Intricate psychological thriller!

The It Girl by Ruth Ware 

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At times the tension in “It Girl” is high to the point of breathlessness. Hannah Jones is beyond devastated over her friend April Clarke-Clivedon’s brutal murder. Anguished because this was her friend, anguished because it was Hannah’s evidence that had college porter John Neville had been imprisoned for life.  Anguished that Neville maintains his innocence, anguished because of the ‘what if’s” if Hannah was wrong about Neville. And dare I say on another plane entirely the fact that she’s married to her dead best friend’s boyfriend. 

The story moves between the time a group of young things from various walks of life first meet at Pelham College Oxford University to the current times, some ten years later. We know there’s more to come. Hannah has retreated away from Oxford, from being a top student, to living and working in Edinburgh away from the spotlight, suffering severe anxiety and depression. Married to Will she maintains a fragile stability but every time The Pelham Strangler murder is revisited in the headlines she’s thrown. Now a revisiting and a plea from one of their youthful cohort to talk with a journalist about the events of that time has thrown her. Pregnant and anxious, with Will disapproving of any discussion, where the past and present are about to collide, the outcome is anyone’s guess. But make no doubt, collision is unavoidable.

Ware’s writing is tight although at times I wanted less of the slow buildup. At times I just wasn’t wasn sympatico with Hannah, and one had to wonder if April was simply a troubled rich kid or super devious. And then there’s April’s ex-boyfriend Will, now Hannah’s husband. Hmm! 

The technical transition between the ‘past’ and the ‘now’ is clear and precise and not at all bothersome.

Another complex mystery from Ware. The breadcrumbs as always are scattered to the four winds, but the hunt is intriguing!

A Gallery Books ARC via NetGalley. Many thanks to the author and publisher.