I have read a good amount of this author's backlog. Most recently, I found myself really loving The Ivies--I loved the narrative voice and plot of that book. This book, though, was just a bit lackluster for me. The first quarter of this book was pretty fast-paced and really sucked me in, but once the *murder* occurred, it just became really hard to be invested in the story and follow what was happening. Also the motivation for the murder was...weird to me. This was an OK read, to me, and I definitely think if you're a bit younger or newer to this genre you'll probably enjoy this a bit more than I did!

Cecelia Ellis knows exactly what death is as she has been surrounded by it her entire life. Her mother passes away from cancer and she ends up going to live with her estranged grandmother and esteemed mystery writer, Maura. This small coastal California town seems normal until the homecoming queen is murdered, and this is not the first time this has happened in this town. Cecelia throws herself into the investigation as she believes that there is a serial killer on the loose. Will she be able to figure it out before time runs out?

Sooo...I really wanted to love this book but I just did not. First off, we have a HUGE cast of characters that we don't really get enough time with to flesh out. They all just seem the same and it was hard to tell the difference between them all throughout the book. We get the high school teenagers that Cecelia is friends with along with the people that were around when the first murder happened years ago as well as families that live in this town. It was very hard to keep track of and frankly I didn't find myself enjoying any of the characters because we didn't have the growth. Second, I figured out the end of this book about 20% of the way in and it seemed to drag out because of that. The ending did not shock me in anyway and I just was hoping for more from this book as I enjoyed Alexa Donne's first novel.

**Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy. All opinions are my own.**

I really enjoyed this ARC. It really game me a slasher who did it to the prom queen vibes. I was entertained the whole time and I really thought I had the book figured out . I was completely taken back . I definitely recommend to anyone who loves the old school 90s thrillers.

Thank you Netgalley for this review copy

I've been forcing myself to read it for a while but no, it's not working. Then I decided to DNF but I didn't want to waste my timr for nothing so I skimmed it and it was a right decision.

Well...

This really hurts my soul, but for the first time since I started reading Alexa's books, this one was hard to finish.

I want to preface this by saying that I've read all of this authors books, and The Ivies was such a fantastic debut into this genre. When I heard she was doing an homage to Murder, She Wrote and dead prom queens and all the kitschy loviliness of old school mysteries, I was so excited to get this.

But...this was a departure from her previous work in so many ways.

Cecelia Ellis lost her mother to tragedy and has to move in with her estranged, ultra rich grandmother in a small town called Seaside. Maura initially made her fortune by writing about the mysterious murder of her schools prom queen. When history repeats itself, Cecilia finds just how twisted small town secrets can be.

We got about five seconds of the narrative insisting upon itself that we won't be encountering stereotypes, only for the stereotypes to be systematically enforced ten fold. The characters were, well, caricatures. Unrelatable and unrealistic and so so very obvious in their motivations.

If you follow Alexa you know she's a fan of mystery and thriller. I've seen her talk about these very tropes more than once, and also talk about the importance of subverting them while keeping true to the heart. Unfortunately, this followed the easiest path it could find with very little twists that didn't present themselves like a glaring red flag.

IEven the prose was just. Not something I'd normally expect. This one bummed me out a bit.

I'm not going to spoil, so I won't go into specifics. I'm sure others will enjoy this and I truly hope they do. This was just a miss for me, but I'm excited to see what she does next.

My thanks to the Publisher and Netgalley for gifting me with this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This cover and title gave me pretty little liar vibes but unfortunately I was just bored the whole time and ended up not finishing at the 50% mark

WOW! This was amazing. I didn’t see that ending coming! I want to read more from this author! Despite what happens to Cecelia she still manages to pull through everything! Love it!

Thank you to Random House and TBR and Beyond for the #gifted copy of the book.

This is the first book I have read by Alexa Donne. I definitely think it read more like a mystery than thriller and it is definitely suited for teens. I thought it was a little slow paced for me and I figured out #whodunit right away, but still a solid read.

Cecelia Ellis is moving in with her famous writer Grandmother after her mother passes away. She isn't all that happy about moving since she is almost done with high school. She dislikes the thought of having to make new friends and live with someone whom she really does not know. The homecoming queen turns up dead yet again and Cecelia is determined to find the murderer.

This book is like Mean Girls but with murder mysteries mixed in! I enjoyed the story and appreciated the fact that I didn’t see the ending coming. There was a lot of characters and intermixed plots which kept me guessing throughout.

Cecelia moves in with her grandmother, Maura, after the death of her mom. Maura is a famous author whose first book was loosely based on the death of the homecoming queen at her school 50 years ago. And when history repeats itself, Cecelia decides to investigate.

Thank you to @tbrbeyondtours and @amychristinepar for the ARC copy and tour spot!

"Pretty Dead Queens" is the first book I've read by Alexa Donne, but it definitely won't be the last. I was intrigued by the premise of the book, and it didn't disappoint. As a fan of Twilight, I appreciated and laughed at the references to Bella Swan.

There are multiple suspects with motives, and it was interesting to try to figure out who the killer was as more clues were revealed. I also enjoyed the "amateur sleuth/high school detective" aspect of the book.

Although I guessed one of the plot twists part of the way through the book, I didn't guess the final twist. I was so shocked by the ending. If you enjoy reading young adult thriller books, don't miss out on this one.

*I received a free eBook ARC, but this is my honest review. Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and Alexa Donne!

This was a reasonably fun read. As an adult who's catnip is YA mystery I was excited to get an ARC of this book. The upsides were that it's fun, easy to read, and has a certain soapy-ness to it. The downsides, for me, was that the pacing was super wonky and the aforementioned soapy-ness. The first 25% of the book flew by. I liked the characters, the setting, the set up with the history of the town and the budding romance. But, once the murder happened it went from 0-1000 really fast. There wasn't any build up to the sleuthing it was just sort of plopped in the readers lap like 'this is what we're doing now as a perfectly reasonable trauma response to my mother's cancer death' ....it was jarring and I had a hard time staying invested after that. Once we get towards the reveal of the whodunnit it was somewhat surprising, at least part of it, but the motivation for the murderer was a bit on the WTF side. All in all I think teens more than adults will enjoy this, which is, of course the audience it's aimed towards.

Alexa Donne became one of my favorite authors with the release of The Ivies in 2021. Pretty Dead Queens is another home run.

In this young adult thriller, we follow Cecelia Ellis as she returns to the town of Seaview after her mother's death. Not only is Cecelia back in coastal Seaview, but she is staying with her estranged grandmother, who also happens to be a thriller writer. It is always fun for me to have a thriller writer written into a thriller. Talk about inception!
When Seaview's homecoming queen turns up dead (again), Cecelia launches her own investigation to catch a copycat killer, just like the heroines in her grandmother's novels.

I love Alexa Donne's writing style. I also enjoy her characters and how relatable they are. I have to pause here to praise Alexa Donne for using this thriller as a cathartic outlet for dealing with the very real grief of losing her own mother. Not only is her writing style and characters wonderful, she also has a way of creating an atmosphere that makes you forget you are reading a book.

I would recommend this book to fans of Murder, She Wrote and those that are fans of books within books.

I loved this book. Point blank.
Pretty Dead Queens follows Cecelia Ellis following the wake of her mother's death, as she moves to northern California to live with her prolific writer of a grandmother. Her grandmother's success? Writing mysteries, the first of which was based on the true story of a homecoming queen in the town some fifty years earlier. When a second homecoming queen turns up dead, Cecelia throws herself into the mystery--both present and past, for answers. But in this small town, secrets are aplenty, and no one is completely innocent.

Alexa Donne knows how to write teenagers. All of the teens in this book act like their age. Does that mean at times my decrepit 22 year old self was internally screaming at some of the actions? Yes. But what is being a teenager if not being reckless and involving yourself in a murder investigation? Okay, maybe not the latter, but you get my point.

There are essentially two mysteries going on, while Cecelia is dealing with (read: avoiding) the grief of losing her mother. The two mysteries are eerily similar: homecoming queen found dead in the school's pool. But fifty years earlier, the supposed culprit was caught. Or was he? The twists! The turns! I loved it. I could have done without the Luke and Caleb being in a secret relationship--the whole secret gay relationship trope feels a bit problematic? Especially since there was a lesbian couple in the book and there wasn't homophobia outside of an incident in middle school that's briefly mentioned? But I am also not a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, so I may be out of my depth here. I did call it towards the beginning, but I was definitely questioning myself throughout which is always a good thing! I am also never going to be upset by guessing an ending--I feel vindicated when I get it right.

Cecelia's group of friends are great, diverse, and very supportive. They also have distinct personalities and do push back against her at times--oftentimes I think new friend groups in YA tend to just fully accept the new girl right off the bat, but not so here.

There's a small love triangle, but nothing like cheating or a lot of conflicted pining, which is always appreciated.

Cecelia is a smart girl, if a bit hasty in actions--she's a complex person and I loved her as a character. And she likes K-pop so we're basically besties. I haven't lost a parent, so I can't understand that aspect, but my mom did have breast cancer, and I know the stresses and fears that come with that. Cecelia deals with her grief by hyper-focusing on something else--the murders.

This book isn't just about solving a murder, it's also about the complexities of mourning and how there are different ways of grieving. Alexa Donne effortlessly weaves deeper issues into her work without overwhelming the reader and keeping the entertainment factor high.

I would highly recommend this to anyone who loved The Ivies, loves an overlapping in old cases and new cases, and loves small town murder mysteries. Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for sending me an e-arc in exchange for my honest review!:)

TW: Blood, murder, death of a parent, grief, drugging, strangulation, kidnapping, attempted murder, knives, adult-minor relationship, homophobia, blackmail

I absolutely loved this book! There were so many twists and turns. I highly recommend reading this amazing YA thriller.

Oh my gosh- I cannot say enough how much I loved loved absolutely loved this book! It was my first authored by Alexa Donne but it won't be the last one.

I loved "Pretty Dead Queens," from the opening Author's Note. I love "Murder, She Wrote," and this was such a twisty turny, always keeping you guessing kind of story that fit that inspiration. The intertwining of the new murder versus the older one, the list of suspects growing and keeping you second guessing and hooked until the last second was so well done. The ending was too- it didn't come out of nowhere and actually made sense, which I think a lot of thrillers tend to miss the mark with.

Genuinely cannot say enough good things about this book, and I wholeheartedly would recommend it to anyone who would love a more modern "Murder, She Wrote," vibe or YA thrillers.

I did receive an ARC from Netgalley and the publishing company in exchange for an honest review, which has not affected my review.

To no fault of the book or the writing, this was not for me. That said, I still enjoyed it and I might reread it at a later date. The plot was original and I loved the mystery and setting, it just overall took a while to get into the story. It was pretty slow.

When Cecelia Ellis loses her mother to cancer, she moves to Northern California to live with her grandmother, the famous crime writer Maura Weston. Maura's first book was a fictionalization of a murder that occurred at Seaview High where the homecoming queen is killed the night of the dance. Since then, she's enjoyed a prolific career. There's even a convention happening in town to celebrate her novels.

Cecelia quickly finds her footing amidst Seaview's popular crowd, The friends she makes can be vicious to one another, but she can't help but fall for sweet Ben. Then, another homecoming queen is murdered in the same way. With a copycat killer on the loose, Cecelia is determined to find the culprit. Throwing herself into the investigation gives her something to do, a purpose she didn't have when her mom got sick. As Cecelia and Ben dig into the case, Seaview's secrets quickly come spilling out. Motives abound, and there is definitely more than one person who could have committed the crime.

Full of red-herrings, the ending might surprise even the most seasoned mystery reader.

Best for ages 14 and up, Recommend for purchase for high school collections with patrons who can't get enough mystery and murder.

Reasons to Read
-Famous writer Grandmother - After Cecelia’s mother dies, she goes to live with her grandmother, who is a famous mystery writer.
-Past Beauty Queen - her most famous novel is about a beauty queen who dies at homecoming, and it’s based on real life
-New friends - So Cecelia dives into school and makes new friends, until one of them is also crowned queen. She finds her dead just like the one in the past
-Solving mystery - Cecelia now is hot on the trail to solve both murders. And listen this book has multiple twists, and the ride is pretty interesting. Definitely for those who love a true crime type book!

Thanks so much to Netgalley & Random House Children's, Crown Books for Young Readers for this arc of Pretty Dead Queens by Alexa Donne!

This was a super fun read that definitely scratched that need-to-find-something-like-AGGTM itch. I really liked the main character Cecelia and her story of having to move into her famous mystery writer grandma's big house, going to a new school, and then finding a body at said new school. Cecelia is described at one point of having "Harriet the Spy ways" and that is definitely true. She stressed me out almost just as much as Miss Pippa Fitz-Amobi does.

I loved having a current mystery to solve, while also having that story line of the past murder from when Cecelia's grandmother was young (the one that inspired her big bestseller). I loved all of the juicy details of this and was excited to see how everything would play out. I wouldn't say I didn't see the end coming, but there was some of it I really didn't see coming that made this over the top in a great way.

I won't beg for this to be a series. I won't.

Okay I will. I just really hope this becomes a series and Cecelia finds herself in more thrilling situations lol

“Kids in towns like these are born here, die here. Relationships go from womb to tomb.” -From Pretty Dead Queens

4.5 stars

A fast paced fun murder mystery. I like that Cecelia for the most part felt like a real teen, making sometimes teen-like bad decisions, though some of her knowledge in casual ways she described things seemed like more than a teen would know. How the murder victim was getting her secrets certainly felt fresh along with some other small town details. I really felt the vibe of the small town. I thought the themes of grief and friendship were explored in a good way. As an adult reader, I didn’t feel like the final reasoning you got made a lot of sense; but I think teen readers will eat it up and might be surprised.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.