I received this ARC from NetGalley for an honest review. As the daughter of a cop, and an advocate for YA horror, I was intrigued by the book concept. This is Kelly Charon’s first book, making it (I believe) my third book of a new author in the past month?

Pretty Wicked

Kelly Charron

September 2016

Format: Kindle ebook
Genre: Young Adult, Horror, Thriller
Rating: 2.5/5 Moose

Synopsis

Ryann is the fifteen year old daughter of the local police detective. She’s lived her life in the shadow of her older perfect sister, feeling the pressure and observing the ins and outs of how crime is handled in her small town.

And she’s decided her one way to be better than her sister: she’ll become the perfect serial killer. She wants to be responsible for death and the fear in her small community.

Carving out her own murderous legacy proves harder than she predicted. Mistakes start adding up. And with the police getting closer, and her own father becoming suspicious, Ryann has to prove once and for all that she’s smarter than anyone else—or she’ll pay the ultimate price.

Rants, Raves, and General Thoughts

Goodreads made this book sound so much better than it actually was, unfortunately. Even still, most of the reviews are incredibly positive. This isn’t the worst book I’ve read, but …..it could use some work.

This story is….fine. I can’t decide if I disliked the book or if I disliked the main character. Instead of reading as sociopathic or psychotic, she just read as bratty the entire book. Definitely more narcissistic than sociopathic. The author seemed to have several different stories going at once, but none of them were done amazingly well? It reads a bit like the author did most of her research by watching crime shows, rather than anything substantial. She had the main character doing research on computers that could clearly be traced (everyone has a library login — why keep researching serial killers? So many people can see that information.)

Introducing the Unknown Secret Admirer so deeply in the third act (yes there were hints of it in the second, but it was so understated) read more like the author couldn’t figure out how to end the book, so she added the Admirer in later.

I feel like the author has potential, but could use a good editor and/or feedback. At the very least, there is a point where the author said “night in shining armor,” rather than “knight in shining armor.” I mean, I get things are going to get missed, but this just could have used a few more pass throughs.

Final Verdict

I AM SO BUMMED I DID NOT LIKE THIS BOOK. But I can’t recommend it either. I am, however, going to keep an eye out on the author for her future work.