Review: Tragedy Girl by Christine Hurley Deriso

Tragedy Girl by Christine Hurley Deriso

Of course Anne would be drawn to Blake. He’s good looking, he’s friendly, and they both bring sob stories to the table: her parents died in a car wreck, his girlfriend, Cara, drowned. Of course Blake would understand what she’s gone through. And of course they can help each other work through the pain. It’s like it was meant to be.
But just as Anne starts to feel she’s finally found something good in all the tragedy, she can’t ignore signs that something’s off. Her friends rarely let her be alone with Blake. Even those closest to Blake seem uneasy around him. And then there are the rumors about the death of Cara, whose body was never recovered. Rumors that suggest Blake’s pain is hiding something darker than Anne can even begin to comprehend . . .

Publishes in US: April 8th 2016 by Flux
Genre: ya contemp
Source: Flux via netgalley
Disclaimer: I received this book as an ARC (advanced review copy). I am not paid for this review, and my opinions in this review are mine, and are not effected by the book being free.
Series? no

Buy it: Amazon IndieBound Book Depository Barnes and Noble

Author stalk away: ~site

    I wanted to read Tragedy Girl because I am drawn to the books with hard issues. Both are bringing hard things to the table, and to top it off Anne may be in danger from Blake, either abuse or possibly involved in death of his previous girlfriend based on the ominous end to the synopsis. 

    The writing was good and it immediately drew me in. Anne is a good main character and I liked her. she was going through a lot, she is dealing with her parents passing away the last springs and she started over at a new school for her senior year so there's fighting the stigma being the new girl on top of that she has her own tragedy from her past to deal with.

    It seems pretty natural that her and Blake would connect they both have things that they wish that they can move on from .... not forget but not have everyone look at them with pity and treat them differently. They have lockers right beside one another and this allows them to have more conversations and put them in a position to have interaction with one another.

    It was the groups of girls that kind of had me thrown off at first. they seem nice but then there was also a girl who apparently has been crushing on Blake for a long time and she is not very nice to Anne at all and causes some pretty big scenes. I was wondering if she was really being protective over him or that was a whole other issue. the other two seem to include anne.in their plans and their group of friendship and I like them.

    There are few things that were off about blake. one day and thought she saw fear in his little brothers eyes when they were together and then the way that Blakes so called best friend was acting just seemed really off to her.
 

    I enjoyed the sense of family in this one. Annes aunt and uncle invited her to come live with him after her parents passed away. they really go out of their way to see how she's doing and make her feel at home and include her in their plans. I like them both a lot and even though there's times where you know they almost seem overbearing and things can seem a little awkward I really appreciate how hard they were trying to care for her and be there for her after everything that happened

Bottom Line: Good sense of family and writing that drew me in.

My question to you, my lovely readers:
Has tragedy brought you closer or further apart from friends?