I had a really hard time getting into this book. In the end, I chose not finish it. The characters felt very flat, and although this was sort of a mystery I found that I didn't care about what the resolution was.

I loved the voice of the main character. Hawthorn was just witty and eccentric enough to carry the story forward when I wasn't completely invested in the plot. The themes covered many of the issues I remember facing as a teenager, and I believed that Hawthorn was in fact a high school student. I enjoyed the mystery aspect of the story, although I felt like it wasn't a main part of the plot.

When Lizzie Lovett turns up missing, everyone is upset. Even Hawthorn, who has for years, despised Lizzie. Hawthorne is obsessed with finding out what happened to Lizzie. Her methods and conclusions surprised me.
I enjoyed getting to know Hawthorn, even though she frustrated me at times (probably a parental thing on my part).

Didn’t care about the characters. The main character wasn’t that interesting and I just didn’t get sucked into the plot of the book. It had potential but it just fell flat for me. Sadly. I really wanted to like it because I heard good things about it but sadly it just wasn’t for me.

(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

Hawthorn wasn’t trying to insert herself into a missing person’s investigation. Or maybe she was. But that’s only because Lizzie Lovett’s disappearance is the one fascinating mystery their sleepy town has ever had. Bad things don’t happen to popular girls like Lizzie Lovett, and Hawthorn is convinced she’ll turn up at any moment—which means the time for speculation is now.
So Hawthorn comes up with her own theory for Lizzie’s disappearance. A theory way too absurd to take seriously…at first. The more Hawthorn talks, the more she believes. And what better way to collect evidence than to immerse herself in Lizzie’s life? Like getting a job at the diner where Lizzie worked and hanging out with Lizzie’s boyfriend. After all, it’s not as if he killed her—or did he?

There are a number of things that I really don't like in fiction - YA fiction, in particular. And guess what? Most of them appear in this book! Let's run through them quickly, shall we?

1) Whiny, self-absorbed teenager.
2) A plot that swings from serious to ridiculous within pages.
3) Random hippies and theories of werewolves.
4) Whiny, selfish, teenagers (yes, I covered that but that's just how much I hate them!

I think this book tried too hard to be too many things at once and never really managed to get just one of those things right...

And that is sad cos the blurb totally had me interested.

However, this one book won't stop me from reading more by Chelsea Sedoti - I look forward to giving her another try.


Paul
ARH

I received a copy of this for free to review from NetGalley**

I'll be the first to admit this is a very typical YA mystery trope filled book but I was hooked by the writing style and I really liked the main character Hawthorne and her weird obsession with the popular girl gone missing. I read this book in 2 sittings and will pick up any books by this author who's premise sounds good to me. I liked the writing style and I was really keen to find out what happened to Lizzie myself. Didn't disappoint. 4 stars

The worst book to be published in January 2017 most likely.

I couldn't take this story seriously at all. I even wished there were some real supernatural elements because the main character's assumptions annoyed me so much. Couldn't read past page 100.

Plain and simple: this book wasn’t what I thought it would be.

After reading the blurb, I assumed this would be a YA novel based on a missing person investigation. Instead, it was mainly about the main character, Hawthorn was using her imagination and creating different scenarios in her head.

Although there were times where Hawthorn annoyed me a bit, I truly enjoyed her character development. As the normal teenage/high school process, we are all conflicted on who we want to be and tend to always assume the grass in greener on the other side. As Hawthorn develops, she realizes that the grass may appear greener, but that is not always the case.

I received this as an ARC through Netgalley and I thank the publisher for the opportunity to read it!

I didn't enjoy reading this very much. It felt forced and wasn't a fun read.

I wish I could have gotten into this book. I tried - multiple times, actually. I was never fully able to get involved in this and that was terribly disappointing.

This book was just an okay read for me. I didn't love it. I didn't hate it. It was just whatever.

I loved delving into the mind of Hawthorn as she tries to figure out the mysterious death of a popular and beloved young woman. Teen angst, conspiracy theories, and themes of belonging and identity are weaved beautifully in a captivating story with hints of horror and other worldly beings. The characters are believable and relatable to high school readers. I highly recommend this book to YA readers who like a bit of creepiness with their coming of age stories about figuring out how you fit into the world.

*I was provided a copy from NetGalley in an exchange for an honest review*

The way that Hawthorn is portrayed in this book made everything so cringy. I understand living in a fantasy world and wanting to disappear because high school sucks. But her outlook on things made me dislike this book. Her voice as a character as not something I could relate to.

I wanted to go in and like this book, I really did but the delusions that Hawthorn has and the way she treats her friends is painful. While I did appriciate the realness of losing friends and the views of what really happens after having sex for the first time, nothing could really make up for the rest of the books. The obsessiveness she has over Lizzie is shocking as well.

Everything about this book was just unhealthy. The 25 year old going after the 17 year old, using each other for the wrong reasons. I feel like the ending could have been done better but it makes sense with Hawthorn’s obsessiveness with the situation.

The redeeming quality for this book was the ending. Hawthorn grew up a little, she opened up to things and made this kind of a coming of age tale. That made it cute. But only like the last 30 pages.

The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett by Chelsea Sedoti
Grade 9 and up
While some teens are mature in some ways and immature in others, that is our Lizzie. I liked Lizzie, she is trying to find her place in a place she has never been accepted. Lizzie is a senior who doesn't want to commit to a college and only wants to find out what happened to the former cheerleader who according to Lizzie had everything to live for. The focus is on the disappearance of a former high school cheerleader and comes up with a theory that she has turned into a werewolf. This is truly a mystery, coming of age, and the realization that we really don't know what is going on in the mind of others. An entreating book, I enjoyed it and would recommend it

Have you ever wanted to scream at a character? Well that is how I felt about Hawthorn Creely. I liked her, but OMG! I wanted to scream to Hawthorn to pay attention to people around her. No specifics, I don't want to give away the story, but if you read the book you would understand. Also, what is with the obsession with wolves? I understand that she doesn't want to accept bad things in life, but the wolves throughout the whole story became a bit much. Now the story itself was good. A girl goes missing and of course the boyfriend is suspected, but taking over said girls life? I feel like I would have loved every aspect of this story if it had a different main character. She can be very clueless at times. I was interested throughout the whole story though. I would still recommend the book to people.

Hawthorne is hoping to skip a day of school and think she might've found a reason when she hears that her brother's ex-girlfriend, Lizzie Lovett, has gone missing. Hawthorne never really liked Lizzie who is everything Hawthorne is not - popular, pretty, and happy. But now she becomes obsessed with Lizzie and her current boyfriend, Enzo. Soon Hawthorne is working at Lizzie's old job and consulting with Enzo about her theory that Lizzie might have turned into a werewolf.

Boy, this is an odd book with an unlikable protagonist. I get it that Hawthorne is struggling in her own life so it makes sense that she would be pretty weird as a narrator, but that didn't make her any more fun to read as she engaged in self-destructive behavior. I was waiting for something big to happen but there really wasn't any big twist. That's more like real life, I know, but it made the story flat for me.

Man, that's a weird book. You seriously have to be in a very specific mood to read this. Luckily, I think I was in the right mood for most of this story. It's not a traditional "mystery" about someone going missing. Hawthorn is an incredibly bizarre character who, like the synopsis suggests, starts to "become" Lizzie (the missing person) in a lot of ways. This includes getting her job and talking to her boyfriend. However, I read the synopsis as being some kind of creepy impostor situation where people believe she IS Lizzie. Hawthorn really just has some insane theories about what actually happened to Lizzie and tries to get as much information as possible. Again, this sounds like a mystery but it's really not about that.

Hawthorn was a bizarre, imperfect, and often annoying main character. She definitely had a lot of flaws and obsessive traits, but I have to admit that I was fascinated by her journey. The side characters were really interesting too. She had a complex friendship with Emily, her best friend, on top of equally complicated relationships with her family members. Her brother was a popular kid in high school that played football, her dad is a history professor, and her mom is an (ex-)hippie. There's a caravan of people that come to stay in their yard. It was a very weird situation, to be honest. I think this book is really about finding your place and realizing you're not the only person who feels weird, alone, or judged all of the time. Hawthorn really goes on a journey to find herself... by becoming obsessed with someone else. 

Overall, I'm not totally sure who to recommend this book to? Its clear from other reviews that people didn't love it because it was too weird or whimsical. You absolutely need to go into it with an open mind or else you're likely going to hate it. Because of those other reviews, I tried to eliminate all of my expectations. If you start this book with no expectations when you’re in a quirky mood, maybe try it.

I did get an arc from Netgalley to review but due to many innumerable reasons, it took me a year to get around to reading this.

Although I cannot say I missed much.

Hawthorn Creely, the main protagonist, is insufferable. She is self absorbed and vain and mean to everyone around here. The author tried to justify her behavior by trying make her look like a free spirit with wild imagination but her character did not settle much with me.

Her obsession (I have no other words) is unsettling. Hawthorn, herself, has no idea how she actually feels about Lizzie Lovett which irked me a lot. The disjoint tones in the story made it a lot more annoying to read. The dry humor and cynic in Hawthorn just made me roll my eyes all throughout the book.

To be honest, I pretty much liked every other character than Hawthorn. I liked her parents, her brother and even the hippies from her mom’s past. I actually liked Conner, Rush’s best friend, a lot and wanted a lot more of him in the book. Emily, the best friend, was also a character I enjoyed. She was smart and talented and kind.

I really wanted to enjoy the book but I was so disappointed. But nonetheless, thank you Sourcebooks Publishing for sending me a copy and I apologize sincerely for getting to review it this late.

This book was definitely unique, I was thinking it would center more on the scariness of the disappearance, but was happy it focused more on the other’s reactions to the disappearance. I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I thought it was a lot funnier than I anticipated and questioned myself for laughing at some points.
I thought Hawthorn was a great narrator. She had a hilarious sense of humor, and a was quite blunt. Hawthorne told the story as almost a reporter, which I really liked. I thought the side characters were a great contrast to Hawthorn. She reminded me of the girl who cried wolf, coming up with odd theories and such, which added to the story.
If you are looking for a funny take on a serious situation this is definitely the book for you. It had it’s serious moments, but more so was comical, to me anyway. I thought the story came full circle in a way I personally wasn’t expecting, but thought made the book what it was, highly enjoyable.