It wasn’t really interesting at all. I wasn’t invested in the characters, I didn’t care about the murdered girl, and I didn’t care to find out who did it. The dialogue is very strained and unnatural. No one actually talks like this, and it was awkward to read. There are a lot of usage and wording errors, not to mention punctuation errors. This book needs a really good editor.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me this arc.

This book was a decent read. I only say that because it did get a little to teen drama for me. The story starts off with the ending essentially of an unknown girl being murdered under the bleachers. The unidentified girl sees and knows who her killers are but we have no idea then cuts back into the past that will lead you to how it al unravels. Each chapter is centered around three teen girls; Scarlett, the queen B type, Rachel, the passive one, and Laura, the outcast. Laura and Rachel used to be best friends but then Scarlett came around and stole Rachel away. The whole time you are trying to figure out who the dead girl is and who are her killers and that is mainly what kept me intrigued but it did start getting a little dark and twisted for me. Not to give too much away but there was a point in the story that didn’t need to go in that route that I had to skip through it.

Overall, I would recommend if you can get over the whole teenage girl drama aspect. The author did very well in her writing and keeping me guessing until the end.

I really dont know how i feel about this book. I mean I enjoyed it. But, parts of it just really annoyed me. I like how we don't know who the murdered girl is at the beginning. Just how she dies. I do feel the author tried to throw way to much into this story just to provide motives to all these different people and throw the reader off the trail. In one story you have drugs, bulling, assault, rape, abuse in multiple forms, discussion of suicide, and multiple murders... lastly, the ending. The murderer i get. One accomplice, ok. The other one, Whaaaaat?? It makes no sense to the story whatsoever. It felt cheap, solely for shock value. By the end of the story, it felt like the writer was just trying to throw in curveballs and cliffhangers to speed up the ending. One chapter actually ended with “what he said next shook me”.... seriously? Now we are in a clickbait article?!?