Book Review: "Bad Girls with Perfect Faces" by Lynn Weingarten

Wild, a little campy, and totally addictive, I devoured Bad Girls with Perfect Faces in a matter of a few hours. What a great read for a lazy Sunday!

"Be careful when your feelings are too strong, when you love someone too much. A heart too full is like a bomb. One day it will explode."

Sasha and Xavier have been best friends for about a year. They seem to get each other perfectly, to speak a language unique only to them. When Xavier starts dating Ivy, Sasha doesn't get jealous or weird about it. She's there for Xavier when Ivy blows off their plans, and she calms his fears when he thinks Ivy might be cheating on him. And when they break up, and Xavier barely leaves his room for about a month, Sasha is there for him, trying to make him laugh, and helping him do anything but think about Ivy.

Lately, Sasha realizes her feelings for Xavier have changed. She needs to tell him how she feels, but she's afraid to jeopardize their friendship. She just can't keep it a secret anymore. Or maybe just a little longer.

Before Sasha gets her courage together, they run into Ivy at a club. She wants Xavier back. She promises it will be different this time, that she'll never hurt him again. But Sasha knows better. She doesn't want Xavier to hurt the way he did for the month he and Ivy were broken up, and of course, there are her own feelings to consider.

She needs to prove to Xavier once and for all that Ivy can't be trusted. She creates an online profile for a guy named Jake, and starts building a friendship with Ivy. She knows that Ivy won't be able to resist. But she has no idea what ripples she'll set off.

"Back then I couldn't have imagined what would happen later, how everything would twist around inside me. But that's the thing about life. No matter how smart you are, you'll just never be able to imagine any of what's coming for you, not until it's right there, standing on your throat."

There are a lot of plot twists to be had here, so I'm not going to say anything more. Suffice it to say, even when what happened was a campy and/or unrealistic, I was completely hooked, because I had to know what happened. The book is a little melodramatic, but it's a book about high school seniors, so weren't relationships cause for melodrama back then?

I have never read anything Lynn Weingarten has written, but I'm definitely a fan now. I found this book utterly irresistible and compulsively readable, and the characters fascinated me. It reminded me a little of Karen McManus' One of Us is Lying with its multiple narrators and the general mood of the book.

If you're looking for a book to keep your attention on a sleepless night or a lazy day, pick up Bad Girls with Perfect Faces. It's troubling but definitely a wild ride!!