Addison is 100% obsessed with the book series <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Gap Lake</span>: a twisty, soap opera-esque trail through a summer camp, stalked by Michael Meyers' younger, less cute brother. Teen slasher film: the book series, essentially. Addie is deeply invested in <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Gap Lake</span>, and runs the most popular fan site (GapLakeLove - snappy title there Adds), writing fan fiction and theorizing with her friends and followers about what plot points might come next. And then, one day, it all goes to hell.

I had <em>such </em>high hopes for this book. Its premise is unique and very interesting, especially for a book written for 15-16 year olds. It's fast-paced, snappy, and I honestly didn't see 100% of the twist coming. But that wasn't, unfortunately, enough to save it from the depths of Gap Lake.

<strong>Rating:</strong> <img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-472" src="http://bookishgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/3.png" alt="" width="190" height="60" />
<h2>How I'd Describe This Book to A Friend</h2>
One day, Addie receives an email from the author of <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Gap Lake</span>, RJ Rosen. She is elated to discover that RJ has stumbled upon her website and loves what she is doing, how she's engaging with the fans. And even better, he wants her to help host a blog tour for his upcoming new release! He sends her a chapter to post, and Addison excitedly obeys, gushing to her best friend Maya (whose parents are both cops, a fact that will be drilled into your head at least 10-12 times during your tenure in this book) about how lucky she is! Maya, meanwhile, just wants Addie to find an actual boyfriend and crawl out of the shadows to get some sun. Not happening.

Addie receives a message from RJ Rosen one day after school, telling her there is a surprise in store for her. Addie, who could not get more excited if she tried, careens into the journalism room with Maya, talking about how amazing this opportunity is. Sitting there, folded into a desk with her head on her hands, smelling faintly of standing water and very much not alive, is the star cheerleader: Lydia.

Some surprise, huh?

It takes off from there - Addie realizes that this murder is very reminiscent of the plot of a <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Gap Lake</span> novel - unfortunately, everyone is so tired of her babbling about <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Gap Lake</span> that nobody wants to listen. Good thing Maya's parents are cops you guys! Except they don't wanna hear it either. RJ Rosen becomes creepier and creepier, and Addie struggles against time and this faceless killer to unmask him before another life is taken - namely, her own.

Unfortunately, the last 15% or so of this book manages to go off the rails, and not in a fun way. Things wrap up in too neat, too perfect a little bow for such an epic shitstorm of a situation Addison, her friends and family have gotten into. Were it not for that, I'd have really enjoyed this book.
<h2>The Bottom Line</h2>
Addison is lovable, though neurotic and a little bit paranoid (understandably). Maya is a force to be reckoned with, and I really enjoyed her snappy comebacks and personality shining through. Everyone else just sort of exists, as a love interest or a disinterested parent. As I said above, this would all be forgivable were it not for this utter disaster of a final 15%. I had such high hopes for you, <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Copycat</span> - you were so close!

But at least Maya's parents are cops, so it's not a total loss.

Addison is the ultimate fan girl. She blogs about her favorite murder mystery series Gap Lake. Addison receives an email from her favorite author of the series, R. J. Rosen. He wants her to help him with his upcoming book. Things turn horrible wrong when events from the Gap Lake series start happening. Not the best mystery I read but not the worst. Definitely would recommend this book to a mystery fan.

~~ I received an eARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~~

I'm hovering somewhere between 2.5 and 3 stars for this one.

One of the biggest letdowns for me was that whenever there were messages that came through or emails, all that we saw was a giant blank space. I don't know if this is a formatting issue for the eARC I received from Netgalley but I feel like this caused me to miss a huge chunk of necessary information.

Otherwise the story was good. It moved well and had a Pretty Little Liars feel to it. I liked the 'life imitates art' thing that was going on and that it featured a murder that had been made to look like it was out of a book. It reminded me a little of a Criminal Minds episode. I'm not sure how I feel about Maya though. It seemed like she didn't really support Addison. Her Dad confused me too.
I was however let down with the reveal.

I don't think I'll be picking up a physical copy of this book when it releases

***Thank you to NetGalley for providing me a complimentary copy of COPYCAT by Hannah Jayne in exchange for my honest review.***

Addie writes fan fiction for her favorite mystery series. She can hardly believe when the writer notices her work and asks her to help with publicity for the last book of the series. But soon murders that mimic the books begin happening. Is life imitating art?

The premise of COPYCAT and having read some of Hannah Jayne’s books previously inspired me to request the ARC. Addison was a likable main character, I could practically feel her teenage enthusiasm for reading and writing. Her excitement at being contacted by Spencer felt organic.

COPYCAT moved at an even, medium pace. The dialogue was the weakest part of the story. It felt like an adult writing for a teen, rather than a teenager actually speaking. If the mystery aspect had a few surprising twists or a gotcha moment, I would have rated #COPYCAT higher.

Tweens and younger teens will probably like COPYCAT more than older kids.

R.J. Rosen, the reclusive author of the Gap Lake mystery series, is Addison's favorite author. Like R.J. Rosen, Addison protects her identity under Lady A when she writes fan fiction on her blog and for the school paper. When someone claiming to be the real R. J. Rosen contacts her to help launch the new book in the series, she can't believe her luck. The Author promises some surprises for Addison along the way but the only surprise she gets is finding a body. One of her classmates is murdered and posed similar to the new chapters of the Gap Lake book. Addison thinks there might be a copycat using the series to commit murder but nobody believes her and R.J. Rosen assures her there is still more to come.

Copycat is a YA murder mystery/thriller that reads somewhat like a book within a book. I loved the premise of this novel, about a serial killer who is mimicking a book series to commit murder. One of the things that didn't really work for me with this novel was the snippets of side story that didn't really impact the main plot. I think they were meant to be red herrings but just fell a little flat. I think this novel might be more appealing to the younger end of the YA spectrum, early teens.

#Copycat #NetGalley
The book is okay. Hannah Jayne is the suspense master of YA literature. I felt like Copycat has a lot missing that could have made it a little better. Overall, the story is good, but the ending left me a little puzzled over motivation for the events that take place. I will read her again, this one just missed for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the E-Arc copy of this novel. I have given an honest review in exchange.

GIven I'm not a YA, I'm not really the target audience for this book but it was an OK read - although murders involved was very a gentle mystery and not so suspenseful..characters ok but I'd have liked to have learnt more about them

Oh man, I had such high hopes for this one. In my teens, I grew up on a steady diet of R.L. Stine and Christopher Pike. In my 20s, I had a brief flirtation with Pretty Little Liars. So when I heard about this book, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. I had such high hopes for the story, but was so distracted by the characters. Addison and Maya are so painfully awkward and immature that I had to check and make sure this wasn't a story about 12 year olds. The "romance" was uncomfortable and forced and cringeworthy and the story itself didn't have much suspense or excitement. But it was a quick read and I really like Hannah Jayne's other books, so I'll definitely give her another chance.

The book was ok. I liked the suspense but the characters were unbelievable. Also the ending was horrible. You read through the whole book to know who's the killer is and then it was like , ok I'm done bye. No it needed more details or at least one more chapter.

Jayne, Hannah. Copycat. Sourcebooks Fire, 2018.

Addison loves the Gape Lake series, so much so that she has a blog dedicated entirely to the books. When she receives an email from the author asking her to be part of a blog tour, she is ecstatic.

And then the murders began.

Seriously, after that life and art imitate each other as Addison tries to find the solution to the mystery as the body count rises in her hometown.

This book will probably be plenty suspenseful and interesting for teen readers, but I figured out the solution way too early for the suspense to truly be suspenseful. Additionally, the first third of the book or so was rather stilted and clunky; it took a while for the writing to smooth out and become suspenseful. I would give this book to fans of thrillers, especially those who read things quickly and need another book to fly through as they wait for the next book in their beloved series, but this isn't a stand-out title.

Recommended for: teens
Red Flags: murder (and consequently corpses)
Overall Rating: 3/5 stars

I received a complimentary copy of this book through Netgalley for the purpose of review.

I really enjoyed this book! I loved the mystery that was taken out of the pages of a book, playing out in real life. I wouldn't want to be in it, but to read it, yeah, is really awesome! These characters, Addison, Maya, Spencer, Colton, they were all really great!

Addison's site sounds a lot more in depth then the blogging that I do. But it's pretty awesome when an author contacts you, and I can totally remember feeling/doing the same when it's happened to me, though not quite in the same way, especially not with murder following!

One line in a dream sequence that kinda pokes at mystery novels like this book is, which is pay attention to when a character shows up where they're unexpected. And that's pretty good advice, because there's a few scenes where this plays out. Loved that!

In the end, I have two complaints. One, that the information about the Gap Lake books-and the teasers that R.J. Rosen is sending-it feels like a lot is missing, and what's left is a bit disjointed.Two, that the ending was a bit short, like the reason why he was doing this to Addison specifically, there wasn't backstory there. There were so many things that I wanted clarification on, like was the bad guy who sent her the teasers the real author or not, and if not, why didn't the real one make contact with the police or something? The solution I wish for is that we could've had things more expanded. Bonus, then we would've had more book!

This book was really great, and I really enjoyed it!

In a book that had a lot of similarities to my own involvement with blogging and the literary world I was eager to see what sort of mystery was in store but instead I got a bit of a mess.

“Copycat” tells the story of Addie, a book blogger and aspiring writer who dedicates her time to the mystery/thriller Gap Lake series is given the opportunity to share snippets for the upcoming novel from the author himself but when a classmate is murdered and the crime scene is eerily similar to what happens in the book, Addie discovers that sometimes life really does imitate art.

Let’s start with the positives, as someone who has a book blog and a few interactions with authors myself every reaction Addie had to that experience was very similar to my own, including the lack of enthusiasm by everyone who happen to not be as invested as you so it was easy to connect with her in the beginning but then things sort of went off the rails.

It’s a bit clunky and repetitive in the beginning as it sets up a duel narrative with reality paralleling the fictional world of Gap Lake so when the murder takes place as a reader you can follow along with the similarities to the book within the book. In a sort of ‘Pretty Little Liars” scenario things go wrong pretty quickly and there’s more than a few moments where you are left sitting there scratching your head because things aren’t adding up.

The motivation and the murderer itself was a huge let down I actually thought it was going to be someone else so when the reveal happened it was almost too obvious and sort of lazy and the entire reasoning for why made sense somewhat but for the whole other part later it comes out of left field to the point that I didn’t even care anymore because it was so ridiculous, not to mention that we spend a good amount of time trying to solve this mystery just for it to wrap up with a nice bow and all other plot points join in that picture perfect resolution in a matter of maybe 3 pages.

I can see how some people might like this, especially if you are a fan of the PLL type villain behind a screen but for me this was a disappointment.

**thanks to the publishers and netgalley for providing an arc in exchange for a fair and honest review**