My Rating - 4 out of 5 stars
Publisher - Kingston PublishingGenre - Young Adult
Publishing year - 2020
Language - English
ASIN - B08HGY72LG
Pages - 254
My Review -
Another book from Zachary Ryan is based on high school drama, but unlike his previous trilogy, The High School Queens, this book offers a lot more than the juicy show. The group of five friends is torn apart; when one of them kills ten people in the school. The story revolves around the remaining four friends' struggles to deal with their new reality.
Ben is the group leader who comes from a wealthy family; Zachary loves theatre and is a great singer. Cass's life spins around her family issues and lover, Jarele. Lane is into poetry; Gabe is the one who was browbeaten a lot and ends up killing people. Lane and Gabe were close because they both lay low for different reasons and felt outsiders in the group.
They all were going to graduate soon, but Gabe's actions made them the topic of controversy. All they want is to live and enjoy their last days in school, but they can't. They ended up in therapy dealing with the fact that their best friend did all of these. They try to remember their last conversation with Gabe and understand why he commits the heinous crime.
They all hide secrets from each other and question their friendship. The story is about dealing with their insecurities and growing together as a group. Being teenagers, they spend more time building a superficial image than dealing with the actuality that leads to their fall. Every character is portrayed as unlikeable, but some of them come as decent ones with time.
In the past few years, I heard about many school shootings in the USA, which are tragic. According to Wikipedia, between 2012 to 2017, US civilians bought 135 million guns, 2 million more guns than the combined stockpile of all the world's armed forces. The numbers are disturbing, and Zachary Ryan portrays some scenes where the youngsters realize that shooting affects them and their parents and teachers. I just hope that part was narrated a little bit more.
I personally like the author's writing style. He makes the book fast-paced and enjoyable. I find some grammatical errors in this one, and I hope not to see them in his other books. However, the language is lucid, and if you're into high school books where characters deal with bullies, fake images, blackmailing, hiding their true selves, this YA book is ideal for you. I recommend it.
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