Queen B’s Decree: This is a mix of a coming of age story and a murder mystery. Sarah is a new scholarship student at a rich girl’s boarding school, and she’s definitely learning she doesn’t fit in when the resident mean girl sets her sights on her.
This story is told through Sarah’s point-of-view entirely, and she has diagnosed bipolar disorder. I listened to this as an audio and it was like I could feel when her mental illness was prevalent; you could hear the racing thoughts as the narrator sped up. It really worked well.
Since Sarah is sometimes ruled by her delusions, it was so hard to navigate what was real versus what was hallucination, so I felt like I never could predict what was gonna happen. When a murder occurs, it becomes a real who-dun-it as Sarah herself doesn’t even know what her alibi is.
Overall, St. Ambrose School for Girls felt like an accurate description of what I imagine happens at a rich boarding school when a poor person attends. Throw in the LGBTQ prejudice and I’m not at all surprised this is set in the early 1990’s. Definitely an interesting read.
Book: St. Ambrose School for Girls by Jessica Ward
Series: standalone
Genre: Thriller, YA
Hotness: no salsa
Plot Devices/Tropes: unreliable narrator