Pretty Girls’ Back-of-book Description:

#1 internationally bestselling author Karin Slaughter returns with a sophisticated and chilling psychological thriller of dangerous secrets, cold vengeance, and unexpected absolution, in which two estranged sisters must come together to find truth about two harrowing tragedies, twenty years apart, that devastate their lives.

Sisters. Strangers. Survivors.

More than twenty years ago, Claire and Lydia’s teenaged sister Julia vanished without a trace. The two women have not spoken since, and now their lives could not be more different. Claire is the glamorous trophy wife of an Atlanta millionaire. Lydia, a single mother, dates an ex-con and struggles to make ends meet. But neither has recovered from the horror and heartbreak of their shared loss—a devastating wound that’s cruelly ripped open when Claire’s husband is killed.

The disappearance of a teenage girl and the murder of a middle-aged man, almost a quarter-century apart: what could connect them? Forming a wary truce, the surviving sisters look to the past to find the truth, unearthing the secrets that destroyed their family all those years ago . . . and uncovering the possibility of redemption, and revenge, where they least expect it.

My Thoughts

I went on vacation and wanted something I could read quickly and really get into. Having read a lot of Karin Slaughter’s other books, I was fairly confident that Pretty Girls would fit the bill. And boy was that a good choice! I’ve always been able to devour her books in about a week and this one is no different.

In this drama/ thriller/ mystery/ horror, Slaughter does a wonderful job of portraying family dynamics as well as individual character development. One of the main themes in the book is rape. And while I do not have any personal experience with that (thank God) I think she probably does a good job of relaying the aftermath of such a horrendous experience.

On that note, it was a very gory and graphic thriller novel (even for Slaughter) so if you are at all uneasy reading about rape, torture, and gore, you may want to skip it. But other than that, if you’re looking for a good mystery/ thriller/ horror, I definitely recommend Pretty Girls.

Favorite Quotes From the Book:

“She was so quiet, but she noticed everything. Her eyes tracked the world like it was a book written in a language she could not understand.”

 

 

“He said that children always have different parents, even in the same family.”  

 

Paul had once told her that there was no such thing as coincidence. “The Law of Truly Large Numbers provides that given a large enough sample size, any outrageous thing can happen.”

In Conclusion

Overall, I’d give Pretty Girls 4 starts. Definitely worth a read, especially if you like a good gory mystery thriller. If you’re already a fan of Karin Slaughter’s this will definitely not disappoint. If you haven’t read her work yet, what are you waiting for?!

Be sure to check out the ‘pin-able’ quotes below!