Inside cover blurb:
Litigation lawyer and harried single mother Kate Baron is stunned when her daughter’s exclusive private school in Park Slope, Brooklyn, calls with disturbing news: her intelligent, high-achieving fifteen-year-old daughter, Amelia, has been caught cheating.
Kate can’t believe that Amelia, an ambitious, levelheaded girl who’s never been in trouble would do something like that. But by the time she arrives at Grace Hall, Kate’s faced with far more devastating news. Amelia is dead.
Seemingly unable to cope with what she’d done, a despondent Amelia has jumped from the school’s roof in an act of “spontaneous” suicide. At least that’s the story Grace Hall and the police tell Kate. And overwhelmed as she is by her own guilt and shattered by grief, it is the story that Kate believes until she gets the anonymous text:
She didn’t jump.
Sifting through Amelia’s emails, text messages, social media postings, and cell phone logs, Kate is determined to learn the heartbreaking truth about why Amelia was on Grace Hall’s roof that day-and why she died.
Thoughts:
I’ve been really into thrillers lately, but never the predictable/formulaic type and Reconstructing Amelia was neither of those things.
I never could have guessed in a million years all the plot twists this book threw my way!
Secret romances, secret societies, secret lives, so many secrets! I feel like I can’t say much without giving it all away, so I’ll just say it’s great for anybody who likes an incredible mystery or stories about the challenges of being a modern teen. But really, it’s great for everybody!
Plus: I like that the narration flips between Amelia and Kate’s perspectives because it reveals the story in layers. Amelia’s was definitely the more intriguing voice, in my opinion.
Minus: There are some aspects of the plot I’d like to know more about because some of the character connections seemed a bit implausible. Also, my favorite character in the whole book happens to be dead…
If you like this book, try:
The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart– Also about secret clubs at a ritzy private school, but much more lighthearted.