Review: With Malice by Eileen Cook
SYNOPSIS: 
It was the perfect trip…until it wasn’t.
Eighteen-year-old Jill Charron wakes up in a hospital room, leg in a cast, stitches in her face and a big blank canvas where the last six weeks should be. She discovers she was involved in a fatal car accident while on a school trip in Italy. A trip she doesn’t even remember taking. She was jetted home by her affluent father in order to receive quality care. Care that includes a lawyer. And a press team. Because maybe the accident…wasn’t an accident.
As the accident makes national headlines, Jill finds herself at the center of a murder investigation. It doesn’t help that the media is portraying her as a sociopath who killed her bubbly best friend, Simone, in a jealous rage. With the evidence mounting against her, there’s only one thing Jill knows for sure: She would never hurt Simone. But what really happened? Questioning who she can trust and what she’s capable of, Jill desperately tries to piece together the events of the past six weeks before she loses her thin hold on her once-perfect life.
REVIEW:
*Book Received in Exchange for Honest Opinion/Review*
*This review contains spoilers*
I am 90% sure the author watched and Amanda Knox special on TV, and decided to write a novel with a similar plot line. Oh let me add a sprinkle of amnesia, and a car accident…so much meh. I was interested in the mystery aspect about it, was mainly the reason I decided to keep reading but you never find out exactly what happened! And we all know how I feel about open ending *insert eye roll.*
So for the first 40 pages, Jill has no idea what has happened, she wakes up and then you are just observing everyone walking on egg shells around her. And in all honesty, it was boring AF, I thought about DNF-ing the book right then and there because that wasn’t interesting and it certainly didn’t hook this reader. I decided to push on because the story line did intrigue me, why was there an accident, what really happened? But in the end it was anti-climactic. Most of story was Jill defending herself and reading blog posts that people put online about Simone. There was absolutely no character growth or progression. Jill was stagnant and played a constant sob story.
The plot bounces from Jill’s memories, to online posts, to present day, where the police are getting involved. Its all very vague and Jill’s relationships with all the characters seem cold, distant, and disconnected, especially her parents. I use the term ‘memory’ loosely because how can we tell if they are real or not, she could be having false memories…you know what I want when I read a story, closure! You know what I didn’t get, closure. Even as this story ended, it all wrapped up rather abruptly and was like one day the police were heavily breathing down Jill’s neck and poof its all over and Jill is free. I don’t recommend this to anyone, just save yourself the hassle and avoid it.
LINKS:
Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes and Noble
