I really enjoyed reading Bettina's story. Her father, the Smiley Face Killer, is serving a prison sentence for killing her mother (and another woman), but when another victim turns up with the same trademark smile carved into her face and the words, "I'm back," Bettina has to confront the possibility that her dad may not have committed the crime, all while navigating the return of the media's attention, especially since she's the one who found the newest victim.

This was a good, engaging mystery; however, it's not appropriate for my audience (teachers making recommendations to students - the novel has heavy profanity and teen partying, including in the first chapter, which makes it tough to recommend from the front of the classroom).

Dead Girls Talking is a superb addition to the YA mystery/thriller genre. Ten years ago, Bettina's father murdered her mother in cold blood and Bettina was the witness who sent him to prison. In the present day, she is living with her grandparents, has recently been dropped from her friend group, and has started making some bad decisions drinking and boy-wise. And then she stumbles upon another body, found in exactly the same way as her mother, with a cryptic message written on the corpse. Is this the sign of a copy cat killer? Or has her father been innocent all this time? Enter Eugenia, the daughter of the town's morticians and exactly the friend Bettina needs in this moment. The girls decide to investigate this murder because they don't know who to believe or trust.

One thing I absolutely loved about this story is that it is definitively YA. It seems that some YA writers have recognized that many adults read their stories, so now the plots and events skew older and the main characters, while ostensibly teens, behave and have the knowledge of much older people. Bettina and Eugenia read like actual high school students. When they set out to investigate the murder mystery, they have no idea what they are doing and it shows. They realize very quickly that it takes more than a white board and a bundle of red string to solve a crime, and it is really interesting to watch them brainstorm strategy and find potential leads and then follow them, sometimes blundering into information.

Megan Cooley Peterson's writing here is just right. We spend the perfect amount of time in the beginning getting a feel for the town and its inhabitants, get enough of Bettina's back story to pique our interest, and then the tension and the mystery slowly build as Peterson weaves a twisty tale that seems to include half the town. Because the main characters are written so well and so accurately as children, when they are threatened the tension amplifies--kids are not going to pull some superhero action to save themselves, there is a real threat for them here--and by the third act you will be right at the edge of your seat.

The mystery itself is eminently satisfying. Peterson builds a strong cast and then casts strong aspersions on pretty much everyone named. When the final revelation comes to light, there is no hint of a copout or pulling a conclusion out of thin air. I went back and re read the first few chapters after finishing this and the threads hidden in plain sight were impossibly clever. Despite this being very much a YA novel, I, as an adult, really enjoyed the story and its conclusion, but this would also make a great summer read for any teen in your life.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Megan Cooley Peterson for providing me with a complimentary digital ARC for Dead Girls Talking coming out June 18, 2024. The honest opinions expressed in this review are my own.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author. I really enjoyed YA murder mysteries. I thought the plot of Bett’s dad killing her mom was interesting and I was keen to see what the outcome from that was. I thought Bett and Eugenia becoming friends was interesting. Eugenia was a cool character as the daughter of a mortician. I think the ending could’ve been a little more flushed out. There were some side characters who were a little two-dimensional. I think some characters disappeared suddenly as the plot progressed. Bett was pretty mean some of the time, but I think she had a lot of trauma. But overall, I really enjoyed reading this book. I thought the writing was fun. It kept me entertained.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys YA murder mysteries!

Thank you so much to netgalley and the publisher for the arc of this one in exchange for an honest review!

This book is about a young woman whose father killer her mother but did he?

I liked the idea of this book and the cover is cool.

However, I didn’t really connect with the characters or the plot. I thought the writing was decent but nothing special.

This book was just ok for me but I hope others love it.

Wow what a great YA thriller!! Thanks to NetGalley and Holiday House for this eARC. Dead Girls Talking by Megan Cooley Peterson was a page turning thriller about Bettina June known in her small town for being the daughter of a man who killed her mom. Half the town was convinced he was innocent while the other half are sure it was him. Suddenly 11 years later copy cat murders seem to pop up and Bett may be the next victim. I loved the dynamic of Bett and Eugina her new best friend - the weird funeral home director's daughter. This book kept me on the edge of my seat and I truly didn't expect ending. I loved this book. Highly recommend!

Bettina lives in a small town. Everyone knows that her father was arrested and is now in prison accused of being the Smiley Face Killer. Everyone knows that Bettina’s father murdered her mother a decade ago.

Years later another girl is brutally murdered and the modus operandi matches that of the Smiley Face Killer. Is it simply a copycat? Is her father an innocent man? This is the mystery that we have to solve.

The writing style was alright but it felt a bit more simple and straightforward. Which it does not have to be a bad thing. The book had good pacing and I was able to read it quite quickly. But also when things move along so quickly it can feel a little bit abrupt and choppy.

I really loved Eugenia as a character. She is considered weird because she lives basically in the mortuary but she is a good person and the one that will help Bettina crack the case.

But it was an entertaining true crime murder mystery and we have two teenage girls in a small town trying to solve it before they are next. So it definitely has a little bit of Riverdale and A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder in it.

The town of Wolf Ridge is famous for the Smiley Face Killer... a man who killed a woman and carved a smile onto her face.. and that man is Bettina Holland's father. Bettina's father murdered her mother a decade ago, and the murder has become famous in podcasts, murder tours, and docuseries. Bettina was a witness and testified against her father and grew up having to visit him twice a year for ten years as he was sentenced to life in prison.... and now the murders have begun again and Bett is determined to find out who the copy cat killer is and what the truth of what happened to her mother all those years ago was. Bett comes from old money yet she's pushed everyone away, and in order to solve this case she'll need the help of bookish goth girl Eugenia, the mortician's daughter. The closer Bett gets to the truth the closer she gets to becoming the next target, can she find out who truly murdered her mother and if her father was the killer or not? This book started off kind of fun but then just got annoying if I'm being honest. I was so tired and fed up with Bett and that ending?? Seriously?? I hated it if I'm being honest. I would have rather the story be told form Eugenia's POV, she seemed like the better character to read from. Honestly this book just kind of felt like a mess. The story felt frustrating, but not in the fun tv show teen mystery drama way but more in the I just need to get to the end because everyone here is so frustrating. Bett never really grew on me and the killer reveal was meh at best. Unfortunately this book was a miss for me, but if you enjoy small town mysteries with teen girl detectives, give this one a go, maybe you'll have a better time with it than I did.

Release Date: June 18,2024

Publication/Blog: Ash and Books (ash-and-books.tumblr.com)

*Thanks Netgalley and Holiday House / Peachtree / Pixel+Ink | Holiday House for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

I dnf'd about 40% in. I couldn’t connect with the main character and the writing style wasn't for me. I really wish this hadn’t been the case because I love YA mystery/thrillers and was so excited to read this one.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC

This was a fast-paced and engaging YA thriller. I was gripped and invested in the story and the characters. I never managed to guess the killer, but had throughly fun trying to. Our mc was relatable, something I don't always find in thrillers. It was a fun and quick read for readers by authors like Holly Jackson and Karen M. McManus

This is exactly what I want when I’m craving a YA angsty thriller!
I liked the main character, Bett, she was the perfect mix of flawed, empathetic, and tough.
I was suspicious of several characters, which always makes me want to keep saying “one more chapter…” and I wasn’t disappointed!

3.5 stars rounded up. This was a fun, fast-paced mystery thriller. I liked the characters and friendships in this one. I could picture the story being made into a movie.

It's always fun reading books with a lot of suspects. I actually didn't guess the killer in this one. It's not the most original plot but I did like this one overall. It's an entertaining quick read.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

I was very excited going into this story but it all just fell flat. The cover was what really made me read the book. Probably shouldn’t read a book based on the cover.

The plot was a bit interesting don’t get me wrong, like I was interested to figure out who was the killer. The pacing of the book and the writing were both fine but it didn’t just grip me to just continue reading, I took so many breaks in the day reading this book due to not actually caring about the build up.

The explanations to what happened felt so flat. There was so many things that weren’t explained or if it was it wasn’t explained well enough. The killer felt like it was a last minute decision reveal. Also didn’t really liked how they took to discovering the killer, like they just picked some people that seemed suspicious and went with it.

Bett felt underdeveloped, like the author just write her there for the plot, she’s felt so bland. She has no characteristics, the only one she has is being the murderer daughter. Being the murderer daughter was her whole personality, she stayed in the past and didn’t even think about the future. Like for example whenever someone mentioned her mum she quickly shut down and stopped talking to that person ever again. Eugenia on the other hand was also just there, like I just don’t get the point of her being there. There friendship also felt so forced, like Eugenia saves her at a party and they decided to have a sleepover and suddenly Bett accepts the request of finding out the killer after not even being there for two hours.

Overall this was just okay, like the whole plot is interesting but I just don’t think it was done well enough with characters being so bland and having no knowledge of anything they’re doing.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this arc in exchange for an honest review.

Enjoyable plot and characters.
Lots of mystery and although I solved it before the end, the killer wasn't immediately oobvious.
Well written and thought out characters, although I found the main character a bit too much at times.

If you like murder mysteries, family secrets and amateur detectives who are better at their jobs than the police force, you should give this a read!

Thank you to netgalley for the free ARC. This is my unbiased opinion.

Dead Girls Talking was a very cute and sweet murder mystery following 2 girls who didnt start out and friends, but allowed the friendship to grow throughout the book.
I thought that the "murder" part was so cool and unique, however the "mystery" wasnt really there for me. At times I wast really interested and just thought that there wasnt enough added to the story to give it that WOW.
I enjoyed the way Bettina was written and found her a strong main character.

Thank you so much for allowing me to read this book!

I really need the YA genre to stop making every adult a useless moron just so some plucky teens can unmask the killer and save the day. it's causing me physical pain at this point.

So much of Eugenia's and Bett's "investigation" didn't make much sense to me. They said it couldn't be the trucker who killed Melissa because of the old matchbook. But they didn't think twice about suspecting Xavier, who's even younger than the trucker. Why was the matchbook even at the scene? The killer just happened to have this decade old matchbook lying around and then dropped it at the crime scene? Did they drop it on purpose or..?

Eugenia and Bett figured it must be a serial killer but made completely different suspect lists for each victim, googled their way through "how to solve a crime," trampled on an active crime scene, and in the end never even guessed at who the killer was. It felt like Bettina was getting drunk at least as much as she was going around harassing people with questions that ended up being pointless, since they never once suspected the actual killer.

This has an interesting premise and a great cover, but unfortunately I didn't find the story to be a very engaging or enjoyable read.

DNF @ 20%
Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC!

Unfortunately I was just not feeling this one. Right off the bat, I did not vibe with the MC, which, to me, is the most important part of a book, because the main character is the one you follow the story with. Furthermore, I just did not care to find out who the real killer is; I didn't feel any intrigue around the mystery.

to say im disappointed in this is a understatement. first i would like to say is i was very excited about this. when I first seen the cover i knew i had to read it, then i read the description and was over the moon. lately I’ve been into young adult murder mysteries/ thrillers (I’ve recently read a ya series and fell in love with it) so i knew what i was getting myself into when reading this (or so i thought)

I understand young adult is targeted towards a younger audience but I enjoy a good young adult book from time to time.

Now I had a couple problems with this book.

first the writing style (yes I understand it’s ya) felt really mediocre even for the genre, when I say this I mean one page it’ll be good and then out of nowhere they throw in words that could’ve been replaced with a simpler word rather than a big complicated word whereas a younger audience would get confused by it. (even I found myself confused😭)

Second there was a scene towards the beginning where the main character was having a sexual encounter with someone and it didn’t feel right to read it in a young adult novel. The scene wasn’t very explicit but it still felt like it was too much for it to be in this.

Third: this is very fast paced. Don’t get me wrong I love a good fast paced book here and there but I felt like we just got thrown into this with no buildup or anything. One page there’s a body and the next she’s making friends with the other main character and trying to discover the killer.

Fourth: honestly all the characters felt like they were just there 🧍🏻‍♀️and what I mean by that is that they didn’t feel real, they felt undeveloped and had no emotions or anything. The mc’s “love interest” was boring and felt he was just there to add nothing to this story except being a “mysterious bad boy” who is interested in the mc’s mothers death.
The second mc Eugina was literally the best character and still she gave us nothing 😀. Her relationship with the mc Bettina was so random? I understand being in high school and not knowing some of your classmates even though you’ve been going to the same school for years but how they became friends was thrown at me out of nowhere.
In the beginning Eugina is giving and presentation in class and Bettina makes a comment basically bullying her and the class laughs and next thing you know Bettina is inviting her to a party and boom they form a friendship and start looking into the murders because you know Eugina is the morticians daughter 😀

There’s also many plot holes in the story that we never get an answer too and the story felt unfinished.

I could keep going on and on about this book and everything I didn’t like about it but I will spoil the story.
Maybe it’s because im older and the genre isn’t targeted towards me and that’s why I didn’t like it? I hope anyone who does pick this up in the future enjoys its more than I did.

thank you netgalley and the publisher for sending me a free copy in exchange for an honest review!!

I really enjoyed this story! it was an amazing ya thriller/mystery and I really liked the way the story turned! there were a few moments where I couldn't really understand what they were doing and I was kind of annoyed at them but if you keep in mind that the characters are teenagers and its a fiction book it doesn't hurt the story! I would definitely recommend it!

(thank you netgalley for this arc-copy)

Thank you NetGalley for giving me early access to this book.

I really liked the premise of this book. Ultimately I think it missed the mark. The FMC was a bit annoying. At the end of the day, she was an upper class white girl. It was kind of hard to see sympathy in her plights outside obviously the murder of her mother. Obviously I could have missed the point entirely. The “approach to justice and female anger” was painted in the relationships the FMC has with men but that’s also where it stopped until we got to our killer. I think there was a opportunity to work more commentary.

The plot was…oddly worked. Once we get to the end it’s a reveal of the truth and the why but no explanation to the how? None of the stuff she did prior seemed to matter/influence then climax of the story which was finding out who is behind it all. All in all, the premise was great but I think this one just fell a little flat.

It took me a bit to get into this story. Bettina has a pretty rough exterior she has grown up being the girl whose father is a convicted killer.
The characters especially Bettina, aren't easy to like. However, as the story progressed I did like her friendship with Eugenia. They are an unlikely duo, but seemed to fit.

When Bettina stumbles across a young woman dead in the woods, and the body is eerily similar to that of her mother Bettina starts to question whether he is the killer. As she and Euginia start digging into her father's conviction things begin to jump out that maybe the police and her grandparents are hiding something.

I enjoyed seeing Bettina realize that things aren't as black and white as she always thought, and make a good friend. The twists and turns this story took were surprising and kept me guessing.