Dead girls talking

When she trips over a dead body in the woods on her way home from visiting her mother's grave, Bettina Holland is shaken for more than one reason: the body has markings similar to those left on Bettina's mother's body by her murderer, Bettina's father. The local mortician's daughter, Eugenia, joins Bettina on her search for answers to the questions raised by this new murder. The impact of true-crime obsessions on victims' loved ones is written starkly into the bones of Bettina's character, who lacks any real social connections because of her visceral reaction to push away anyone who so much as mentions her mother. The tentative friendship she develops with Eugenia is part character expansion, part thesis statement in an attempt at commentary on solidarity between women, and adds to a twisty plot. The execution of this thriller finds more success in the latter, a success largely due to subtle authorial machinations that drag everyone's motivations--including Bettina's--into question. Even seasoned thriller readers will find the open-ended conclusion spine-tingling.

Small-town secrets, dead blonds, and teen sleuths. In a North Carolina town where social class dominates, wealthy Bettina Jane Holland, who comes from old money, lives under the shadow of her father's brutal murder of her mother. Trapper McGrath, her father, was a drifter who never finished high school, and Bett's been raised by her maternal grandparents, the Hollands. Now, on the 10th anniversary of Trapper's conviction, Bett finds another woman murdered in the same way--and learns that the prosecutor from the original case (an associate of Bett's powerful grandfather) has died by suicide. Bett, torn between pleasing her old-fashioned grandparents (who employ staff and have formal dinners every night) and rebelling against them, needs to believe in her father's guilt despite his long-maintained innocence in order to live with the fact that her testimony put him away. She's consumed by her own drama and pushes away anyone who asks about the murder, including her longtime best friend, whose financially struggling mother started a "ghost tour" to capitalize on the murder and bring in cash. Clunky dialogue, an obvious red herring that drives the plot, and an ending that shies away from the moral complexities Bett seemed poised to confront detract from the central puzzle. Main characters are coded white. An also-ran in the crowded YA mystery/thriller space. (Mystery. 13-18) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.