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** spoiler alert ** Before I being, I would like to admit that by choosing to read this book of my own free will, without compulsion or obligation, I made a rod for my own back and have no right to complain about any suffering that followed. Nonetheless, I am going to do so:-

The previous holder of my “most unappealing first sentence of a book series�� award was the awe-inspiringly stupid Charlaine Harris, on grounds of grammar alone, for Dead Until Dark’s “I’d been waiting for the vampire for years when he walked into the bar��. However this did at least have the decency , as you have no doubt noticed, to mention a vampire. Sara Shepard effortlessly breaks this record with the following:

"Imagine it’s a couple of years ago, the summer between seventh and eighth grade. You’re tan from lying out next to your rock-lined pool, you’ve got on your new Juicy sweats (remember when everybody wore those?), and your mind’s on your crush, the boy who goes to that other prep school whose name we won’t mention and who folds jeans at Abercrombie in the mall.��

I very nearly stopped reading immediately. This book is clearly not aimed at me. It’s apparently for horrifyingly vain and privileged US 15/16yr olds who are unable to describe someone of a tanned appearance with any grammatical accuracy. However once I got over the shock I reflected that if someone six years older than me feels justified in writing this and aiming it at the delicate minds of teenagers, then surely I’m justified in criticising it as I see fit? And even if not, who’s going to stop me? To that end, I would like to say that any teenager whose first reaction upon seeing the picture of a missing young girl is to rate her cuteness in relation to their own is in need of urgent psychological help in order to amend the way in which she interacts with the world.

As the book opens we are introduced to five vile, spoilt bitches. Their leader is Alison, (“signature�� phrase “I’m Ali and I’m fabulous.��, who is perfect and adored by everyone as well as the kind of girl who enjoys mocking “dorks�� to their face and calling her friends fat or a slag. The whole group are not only rich, they are the sort of rich people who snub the nouveau-riche for having the wrong type of mansions and pride themselves on their “noble bloodlines��. They are also absolutely obsessed with Abercrombie (which I believe to be a chain of clothes stores aimed at Sloane Ranger types and given to oppressing minorities and women) and inappropriately sexualised for their age, blushing at older boys and admiring their “totally grope-worthy stomach muscles��, running about naked in cornfields for fun and playing a game called “Olympian Sex Goddesses��. (Having said that, 3½ years later one of them is embarrassed by thinking the term “boob parts�� in reference to a bra. So maybe they’re not as mature about sexual matters as they think). Their inane nothings are interrupted when 13-year-old Alison mercifully goes missing, a fact which is reported to the police a mere 36 hours later.

Nobody is particularly bothered by this disappearance, and we move on 3½ years to Alison’s parents throwing all her belongings onto the pavement and leaving, opening the way for a new girl from “San Fran�� to move into the neighbourhood and Alison’s bedroom. Thirty seconds later, peer pressure from this new girl with awful taste in music has led Emily to smoking pot, in a scene difficult to take seriously as no one has ever actually offered anyone a joint with the words “Want a hit?�� At exactly the same time Aria moves back from Iceland, where she has become a vain Hipster, and immediately commences swanning about driving without a license (on the advice of her mum), whining about how much better European beer is, misusing the word “irony�� and sleeping with a stranger in a pub toilet. Will that come back to bite her? Yes, it almost immediately will. Meanwhile fat friend Hanna has developed into an uber-popular bulimic flasher and become best friends with the previously uncool Mona, now an attention-seeking poor-little-rich-girl shoplifter. Finally our fourth heroine Spencer is occupied being jealous of her sister and planning to steal her current boyfriend, the stupidly named English-Korean Wren, as well as talking about such mysterious acronyms as Aps, GPAs, VPs & JVs.

Once everyone’s teen-drama problems are set up (glamorous issues only, none of them ever has a “pimple�� or anything dirty like that) they meander about mentioning products, brands and shops every 4th line, most of which I am unaware of and/or not interested in. Suffice to say, they all have an obscene amount of labelled clothes and expensive jewellery to wear whilst they shag their teachers, drink red wine, incongruously quote Sartre and have glamorous panic attacks at the thought of their “dead�� friend Alison. The only interruption to this is some vaguely sarky but strangely apposite texts messages and notes each of them receive at inopportune moments, signed ‘A.�� Who could it be?

Various cheesy seductions occur (the kiss-on-the-cheek between female friends that goes a little too far, the hot-tub massage on spurious medical grounds) and a seemingly endless parade of fashion designers are mentioned as we hear far too many details of the girls�� wardrobes. Characters worry about such difficult to sympathise with issues as how calorie-laden vodka and lemonade is. The girl Emily fancies repetitively mentions how great everything was back in “Cali�� once every two minutes and reminisces about cutting herself in order to tick another box on the “teen issues�� chart. Spencer continues to encourage the inappropriate behaviour of her sister’s boyfriend, even though he seems somewhat of a stalker-pervert type. During a traditional teen horror movie dream sequence Aria’s doorbell rings to the tune of “American Idiot�� by Greenday, which brings a much-needed note of mockery to proceedings. Unfortunately it’s only one note against the symphony of logomania and status obsession. Hanna experiences the kind of drink related total memory loss that only happens on TV even though a car crash is exactly the type of thing that normally leaves a couple of memories, particularly in someone who wasn’t even acting more than mildly tipsy. In summary, a lot of people do stupid things.

The dénouement is the finding of Alison’s body, which turns out to have been buried in a large hole in her own garden, which was filled in for no reason by suspicious builders just after she disappeared. There is no mention of either the builders or her family being questioned regarding this, nor of an internal investigation into what the hell the police were doing totally failing to consider this possibility until the new owners of the house decided to dig up the garden for a new tennis court. This bring our 4 heroines to the same location, namely the memorial service, where they eventually discuss the matter of their knowledgeable stalker. No one actually learns anything, except that all four of them are too stupid to think to turn their phones off at a funeral. The stalker remain unidentified. Their silly dramas drag on. The secret of what exactly they did to their unfortunate victim “Jenna�� remains hidden. And everyone wanders off to wait for the next book.

Most Random Accusation Directed at the Reader

“You thought only girls who entered beauty
pageants ended up on the sides of milk cartons.��

No I didn’t. Where the hell would I get that idea from? The only thing I can even vaguely connect with this is JonBenét Ramsay, and I don’t believe she was missing long enough to be cartonised. Not unless US milk production works a lot faster than I was aware. I guess I just don’t naturally connect kidnapping and popularity contests the way you do, Sara Shepard.

Least Appropriate Item of Clothing for a 13-Year-Old

An “IRISH GIRLS DO IT BETTER baby tee��.

Which I think is a tiny t-shirt? At any rate, not being allowed to wear this by your parents does not make me feel any great sympathy for your strict upbringing. If being disallowed from wearing this is considered a harsh rule, then god knows what the other girls look like.

Most Air-Headed Metaphor

“Before Ali, the girls had felt like pleated, high-waisted mom jeans…but then Ali made them feel like the most perfect-fitting Stella McCartneys that no one could afford.��

Worst Names

Spencer Hastings (female)
Mona Vanderwaal
Chassey Bledsoe (female)
Phi Templeton (female)
Maya St.Germain
Byron Montgomery
Michelangelo Montgomery
Wren Kim (male)
Ezra Fitz
Casey Kirschner (male)
Alyssa Pennypacker
Devon Arliss (female)
Mason Byers (m)


Most Mysterious Statement

“She was a nearly straight-A, four-time state champion butterflyer��

Is this some type of slang term I’m unfamiliar with? It later reoccurs on a magnet in the following form:

“COED NAKED BUTTERFLY��

Which I can only take to be code of some type.


Least Flattering Assessment of a Nationality

“he claimed that all Icelandic boys were ‘pussies who rode small, gay horses’��

Most Unoriginal “Relevant�� Background Song

“Oops I Did it Again�� whilst Hanna steals some Tiffany diamonds. Again.


Oddest Response to a One Night Stand

Texting him a haiku at 2:30am.


Most Childish Response to a Medical Conversation

“Spencer tried not to giggle at the word sac.��

Most Oxymoronic Description

Doringbell Friends, the ultra-hip Quakerschool

Overall, the book reads like a collection of teen problem pages have come to life and just happen to live in the single most unrealistic and unidentifiably elite town possible. The simplification of every example of teen angst and misery Shepard can come up with into a TV-ready series of vignettes featuring unattainably beautiful and rich heroines who are simultaneously incredibly academic and total airheads and whose lives revolve around brands and boys frankly leaves a very sour taste in the mouth. By making her creations so ridiculously fantastic the author has ensured that not only can a teen reader have no chance of seeing herself in the pages and taking comfort in relation to her own problems, but she is also presented with an unattainable standard of victimhood. What this book tells you is that not only is it fashionable and exciting to have problems like bulimia, self-harm, a tendency to drive drunk and an older man preying on you sexually, but that there’s no excuse to not have the body, wardrobe and hair of a Barbie doll whilst you’re attractively suffering.