Dangerous Girls

by Abigail Haas

Wouldn't we all look guilty, if someone searched hard enough?

Elise is dead. And someone must pay.

Anna, her boyfriend Tate, her best friend Elise and a group of close friends set off on a debaucherous Spring Break trip to Aruba. But paradise soon turns into a living nightmare when Elise is brutally murdered.

Soon Anna finds herself trapped in a foreign country, fighting for her freedom. As she awaits the judge's decree, it becomes clear that everyone is questioning her innocence. To the rest of the world, Anna isn't just guilty, but dangerous. And the truth is more shocking than you could ever imagine . . .

"The best teen thriller I've ever read" - Wondrous Reads
"Told with the same "who can I trust?" tone of The Girl On the Train, Dangerous Girls is the perfect mystery" - Bustle.com
"A remarkable thriller that truly needs more recognition" - The Guardian
"A compulsively readable, hair-raising snapshot of the 21st century legal spectacle... a ripped-from-the-headlines thriller that is more than it seems." - Kirkus Reviews

For fans of Gone Girl, We Were Liars and Lying About Last Summer. 

• ISBN10: 1471119149
• ISBN13: 9781471119149
• Publish Date: 18 July 2013 (first published 16 July 2013)
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Ltd
• Imprint: Simon & Schuster Childrens Books
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 400
• Language: English

Reviews

[Angie]

=O

[Sam@WLABB]

Rating: 4.5 Stars

Wow! I now understand all the hype. I started this book, and had to force myself to put it down for food and bathroom breaks. It was quite a thrilling and suspenseful trip.

One of my favorite things about this story is the way Haas let it unfold. It is told in a non-linear way, which only added to the mounting tension and doubt. I thought it was rather brilliant the way Haas jumped around, yet kept a single thread there to show how these part were interconnected. So, although we were moving between different time periods, the story still had a natural flow.

These jumps also gave us interesting insight into the various characters. Presenting them out of sequence allowed us to believe A, B, or C were the culprit, and then later some doubt would be created due to some other event.

Not only were my emotions toyed with as I tried to guess whodunit, they were also stirred by the emotions the characters were experiencing. There was all this raw emotion that jumped off the page, and there were many times where I felt like I was truly in Anna's head and experiencing everything with her.

Aside from this being a masterfully told thriller, we also had some high school drama woven in there, along with some interesting thoughts about the judicial system for an American in a foreign country, and the role of the media in a trial.

Overall: A fantastic reading experience, which I have zero regrets about. I am so happy to have finally read this book, that I have seen on so many Top Ten Tuesday lists, and now I finally understand why it gets so many mentions.

[Bianca]

Wouldn’t we all look guilty, if someone searched hard enough?

[Nessa Luna]

Read this review and more on my blog October Tune.

I have always loved mystery books, so when I heard about Dangerous Girls, I knew I had to read it as soon as I could. When I finally started it a couple of days ago, I found myself being sucked into the story.

During the first part of the book, I was mainly confused - I didn't really get what was going on because it was all happing right through each other. One chapter, they'd be in court and then they were back in school with Elise still alive and then all of a sudden Anna was in jail. While reading the book, I started to get used to these chapters more and more, and I even started liking it - even though I am not fond of flashbacks. It worked for this book.

Like with every other mystery book I read, I suspected everyone; at first I was convinced it was Tate, but then a chapter would happen and I would lean more to Mel or even AK. I even remember writing down, in my notes, that I thought Elise could have staged everything at one point. But hey, that's what a mystery book is for, you start your own little investigation, put on that deerstalker and walk around with your magnifying glass looking for clue.

I liked the fact that the story happened on Aruba, because that island is part of the Netherlands and there was a lot of talk about Dutch stuff and yeah as a Dutchie it just makes me happy that my country is mentioned in a book or movie or TV show.

Reading about all those grown-ups (*cough KLAUS DEKKER *cough*) being complete dicks (pardon my words) to Anna, and especially that show of Clara Rose (two of my favourite Doctor Who companions, by the way!), that made me really angry because that is what happens in real life; when someone gets taken in for question, the world already has their opinion ready on this person and they will always remain guilty in the eyes of these people until they are proven to be not. And the way her friends (especially AK) just dropped her immediately after she got arrested, so much for friendship guys. DO NOT READ THIS SPOILER UNLESS YOU HAVE READ THE BOOK!! In the end, they all turned out to be right, of course, but still I got so angry, because it would have been even more awful if Anna had been innocent.

The way this book was written just made it really easy to read, I think I read more than half of it in one day. There was the normal story of course, the flashbacks of Elisa and Anna's (whose names reminded me of Elsa and Anna from Frozen too much, I was kind of expecting them to start singing Let it Go together) friendship and some important scenes that were relevant to the trial. There were transcripts from the 911 call, Clara Rose's shows, police interrogations; I really loved the way those were written in this book.

I personally loved the ending, it made me gasp and put down the book for a while. It also made me unable to concentrate on the other book (Heir of Fire, I am so sorry I abandoned you baby) I am currently reading and I think I need to go to sleep as soon as I finish writing this review (I wrote it yesterday evening, right after I finished the book). And it also made me want to buy her other book, Dangerous Boys, which I think and hope will be just as thrilling as this one.

If you are looking for the Young Adult version of Gone Girl (imo: this book is WAY better and much more exciting than GG), Dangerous Girls is THE book for you! I do suggest you go for the edition of the cover I have, (ISBN: 9781471119149), because it's the prettiest cover that this book has (honestly, if the book hadn't had this cover, I would have been much more reluctant to pick it up). So everyone go and get your copy of Dangerous Girls, and read it!

My opinion on this book in one gif: 


(gif credit)

[Kelly]

Buddy read review discussion at http://www.divabooknerd.com/2014/12/buddy-read-with-gina-dangerous-girls-by.html

[shannonmiz]

Well. Holy crap. Where am I supposed to begin with this one? I figured I'd sleep on it, decipher my thoughts. That didn't really work out. So then I thought I'd give it a couple days. Nope, still not going great. So let's just go for it, okay?

I spent a good majority of the book screaming at the Aruba judicial system. How corrupt! And I wondered how much the media really does sway opinions: Mine, yours, the judge, jury, everyone. And of course, can you even comprehend the hellish nightmare it would be to be stuck in an Aruban prison, completely alone and innocent, but without any real resources? It scared me. A lot.


I spent the entire book doing two things:
1. Staying up too late reading it because I could not put it down. Seriously, be prepared to just keep on reading.
2. Trying to guess who did it. (I never did, at least, never for sure.) Try to stop yourself from doing this. It made me annoyed with myself. Just read the book.

This book was really well written. It jumps all over the place, from the trial, to the trip, to before the trip, and everywhere in between. But it completely works. I didn't know what to make of any of the characters, except that I was mad at them for how they were treating Anna. I think that was kind of the point though, because if too much had been revealed, well, it wouldn't have been the absolute mindfuck (sorry, there is literally no better word) that it ended up being. I don't even know how to rate it. In fact, I am not even bothering, just read it!

I won't tell you any more. I will, however, insist that you read it. Immediately.

[girlinthepages]

Last week I reviewed The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer, and mentioned that it was the book of 2014 that gave me the strongest book hangover of 2014. I now stand corrected. Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas shattered me. It twisted and turned my mind and my judgement, and left me gaping at its conclusion. This is the book that will keep me up at night.

This is the first book I’ve read by Abigail Haas and I am extremely impressed by how she tackles a mystery-thriller in the YA genre. She is gritty and honest in her portrayal of what the more adventure-seeking and party-centric teenagers indulge in. She’s uncensored with the topics of drug abuse, alcohol over indulgence, and sex, and these risky activities set a believable scene for the context of the murder. The case seems to draw influences from the Natalie Holloway and Amanda Knox cases, with Anna, the narrator, and her friends going to Aruba on a spring break-esque trip that ends in the brutal murder of one of the girls in the group, Elise. Haas does a great job at making the reader feel the spectacle of the courtroom trial and the game that is made out of the evidence, combining the narrative with 911 call transcripts, text message records, floor plans, newscaster scripts, etc. Handing these pieces of evidence to the reader in combination with the narration allows the reader to formulate their own theories and speculations at who may be the murderer.

Speaking of speculations, Haas features an interesting cast of characters who all have their own motivations and potentials for committing the crime. From the group of friends to the seemingly obsessive prosecutor, to Anna’s lawyer and embassy representative, Haas creates flashed out characters that all have such different emotional reactions to the case and the outcome. Readers will questions how reliable of a narrator Anna is, and see how multi-layered the relationships between Anna, Elise, and Tate (Anna’s boyfriend) are as the book skips between past and present. And the ending. The ending. Haas proves she knows how to write a plot twist, and I can honestly say I did not guess the culprit correctly (in the end, anyways, because my mind changed multiple times throughout reading the book).

This book has such a dark tone, not just because of the taboo-in-YA topics it covers but also because Haas does such an interesting job focusing on the dangers of obsession, the chaos of jealousy, and the dark undercurrent of co-dependency that runs in some friendships and relationships. Haas pushes the boundaries of YA and the results are phenomenal, and this dark tale had me on the edge of my seat, literally finishing the novel in 24 hours despite having a full day of work in this time period, and then causing me to immediately go back and reread the clues throughout the narrative once I knew who the killer was, to go over things I missed. I’m shocked that this book hasn’t received more publicity and praise, because Abigail Haas pushes the limits of the YA genre and combines it with the anxiety of a courtroom-thriller, and the results are phenomenal.

This review was originally posted at Girl in the Pages

[Leah]

When I heard Abby McDonald had written a YA thriller, called Dangerous Girls under the pseudonym of Abigail Haas, I was desperate to read it. I thought it sounded fabulous and I was so curious as to who had really killed Elise. The UK cover is really awesome – jet black, with bright writing and broken glass and having been struggling to read Chick Lit recently, I decided that I needed a change of pace, a change of genre, to read something a bit more unexpected so I decided to give Dangerous Girls a whirl.

Dangerous Girls is an amazing novel. It’s the type of novel that totally screws with your head and your mind, but in the best way possible. I don’t read many thrillers, but when I do I like them to be pacey and unforgettable, and Dangerous Girls is definitely that. It zips along and it’s written in such a distinctive way that I’ll have trouble forgetting it. I loved how Haas set it up so the novel flits backwards and forwards and practically sideways. It’s not told in a linear fashion, but instead we can be reading about Anna in prison, and then we see how Elise and Anna met, before jumping to their first few days in Aruba. It’s really clever, actually, and it keeps the plot moving at all times, as little tidbits are revealed about Anna’s relationships; with Elise, with Tate, and new information pops up every now and again and just when you think you’ve got it, you realise you haven’t.

What surprised me most about Dangerous Girls, is that the characters aren’t really the most likeable you’ve ever met. They’re actually quite mean, especially to each other. They’re basically all typical rich kids who turn on a dime, who don’t care about grassing on the other person if it saves their skin. Typical rich kid stuff, too much of Daddy’s money means they’re not held accountable for squat, which made Anna’s ordeal all the worse, and made me DESPISE Tate. Despite, I tell you. Anna’s ordeal was horrific, the stuff of nightmares, really, and I felt Haas described it so well. I felt for Anna, so much, and I just thought how I would feel if I was thrust into a situation like it (PANIC, PANIC, MORE PANIC!!!!). Anna was such a mystery, because like it’s pointed out throughout the novel, she’s amazingly calm. Yes, she has outbursts of anger that any normal person would have, but there’s almost a sereneness to her that I don’t think I’d have in that situation.

The ending of Dangerous Girls is NUTS. Seriously nuts. So nuts that I had to get official confirmation from Abby that the ending I thought I’d just read was indeed the ending I suspected it was. Seriously, it will screw with your head and you’ll wonder if you read it right. I know who I suspected for the ENTIRE novel, like right from the off, and to suddenly be confronted with this new person as the killer threw me off guard. I was CONVINCED I had it correct. It just made me sit back a sec and just go “whoa”. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t exactly out of left-field, and it was always a possibility, but it surprised me, and I don’t get surprised very often at all. This is a must-read for any thriller fan, because it’s gritty, it’s real and it shows that paradise can all too quickly become hell on earth without you even knowing it. I sincerley hope Abby goes down this road again because she’s a damn good thriller writer (to be fair, she can do it all – YA, thrillers, Chick Lit novels, she’s a triple threat) and the world needs more head-twisty thrillers like this one.