What Do They Say About Something Too Good To Be True?

I have been lacking on my reading as of late and was hoping to find a book to get me back into it. When I thought a thriller would do just that I picked up She Started It by Sian Gilbert. This thriller is one with multiple view points from each character, Poppy, Tanya, Esther, Annabel, and Chloe. Tanya, Esther, Chloe, and Annabel are “best friends” present day, except they don’t know each other half as much as they think and they trust each other even less than that. While Poppy’s point of view is from when they all knew each other in school growing up. Poppy had been best friends with Tanya before they met the rest of the girls, they did absolutely everything together. When they get to their primary schooling years they meet the other three and immediately Poppy gets singled out when they start to pick on her. It doesn’t take long for Tanya to join the group and leave Poppy alone. After years of torment they graduate and head off into their lives. Ten years later each girl receives an invitation for an all-expenses paid trip from none other than Poppy. This is actually a bachelorette party for Poppy who has asked each of them to be her bride’s maids. The group decides that they can’t pass up this opportunity for a vacation on a private island for free. They each have their worries and doubts on Poppy’s intentions and how they should handle the past. When they see Poppy they are shocked on how good she looks, confident she is, and how she seems to be running the show. Poppy continues to make comments about the past and even taunts them with a scavenger hunt they do. They quickly learn the past does not stay in the past forever and everyone has something to hide. I really wanted to like this book, like I said I was trying to get out of a slump, but I just kept getting bored with it. I found the group of girls were cruel just to be cruel and it felt very cliché, like we’ve seen and heard this before. The “mean girls” story has been told so many times now, but this one just doesn’t stick out, the bullied in high school revenge plot seems overdone. They do some shocking things, but it feels forced because the author is looking for that “wow” factor. The twists and turns took so long to get to that it was easier to guess them. The thriller feeling I was looking for just didn’t get satisfied.

Favorite Quotes – “In reality, we all stick together because we know no one else would ever understand what we did in the past. And the trouble is, we’ve all become so convinced that what we did was alright that we’ve accepted an invitation from the very woman we did it to.”

“Why do I always like to pick at people’s insecurities? I know I’m doing it, in fact that’s almost why I do it in the first place. There’s something about watching someone’s face fall and know you’re the one that caused it, that you’re in the stronger position.”

“There’s something so fascinating about the way several psychological disorders can be seen through scans and tests, physical proof of the genuine impact they can have.”

“Those bitches might have started it, but I sure as hell finished it.”