Bookanista: Reconstructing Amelia

I picked up this book at RWA in the spring. Didn't think anything about it until a friend starting talking about it and compared it to Gone Girl.

Sold.

This is a little different of a book - since it is technically adult - but it is about a teen's angst and partly from a teen POV so I decided to try it. 

This book was so good, I wanted to talk about it. I loved it! 

I will say there was one subplot that felt a little forced, but it didn't ruin the book for me. It is told in alternating view points of Kate (the mom's) present day investigation and Amelia's POV in past tense (the 15 year old) time leading up to the event of her death. It's also told using emails, text messages, and Facebook statuses so its very technology focused which is different and really worked.

Below I listed my top 10 things about this book! But first what it's about.

Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McCreight

A stunning debut novel in which a single mother reconstructs her teenaged daughter's life, sifting through her emails, texts, and social media to piece together the shocking truth about the last days of her life.

Litigation lawyer and harried single mother Kate Baron is stunned when her daughter's exclusive private school in Park Slope, Brooklyn, calls with disturbing news: her intelligent, high-achieving fifteen-year-old daughter, Amelia, has been caught cheating.

Kate can't believe that Amelia, an ambitious, levelheaded girl who's never been in trouble would do something like that. But by the time she arrives at Grace Hall, Kate's faced with far more devastating news. Amelia is dead. 

Seemingly unable to cope with what she'd done, a despondent Amelia has jumped from the school's roof in an act of "spontaneous" suicide. At least that's the story Grace Hall and the police tell Kate. And overwhelmed as she is by her own guilt and shattered by grief, it is the story that Kate believes until she gets the anonymous text: 

"She didn't jump."

Sifting through Amelia's emails, text messages, social media postings, and cell phone logs, Kate is determined to learn the heartbreaking truth about why Amelia was on Grace Hall's roof that day-and why she died.

Told in alternating voices, Reconstructing Amelia is a story of secrets and lies, of love and betrayal, of trusted friends and vicious bullies. It's about how well a parent ever really knows a child and how far one mother will go to vindicate the memory of a daughter whose life she could not save

Top 10 things:

1) I felt this mom's pain. It was heart wrenching. Find out out a teen is dead has to be horrible for any mom. Especially a single mom.
2) The bond between mom and daughter is special. This mom did everything right yet there was still a break down. I think this portrayed a real relationship.
3) It was very Gone Girl meets Pretty Little Liars. And I love both of those.
4) This book is a about how small secrets can grow into bigger problems. They can sneak up on you and fester slowly.
5) If i learned one thing it is : that quality is better than quantity. The quality is the emotional connection while the quantity is only physical.
6) It brings to light the issue of bullies. That they can be girls and they can be cruel. 
7) It touched me how a young beautiful smart girl who had everything going for her could still get pulled in the wrong direction
8) It was a page turner because I needed to know what happened - like Kate. The desperation bled off the pages into my heart.
9) It made me think about how important we think work is until something tragic happens and then it all doesn't seem worth it in the end.
10) The writing was beautiful. It was different

Pick this one up if you want a break from traditional YA books!

For other Bookanista books:

• Lenore Appelhans showers praise for HALF LIVES by Sara Grant
• Shari Arnold gushes about HYSTERIA by Megan Miranda
• Shannon Messenger adores THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US by Kasie West
• Tracey Neithercott is mad for EARTHBOUND by Aprilynne Pike
• Kimberly Sabatini dishes about ROSE UNDER FIRE by Elizabeth Wein
• Katy Upperman can't get enough of AUDREY, WAIT! by Robin Benway