Last Girl Standing by Lisa Jackson, Nancy Bush

Last Girl Standing

by Lisa Jackson, Nancy Bush

Hardcover, 384 pages

Published February 25th 2020 by Kensington Publishing Corporation

Goodreads synopsis: 

First they were five. Then they were four. Who's turn will it be next?

New York Times bestselling Sisters of Suspense join forces for a gripping novel about a clique of popular girls whose high school friendship is marked by a tragedy that continues to haunt them decades later

***

4.5 Stars 

I noticed that a lot of reviewers of this book are giving it a bad star rating. I think I know why. They apparently didn’t read the story all the way till the end.

This book is broken up in three distinct sections. Section one features the time when they were in high school. And most significantly, the party they had near the river that caused the death of their friend, Carmen.

This section was not my favorite part of the book. I wish the authors had made certain scenes more like a flashback instead of a huge hunk of the book. The writing voice of this section was very young adult and it did give me a headache while reading it. It was kinda repetitive and annoying. I mean, isn’t that how we all were back then?

Then we jumped for a hot minute to the present day. Then before we could acclimate, we jumped to their ten year class reunion which was five years earlier. This sort of confused me but I understand why the authors did it. The Reunion section was much shorter than the high school section and we are basically learning about who is who and who they are at that point in their lives. But we also get another murder in this section, the police chief’s daughter who is also on the force, plus another man.

Then we jump back to present day. Thank goodness. I think this book would have been fine if they had started at the ten year reunion, flashed back to their youth and then hashed it all out in present time. Having all that high school drama in the front of the book is just asking for people to DNF the book. I did get a little tired of it. I mean, come on, there is like a hundred and one people playing a part here and I needed a score card to keep up with everyone. Too many characters for my taste. But when I finally got to the more modern sections, I was breathing a sigh of relief. It was more what I would expect from Jackson and Bush.

This book definitely has its issues but it turned out really well. Great mystery whodunit plot line. I would totally read another book with Detective Chris in it. 

If you are looking for a good mystery/thriller, definitely check this one out.

I received this as an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) in return for an honest review. I thank NetGalley, the publisher and the author for allowing me to read this title.