A Good Girl's Guide to Murder is a 2019 young-adult crime thriller novel written by Holly Jackson, the first in a trilogy. The novel follows Pippa Fitz-Amobi, a 17-year old high-schooler in Little Kilton who sets off to solve the disappearance of an Andrea Bell, a 17-year old, 5 years ago, and the associated death of her boyfriend, Salil Singh, who is said to have committed her murder. The story is written in a mix of third-person chapters mixed with first-person narratives in the form of production logs. These logs have a very special place in piecing together the final culprit towards the end of the book, which was a very exciting part for me.
I was surprised by how much this book took hold of my attention; seeing myself finishing pages in a rapid fashion second to only how I saw myself reading the Harry Potter books. The phrase "compulsively readable" by Guardian seemed like an overstatement at first but quickly came out to be true. The layout of the EPQ document, third-person chapter, an interview transcript and a production log placed together at the start gave an idea of the overall layout. The style of narration was broadly appealing. The atmosphere of Little Kilton and the way Pip perceives and lives through it resonates or at least is bewitching. The true crime voyeurism is also hard here. Pip had the right mix of her own bias of wanting to acquit Sal, while also not to shy away from any opposing arguments, more so in the beginning. It's not to the level as of an actual detective, but that's because Pip is a schoolgirl, and her reasons to like Sal is being explained in a part of the book.
The structure of the mystery has been executed well here. At various points, there are doubling-downs on particular people, and lesser so on certain people. The way in which the writer alleviates the doubt on the persons of interest is the key, and the writer's brilliance comes when she surpasses that scrutiny to still bring out a surprise. I for one had my suspicion on the least focused character as a person of interest, but following an incident in the book(spoiler: Barney's incident), there was no way that was a possibility. It's losing the return plan you always depended on as you focused on your trip. As the story progressed, and towards the end of having kept multiple people in the radar, one person emerged through, I was praying for yet another twist but knew that it was time and this was it.
A Good Girl's Guide to Murder has this feature, where you don't exactly feel docile sympathy for the victim (I was fully expecting her to be alive throughout, kept refined from the account of the hotel-owner woman..yet another stroke of deception from the writer). Consequences form the stage for whatever happens, not much so cold-blooded in Little Kilton. And though we have a perpetrator, and to give a spoiler, two in fact, Pip's speech at the end of the book reveals the sentiment here, many people had their parts to play. A child growing out to be cold has it's influences in parental behaviour, though I feel Jason Bell's behaviour to be too odd to be just bad parenting, yet not enough to have a story detour to explain an unthinkable reason behind it. Even in the case of Elliot, as I understand Pip's sentiment, and her brief understanding of his thought for his children, I understand it more so, while still feeling it to be too cruel to kill your own student who trusted you. I feel the situation has been laid here to the right extent, to not overlook what Andie did, while yet not seeing the fact that Elliot gave in.
Elliot is the character, the one who should have been more suspicious than he was. It was noticeable how his alibi wasn't exactly great at the start, and how he dodged the topic of Andie, and yet Holly could prepare the reader in a way as to give off to 'bigger' sharks in the sea, Nat and Dan for example (never really suspected Nat myself, but Dan was kept a bit under cover for most of the book, and it felt off). So that completes the arc: characters who you think are guilty, characters who have little to do with the whole situation, and characters who lay low until their part comes up.
Pip is the smart geek in the Good Girl's Guide to Murder, the sort of topper you'd like to see in your class. She manages her work well ahead, yet has these cool niches that she lays endless pursuit on. It's almost romantic with her and Little Kilton. One thing I do feel could have been done better is the role of her friends. Cara's role has been placed well, yet for a book that had scenes like the camping and the hangouts, characters like Connor, Zach, Lauren and Ant felt very underrepresented in the context of just this book, which in those scenes gave off the feelings of classics like Famous Five. I don't know whether that part is for another book, however. AGGGTM is a well-written suspense crime thriller that the young-adult community will appreciate.
P.S. Great book cover design