Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

About two weeks ago, I received a lovely package of three Spring ARCs, and Testimony From Your Perfect Girl was among them! I have been intrigued by this one for a while, especially since she wrote The Descendants (a popular book that I have heard great things about). Since this one was only 250 pages, I actually ended up reading it in one day!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Annie Tripp has everything she needs–Italian sweaters, vintage chandelier earrings, and elite ice skating lessons–but all that changes when her father is accused of scamming hundreds of people out of their investments. Annie knows her dad wasn’t at fault, but she and her brother are exiled to their estranged aunt and uncle’s house in a run-down part of Breckenridge–until the trial blows over.
Life with her new family isn’t quite up to Annie’s usual standard of living, but surprisingly, pretending to be someone else offers a freedom she’s never known. As Annie starts to make real friends for the first time, she realizes she has more in common with her aunt and uncle than she ever wanted to know. As the family’s lies begin to crumble and truths demand consequences, Annie must decide which secrets need to see the light of day . . . and which are worth keeping.

Unfortunately, this book is definitely not one of my new favourites.

Before I start this review, I want to preface that this book should be identified as New Adult, rather than Young Adult. There are a lot of mature events that go on in this novel, which may not be suitable for pre-teen and/or young-teen readers.

Now that you have been warned, let’s cut to the chase. This book basically entered around a minor sex scene that takes place around page 130. This scene set up a lot of the crazy things that happen to Annie, the protagonist, as this leads to her becoming more comfortable with her Aunt and Uncle due to the dialogue that results from that event. While I am not exactly a prude, I still think that that scene was so weird and extremely cringe-worthy.

I also really didn’t like any of the characters. I appreciated Annie’s aunt and uncle, as I found them very real and down-to-earth. However, I never found myself rooting for Annie or Jay (Annie’s brother). I didn’t really care about what happened to them, and was more so reading to see how the story would conclude overall. Obviously, I hated Annie and Jay’s parents, but actually ended up hating their Mother more than their Father (even though their father was the reason they were put in such a mess).

The only thing that I really enjoyed about the book was the setting. I loved the wintery scenes that took place, and all of the scenes that took place in their Uncle’s restaurant. While I am not one that loves snow, I loved when Annie was exploring the snowy conditions of the city, and thought that the world building was pretty good.

I also LOVED the epilogue! It was honestly my favourite scene in the entire book.

Overall, I gave this book 2.25/5 stars. Thanks to Penguin Teen Canada for the ARC!

Good Night Book Owls!