bad girls don't die series | book review

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Yesterday at 2pm I started reading 'Bad Girls Don't Die', the first book in Katie Alender's young adult horror trilogy. By 4 o'clock this morning, I'd finished all three. I have always been a super quick reader and when I get into a book, if I don't have any other plans (and sometimes even if I do!) I can spend hours reading it and be finished that same day. I don't think I've ever read a trilogy in less than 15 hours before though, but for some reason with this series I just couldn't stop! 

A part of me is still unsure why I found the books so addictive. They were good, yes and I did enjoy reading them but they were definitely, in my opinion, flawed. However, once one finished I just wanted to carry on with the next, I needed to know what happened to the characters and I guess that that is what makes a good book.

The three books, Bad Girls Don't Die, From Bad to Cursed and as Dead as it Gets, are narrated by Alexis Warren, an american teenager who through out the novels gets in all sorts of supernatural trouble. In the first book, her sister Kasey is possessed. In the second book she is mixed up in the strange Sunshine Club and in the third girls from Alexis' school start going missing and she is convinced a ghost is behind it. 

You might be thinking, as was I, how can one family get involved so heavily with all this supernatural business?! What absolute bad luck! That was kind of a problem for me, the way the characters jumped back in to all this creepy stuff seemingly readily after their first terrifying brush with the dead. In my opinion, the second book is the worst in the series, I just couldn't understand WHY the characters were doing what they were doing after what happened in the first book and their behaviour and attitude frustrated me at times. The third book was my favourite by far. The reasoning for Alexis' involvement in the supernatural a third time was much better explained and believable. I loved the friendship between Alexis and the ghost and at parts the book was funny. This was also the most creepy of the three, although none of them scared me. (I am a horror lover though and it does take ALOT to scare me after years of becoming desensitised, I know other people who did find the series scary.) Sometimes I found that the books were a bit too fast, that everything was happening on top of something else and I also found that, even though Alexis' sister Kasey was a main character throughout the trilogy, I didn't really ever warm to her because I didn't really ever know who she was. All the other characters I could picture in my head, but I don't think Kasey was developed enough for me to get a clear picture of even her psychical appearance, let alone her personality.

Reading this review, you might be wondering why I spent a whole day doing nothing but reading these books. Despite all of my criticisms, I did enjoy reading them and I just couldn't stop. After I finished the third book, I even found myself missing Alexis and wanting to know what happened after, if she managed to finally stay out of supernatural trouble. Because what Katie Alender managed to do really well, in my opinion, is build a relationship between myself and Alexis. I liked the characters she liked, I hated the character she hated, I fell for the boys she fell for and I was screaming at her to not get herself into danger. I really cared for Alexis and I really wanted to keep on reading, and that is what made this series for me a pretty good series! I would definitely recommend these three books to anyone interest in young adult horror/paranormal stories.

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This was my first ever book review, what did you think? Please let me know if you found it useful, if you've read the series and agree/disagree or if it's made you want to try out the Bad Girls Don't Die trilogy!