The It Girl by Ruth Ware on March 28, 2023
Genres: Fiction / Literary, Fiction / Thrillers / Psychological, Fiction / Thrillers / Suspense
Pages: 464
Format: Audiobook
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The #1 New York Times bestselling author of the “claustrophobic spine-tingler” (People) One by One returns with an unputdownable mystery following a woman on the search for answers a decade after her friend’s murder.
I love a book that I don’t have it all figured out right away, or at all. The It Girls by Ruth Ware is very typical of what she normally writes in this locked-room type mystery. The story is told in a dual timeline. And by the end, you will suspect everyone, including your own mom of being the murderer!
Hannah meets April at her first day at Oxford and they are roommates and instant best friends. April is the “it girl” that everyone wants to be. Her family has money and everyone wants to impress her so when meek, mild Hannah is in her friend group she feels pretty lucky. Hannah is talked into getting out of her introverted life and forms a friend group with Will, Emily, Ryan, and Hugh, with April at the center of the group.
Hannah starts to develop a crush on Will, but just when she is about to confess, she finds out he is April’s boyfriend. Coincidence that April always gets what she wants? Then there are the pranks that April pulls on all her “friends.” And not funny pranks either, but rather mean pranks. Is April the friend to all that everyone thought?
In the current timeline Hannah spends a lot of time thinking back to her days at Oxford and the interactions between all her friends. She questions everything because she can’t remember that night very well and is trying so hard to make the puzzle pieces fit on why someone would want to hurt April. All the while, she is pregnant and married to Will in the current day.
On the night of the murder, she saw John Neville come down the stairs from their room and so he is in prison for April’s murder. He has spent years protesting his innocence. A reporter reaches out who is convinced there is more to the story. As Hannah takes a look at history and questions possible suspects, she could be getting dangerously closer to finding the truth than she wanted.
This one definitely had creepy, gothic vibes. And the Oxford school setting was a win. The It Girl was action packed and tense. I didn’t particularly like Hannah. I was always worried about her baby and her careless attitude towards her pregnancy. But the story did fly by quickly for me and Ware did a great job with the twists. I couldn’t have guessed that ending so that totally bumped this up from a 3 to 4 stars for me. I listened to this on audio and the cast was interesting to get to know. This is for fans of Lisa Jewel or Riley Sager.