I did enjoy this book, but it kind of fell a little flat for me because I had such high expectations for it. It was good, and I’d recommend, but it had so much more potential I think.

I had to DNF this book at 20%. The story was very intriguing to me, but y fortunately the characters were so cheesy yet maturely written-they did not read as teens to me, but adults trying to talk like teens. I loved the setting, and the idea of an author using the school’s history as inspiration for a book.

I am impressed by how real the teens felt in this book. They actually read like teens, not younger or older like in many YA books that I read. I enjoyed the prose, not flowery but not overly simple. I was immersed into the story pretty quickly despite having seen variations of this type of plot over and over again. The town and it’s residents feel lively and the twists and turns made me want to continue on to find out who the killer was. I think this book will be enjoyable to people of all ages and they should give it a try.

I’ve been following Alexa’s career for a long time, and this book is my favorite and maybe her best. Pretty Dead Queens is a ripe mixture of Scream x Fear Street x teenage sleuthing resulting in a joyride of red herrings, twists, swimming pools and shadowy Victorian Mansions. Oh, and estranged grandmas.

I haven’t had this much fun reading a YA Thriller in a while. Alexa meticulously places all the clues to her “whodunnit” there in text, this isn’t a Miss Marple tale where you’re missing vital pieces of information and it only comes together on the last page. That’s what makes PDQ so enjoyable—the act of playing junior sleuth alongside Cecilia (our MC).

The secrets in this small town are to die for. Are you ready to take a swim?

Ooh this was GOOD! If you’re a fan of Holly Jackson or Karen McManus this is the book for you!

When Celia’s mother dies she has to move to Seaview in with her grandmother, Maura, an infamous crime writer whose most popular novel is based on a real murder of a young girl named Caroline.

Celia begins to make friends and form romantic connections when another murder takes place, exactly like the murder of Caroline. Celia begins an armature investigation and there are so many twists and turns along the way that keep you guessing right up until the very end!

As the reader you’re never really sure who to complete trust and a plethora of new information is fed to you as the book progresses, making it an extremely enthralling read.

5 stars!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you NetGalley and Crown for the E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Pretty Dead Queens is a superb read. I was engrossed from the beginning and found the story to be completely captivating!

Cecelia, I loved her. She is fierce, strong and real go-getter!
She throws herself into the murder investigation of the homecoming queen who is murdered! She is determined to find out what really happened.
But the more Cecelia digs into the town’s secrets, the more she worries that her own mystery might not have a the ending she is hoping for.
And she soon discovers that Seaview is not the town she thought it was.

A gripping, chilling, intense, thrilling and absorbing story that I didn’t want to put down!
Finishing the novel was exciting and surprising.
I was not expecting the contents of the Epilogue and this reflects the plot in its entirety.
The twists and turns added to the mystery that we are all trying to find answers to.
 
This is an extremely well written story with an intricate plot and skillfully drawn characters. It's a real page turner roller coaster of a ride with twists and turns that seem to spin out of control. The ending was explosive and totally unexpected.
A superb read. I was engrossed from the beginning and found the story of completely captivating until the end.

I loved everything about this story, particularly how it kept me absolutely thrilled until the very end.
After being completely captivated by this book, I honestly don't know what to do with myself now that it's over.

I've been wanting to read this book for so long now. And now I'm wishing I would have have waited so I can read again for the first time.

“I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.”

Random House Children's/rown Books for Young Readers,
I can't thank you enough for this ebook approval.
Thank You for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!
Can't wait to share with others!

Love this book! can’t get over how much I loved this book. Each character was so well fleshed out that I felt like I could picture them right away. Twists from beginning to end and then more twists on top of it. This book would very easily make a great thriller movie with very little work. Please please please make this a series whether you have to go the prequel route or keep Cecilia as the protagonist.

After seeing that Alexa Donne had published another mystery, I couldn't wait to get my hands on Pretty Dead Queens, and the anticipation did not disappoint! I had a hard time putting this book down once I started it and couldn't finish it fast enough. Once again, Donne has assembled a wonderful cast of characters in this whodunit set in a sleepy seaside town where nothing is what it seems.

Cecelia arrives in small town Northern California, where she'll be living with her estranged grandmother following the death of her mother. Shortly after she begins to adjust to her new life, she finds a dead body that appears to be recreating another murder that had happened decades before, permanently glorified in the memory of pop culture thanks to her grandmother's bestselling books. Cecelia propels herself into the center of the investigation as she looks for something to focus on in the absence of her dead mother, and before long, she finds herself in too deep.

A compelling read throughout! Many thanks to NetGalley and Random House Children's for the ARC!

This book feels like a Hallmark whodunit — in the best kind of way. The town is vibrant, its citizens are interesting, and there's lore everywhere. Not only did this book have a ton of supporting characters, but they were multi-dimensional and well-developed. Overall, I really liked Cecilia (although I cringed over a lot of her decisions) and the plot kept me guessing for quite some time.

My.
Goodness.

SO. MANY. MOTIVES. OMG.

Literally kept me guessing until the climax. As soon as I hit that halfway point, I was caught up in a whirlwind of spicy secrets and insane (but in a good way) drama. My suspect list just grew and grew and never really narrowed in until the end. And then I was jaw-on-the-floor, knocked-off-the-couch kind of impressed. All the pieces were there but SO WELL DISGUISED to me that NOTHING turned out the way I expected (well except one little tidbit but I think that one was supposed to be obvious).

The major characters had me so invested. Alexa is so skilled at bringing believable teens (well, characters of all age, really) into her stories that I feel like I'm actually in a high school watching real teen drama unfold. Of course I'm an adult and I can't verify how much high school has changed since I was there, but I get the sense of everyone being very acutely adjusted for the current times, rather than reading about adults making adult decisions while stuck in children shapes.

Cecelia was an absolute treat. I never once felt like she wasn't real even though we have very different personalities. The only thing I wish I got to see more from her was her "girly" style she claimed to have had in SoCal.

Ben... oh boy I liked him straight from the start. Which made me a little biased when it came to the love triangle but come on, who can resist a boy who looks cute in glasses?

Unfortunately I can't truly remember if I guessed who was going to die. I don't think I did.... I remember having it down to 2 possible victims but I think the set up was perfect to keep me on my toes.

And lastly, I did notice a trend again in this book where things were narrated when they didn't need to be in order for the reader to make the connections. But overall it didn't take me out of the story all too much so I just carried on reading to that extremely juicy ending!

Cecelia moves to a small coastal town with her estranged, best selling murder mystery grandmother after the losing her mother to cancer. However, not only is Cecilia's grandmother famous, so is the town, for the murder of the Homecoming Queen that was the basis for Cecilia's grandmother's first bestseller.

Shortly after Cecelia settles into her new school, a copy cat murder takes place and Cecelia takes the case on to solve the murder and other mysterious situations in the town.

I breezed through this, loving the twists and turns and yeah, I love the story of a self proclaimed teen detective. Really enjoyed this.

firstly i want to start off by thanking netgalley & random house children ‘s for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

this book was a roller coaster wow. i have read lots of mysteries in my life but this one was MESSY, in a good and bad way.

i think it does far down the predictable line because i was able to sense one of the plot twist from the beginning but the other was also so unexpected, and even though i was suspicious, i was SHOCKED.

in this book we have messy characters who lie, lie, lie, because what’s a murder mysteries without a few secrets right? we also have a love triangle, small town drama, grief explored (kinda? sorta. i think we would’ve got more if you know, there wasn’t a murder to solve), and did i mention drama already? because WHEW.

the reason for the 3 stars isn’t because the book was bad in any way, i thoroughly enjoyed in and even got to pull out my playlist to fully get into the story, but i was left feeling kind of just empty? i don’t know. i think it’s because i’m a little disappointed the book went the way i knew it was gonna go. so predictable? yes. messy? totally. entertaining? definitely.

this is my first read from this author but i definitely am inspired to pick up ‘the ivies’ since it’s another fan favorite. i’m super thankful i was picked for early access of this book & i know so many true crime nerds are gonna enjoy this in january as much as i did!!! i would definitely love to hear more from these characters in a future book, if we ever got one.

also the representation? did i mention this book has lesbians because this book has LESBIANS!!! wish we got to see more of my fav duo but it’s understandable on why we didn’t.

overall rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Very fast-paced read! I found the end a little predictable but the twists and turns along the way were fun. There were enough motives and alibis to keep readers guessing and re-guessing throughout!

Thank you to NetGalley and Crown Books for Young Readers for a digital arc

Pretty Dead Queens follows Cecelia, who moves to the town of Seaview to live with her grandmother, a prolific murder mystery author who based her first book on the real murder of one of her high school classmates. When another student turns up dead, Cecelia sets out to unravel the truth between the latest murder, and how its connected to the fictional murder and the murder from the past. It is a twist filled tale of small town scandal, grief, revenge, and of course, murder.

I did manage to guess a few plot twists early on but there are enough twists and turns in this story that I was still able to be surprised by several others. And the twists I did guess correctly didn’t spoil the story for me. I was still held in tension as I waited to see if my guesses were correct, and the payoff of the grand finale was executed well enough to make me not care if I’d seen the twists coming.

One particular highlight is the reason Cecelia is pushing so hard to investigate the murder. Her mother recently passed away of cancer, which was the catalyst for her moving in with her grandmother in the first place. Her grief is still fresh, and it is what drives Cecelia to investigate the murder. As she says herself, with cancer, there’s no concrete thing to fight, no villain to defeat. But with a murder, she can fight back. With a murder, she can bring justice.

The author has been open about working on this book in the aftermath of losing her own mother, and you can tell. While Cecelia’s recent loss isn’t the central focus of the story, it shines through every aspect, and a not insignificant amount of her meaningful relationships are formed with others that have gone through a similar loss as she has. It’s an element of the story that sets it apart from similar stories in the teen murder mysteries genre.

Pretty Dead Queens comes out on October 4, 2022, and if you pick it up, you’ll have a killer time for sure.

Thank you to Net Galley for the digital copy and the chance to read this early. All opinions are my own. The book will be published in Oct 2022.

3.5 stars, this was a quick, fun YA mystery/thriller. I appreciated the author’s note at the beginning, the secretive small town coastal setting, and the Nancy Drew vibes. Like Donne’s The Ivies, it was twisty and full of red herrings. It was very fast paced and action driven. I would have liked a little more character development (especially as there are a lot of people to keep track of) and a few things were hard to suspend disbelief for, but Cecelia is a fun character and it seems to maybe be set up for a sequel. One thing kind of odd is that the first 2/3 of the book would have been appropriate for upper middle grades, but then the last third definitely leaned YA, like the author changed her mind with where she was going. Overall, an enjoyable read!

If you’re looking for a twisty, quick-reading thriller, look no further than Pretty Dead Queens.

Moving in with her infamous author grandmother after the untimely death of her mother, the MC finds herself immediately with the “in” crowd and their secrets too. A murder committed 50 years ago seems to have repeated itself now that she’s in town but who’s responsible?

Just when I thought I’d figured it out, Alexa Donne threw me for a loop and I thank her and NetGalley for this ARC.

Fun and fast paced read. I enjoyed the journey of finding out who committed the crimes. While it was easy to eventually figure it the whole, the why was more surprising. My only caveat, is that is your going to highlight a person’s ethnicity and make it a point to mention. It has to have a purpose. Don’t just say someone is a minority just to make it less mayonnaise

If you were a fan of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, you’re going to want to pick this one up. This story had it all. Amateur teenage sleuths, drama, scandals, sassy grandmas, humor, love interests. I’m an avid fan of YA Thrillers and this one hit every mark. I devoured it.

pretty dead queens didn’t grip me at first and was seemingly typical, but about halfway through lots of twists and I truly couldn’t guess who the killer was until right before the end. so 4/5 ⭐️ from me.

This was a fun ride. Even though the death didn’t happen until about 30% in, I felt the beginning was more compelling than the middle. I felt it went on a bit too long/too many red herrings. It was fairly easy to figure out both “twists,” but it was well written and I look forward to Donne’s next.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.