Bad Girls Don't Die by Katie Alender

Alexis thought she led a typically dysfunctional high school existence: dysfunctional like her parents' marriage; her doll-crazy, thirteen-year-old sister, Kasey; and even her own antisocial, anti-cheerleader attitude. 

When a family argument results in tearful sisterly bonding, Alexis realizes that her life is creeping from dysfunctional to dangerous. Kasey is acting stranger than ever: her blue eyes go green; she uses odd, old-fashioned language - and she even loses track of times, claiming to know nothing about her weird behavior. Their old house is changing, too. Doors open and close by themselves, water boils on the unlit stove, and an unplugged air conditioner turns the house cold enough for the girls to see their breath. 

Alexis wants to believe it's all in her head, until these seemingly harmless occurrences become life-threatening - to her, to her family, and to her budding relationship with the student council vice president. Alexis knows she's the only person who can stop Kasey; but what if that green-eyed girl isn't even Kasey anymore?

I rather liked this book, but not that much. It was a quick read and really sucked me in. Now, I know a lot of book bloggers out there read at lightning speed, but I'm not like that. I'm really okay with getting books done at a moderate pace, but this time I discovered my library wanted me to take this back to them - soon. In short, I ended up finishing this in about a day and a half. It wasn't all because of my deadline though. Bad Girls Don't Die was written in such a way that it pulled me in almost immediately.

I don't usually jump at ghost books, but the story here made it feel like it could happen to anyone. Alexis was your typical outcast teen with your typical dysfunctional family. Only, not quite. The family aspects played in pretty well with the story which I enjoyed. What I didn't enjoy was Alexis's attitude.I understand the whole grumpy-teenager thing, but it seemed like Alexis was taking it a little too far sometimes. She complains about The Doom Squad because they "try to hard," but that's exactly what Alexis does in her efforts to continue being an outcast.

It also felt a bit like the poor love interest only made about three appearances in the story. It felt as if the story could have moved along perfectly fine without him and he was just thrown in to appease the swoony teenagers out there. Normally I'm all for a little romance (who isn't?) but I felt as if Bad Girls Don't Die almost could have done without it.

One more downside, I predicted the outcome LONG before Alexis. I kept wanting to scream at her because she was being so dense.

My griping aside, this was still a great story. I loved all the back stories and history. It was nice to read about normal people going through something paranormal. Many times the main character or their families aren't quite normal which works just fine, but normal characters created a nice change of pace for once.

Final thoughts: I know, I didn't have absolutely positive things to say about this, but it's still worth the read. If you're in the mood for a quick spooky, ghost story pick this up and give it a go.


Publisher: Disney*Hyperion
Publish Date: April 21, 2009
Pages: 346
Series: Bad Girls Don't Die #1
Rating: 3.5 stars