4/5 stars
Gripping and full of tension.

Roxie is know to find things that go missing. Kristan needs her help to find someone who is missing as well as a phone. However once Roxie agrees Kristan ends up dead. Roxie is labelled as a suspect but knows she has to find this girl and phone to solve Kristan's death. Across town Inez is working on the streets to make ends meet, but continues to find blood on her hands. She's running from something, but will it catch up to her?

The duel pov in this book makes for a highly entertaining game of Cat and Mouse. As both characters are suspects in this case and time is running out to prove their innocence.

I loved the riddles that tied into Roxie's story with needing to find something of value. However I found some parts of the story rather predictable but other parts left me completely stumped.

Overall it was a fun read to guess where the riddle would take me, not to mention I devoured this in a single sitting. I would definitely recommend this for those who enjoy a mysterious thriller.

Thank you so much to Penguin Group for the E-ARC!

This book was a pleasant surprise.
I thoroughly enjoyed it, as it was a quick read and a good time.

Nancy Drew, Veronica Mars, meet Roxie Hunt. Like those better known girl detectives. Roxie has moxie and is willing to use her puzzle solving skills to help friends and enemies alike.
This book winds several mysteries together. Roxie must solve a riddle in order to inherit a two million dollar diamond necklace. She also finds herself in the middle of a murder investigation when she happens upon the body of a former bully turned client.

Roxie is more than a sleuth—she’s a survivor, determined to make a difference by helping others, no matter the risk. If you’re a fan of Veronica Mars or just love a good mystery with twists you’ll never see coming, this book is for you. Let’s hope this is just the beginning of many thrilling adventures with Roxie Hunt!

That Kind of Girl by Natalie C. Anderson is a gripping, powerful story about resilience, identity, and fighting for what’s right. With a fierce heroine and a fast-paced plot, this book is both thought-provoking and impossible to put down!

This book was honestly phenomenal! I thought it was nothing more than a whodunnit, and fortunately, I was wrong. It had everything. Horror, mystery, romance, police procedural, religion, historical, political, civil rights, and more! It is an absolute must read book! Can’t wait for more from this bright author.

In Natalie C. Anderson’s latest, That Kind of Girl, Roxie and Inez are living two very different lives; one is a student with a knack for finding missing things. The other barely gets by while she works as a maid and a prostitute. Their worlds intersect when another teenage girl is murdered, and Roxie becomes the prime suspect.

Told from dual perspectives, both characters are racing to find answers in what is essentially a treasure hunt (a hidden fortune is also thrown in the mix, as will happen). They are also battling demons from the past, and Roxie’s backstory is particularly compelling (religious cults usually are). Anderson has done a great job creating complicated female leads who are smart, flawed, and tenacious.

The themes in the book, including Inez's work as a prostitute, are slightly darker than one might anticipate from a YA book. That said, a mature YA reader would have no trouble understanding, and the content will likely ignite discussion.

TW: Rape & Substance Abuse

I really liked this book! It was a mystery to solve, a justice severed, a come full circle moment for the characters. A moment stuck in time between the “law doesn’t apply to me” rich people, and the people just trying to get by living their life peacefully.

Roxie finds things. Kirsten has lost something. When Kristen swallows her pride and reaches out to Roxie for help, things go seriously wrong before they even get started. Roxie’s great aunt has left some cryptic poems for her to find a piece of her jewelry worth 2 million, which would set Roxie up for life. But, Roxie is left alone to unravel the mysteries of Kristen’s death and a cold case from generations prior and how these two separate incidences are linked to her great aunts scavenger hunt.

Thank you NetGalley for the E-Arc of ‘That Kind of Girl’ by Natalie C. Anderson.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I loved this story! It's told through a dual point of view and the two storylines intertwine to solve a murder. Roxanne Hunt, our protagonist, is a high school girl who excels at finding things (phones, dogs, photos on the web, etc.) and has a haunted past due to religious trauma. She's being raised by her uncle and her great-aunt Regina recently passed away, leaving a treasure hunt for $2 million diamonds in her home. At the same time, Roxanne was hired by a fellow student to find a person, and the girl who hires her winds up dead. Determined to clear her name, Roxanne jumps into both the treasure hunt and the murder mystery. Inez, our other point of view character, is a cleaning lady and sex worker, who is also tied to the case somehow. Readers will enjoy getting information as both characters try to piece together the puzzle, and it's a race to see if you can figure it out before they do!

A dark and twisty junior white lady thriller. “Junior” only due to the ages of the victim, sleuth, and their friends, altogether a solid mystery with plenty of sordid secrets.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

THAT KIND OF GIRL by Natalie C. Anderson
Thank you Netgalley and PenguinTeen for the earc (Jun24)

Roxie finds things. When Kirsten enlists her help to find a girl and her phone, Roxie is hesitant but willing. When she finds her murdered, Roxie is pulled into mystery after mystery. Across town, Inez is working too---the streets. When she starts finding blood everywhere, she doesn't know why. She just knows she needs to hide so she doesn't go to jail.
THAT KIND OF GIRL is a gripping, dual pov book. It reminded me of a twisted Inheritance Games (JLB), which I appreciated. The mystery that was in the book was greater than I could have imagine, rooting deeper than just a missing phone and a dead girl. I found this to be a tad predictable though like the description of the book gave too much away. Nonetheless, there were parts I didn't put together, which was nice.
This book was thrilling and sad because the characters have gone through so much that it's crazy. Despite the predictability, I would recommend this to mystery lovers.

Okay, I stayed up til 1AM finishing this because I HAD TO KNOW how this all ended. This is a perfect blend of riddle, mystery, murder, and history that just really pulls you in and doesn't let go. I loved that this took place in the present day while still tying back to the history of Asheville. This is SUCH a good read and I am so grateful to NetGalley and Natalie Anderson for giving me the pleasure of reading one of the best books I've read in 2025!

A fast-paced thriller with lots of elements. I enjoyed the puzzle and the characters. Always nice to have a shorter book that can be read in one or two days.

Actual rating: 2.5 stars

I absolutely loved Natalie C. Anderson’s debut when it came out (quite a few years ago now) so I was excited to see another release from her.

Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy this book anywhere near as much as her debut. I had to double check that this was YA right off the bat as one of the POV characters is a prostitute. This is considered to be YA, but I’m not sure I would consider it to be so other than the fact that the other POV character is 16 years old. It was very dark and gritty.

I was also a bit confused at points. It took me forever to figure out what was happening with Pastor just because references to him were thrown in randomly with no explanation until later.

The scavenger hunt was interesting and I liked seeing Roxy put the pieces together. However overall I didn’t really enjoy this one. I was going to round up but I just didn’t like the ending so I chose to round down.

Roxies Großtante hat ihrer Familie ein wertvolles Erbe hinterlassen: ein Diamantcollier im Wert von 2 Millionen Dollar. Doch es gibt einen entscheidenden Haken – sie müssen sich auf eine knifflige Schatzsuche begeben, geleitet von kryptischen Hinweisen in Gedichtform.

Als wäre das nicht schon genug Chaos, taucht ausgerechnet Roxies Erzfeindin, die Queen Bee ihrer Highschool, bei ihr auf und bittet sie um Hilfe. Kristin will eine mysteriöse junge Frau ausfindig machen, doch bevor Roxie überhaupt Antworten bekommen kann, macht sie eine schockierende Entdeckung: Sie findet Kristin tot in ihrem Haus – und sie hat den ersten Hinweis zur Schatzsuche bei sich.

Was hat Kristin mit der Jagd nach den Diamanten zu tun? Wie passt die rätselhafte Sexarbeiterin Inez in das Geflecht aus Geheimnissen? Plötzlich steht Roxie nicht nur unter Druck, die Diamanten zu finden, sondern muss auch einen Mord aufklären. Doch die Zeit läuft ihr davon, denn alle Indizien machen sie selbst zur Hauptverdächtigen…

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Ein cozy Murder Mystery Thriller, der sich langsam aufbaut, aber spätestens ab der Hälfte rasant an Fahrt aufnimmt und mit einigen "OMG?!"-Momenten überrascht.
Die Kombination aus der sympathischen Roxie mit herzzerreißender Hintergrundstory, einer rätselhaften Schatzsuche und einem gut konstruierten Netz aus Intrigen und Geheimnissen macht die Geschichte zu einem echten Pageturner. Besonders gelungen fand ich, wie es die Autorin geschafft hat, ernste Themen wie familiäre Verluste und soziale Konflikte in die Handlung einzubauen, ohne die Spannung zu verlieren.
Zwischendurch rückt auch Inez in den Fokus der Erzählung, und ich muss zugeben, dass ich anfangs mit ihr gehadert habe. Nicht etwa wegen ihres Berufs als Sexarbeiterin, sondern weil sie auf den ersten Blick eine distanzierte und schwer greifbare Figur bleibt. Zudem wird nur in kleinen, bruchstückhaften Andeutungen enthüllt, was sie getan hat – ein Schockmoment, der zunächst viele Fragen aufwirft. Doch je tiefer man in ihre Geschichte eintaucht, desto mehr versteht man ihre Beweggründe. Ihre Handlungen, so schwer sie auch wiegen, fügen sich Stück für Stück zu einem nachvollziehbaren Bild, und letztlich konnte ich mich in sie einfühlen.
Der Schreibstil ist angenehm und flüssig, auch wenn die Geschichte anfangs etwas gemächlich startet. Doch sobald das Tempo anzieht, wird man in ein beeindruckendes Netz aus Lügen und alten Geheimnissen hineingezogen, das einem den Atem raubt.
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Die Story ist beeindruckend gut durchdacht, und wie am Ende alles zusammengeführt wird, ist einfach nur genial. Ein absolut großartiges Leseerlebnis! Ein Buch, das sowohl zum Miträtseln als auch zum Mitfiebern einlädt – perfekt für alle, die Spannung mit einem Hauch Gemütlichkeit mögen!

Thank you so much to Netgalley and PENGUIN GROUP Penguin Young Readers Group for accepting my request for an ACR of this book!
The amount of blood Inez has managed to get all over herself is really quite amazing.
4.5/5
Wow, this book really surprised me! It was so well done I was actually tense while reading it and tempted to close the book sometimes. I enjoyed Inez and Roxie, though I will say it felt more so Roxie’s story than Inez’s. Roxie’s storyline mixed treasure hunt with murder in such a way that kept the story interesting and even made me want to try to figure out what happened. With the story itself, I feel that certain parts got rushed a bit to where I didn’t have time to process it before the next event happened, it was very fast paced but I don’t know if that was a good thing or not in this situation.

Roxie is a high school student who is the Veronica Mars of her school, finding objects that have been lost, for a fee. Inez is a house cleaner and call girl that is trying to earn enough money to go to nursing school and move away. When a girl is murdered, their lives begin to intertwine as Roxie is determined to solve the crime.

This book is described as being about a dangerous game of cat and mouse between the two main characters and I think it could have been played up more. I did find the treasure hunt in Roxie’s deceased great aunt’s house very entertaining, but at times it felt like it belonged in a different book. All in all, this one was not very appealing to me, I give it 3 stars.

I received this advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review and feedback.