Good Girl, Bad Blood – Holly Jackson

I did really enjoy Good Girl’s Guide To Murder although it was very YA. I did want to give the rest of the series a go as I felt it would be an enjoyable read.

The book in short
Pip is not a detective anymore.
With the help of Ravi Singh, she released a true-crime podcast about the murder case they solved together last year. The podcast has gone viral, yet Pip insists her investigating days are behind her.
But she will have to break that promise when someone she knows goes missing. Jamie Reynolds has disappeared, on the very same night the town hosted a memorial for the sixth-year anniversary of the deaths of Andie Bell and Sal Singh.
The police won’t do anything about it. And if they won’t look for Jamie then Pip will, uncovering more of her town’s dark secrets along the way… and this time everyone is listening. But will she find him before it’s too late?
I got this information, here.

My thoughts
In this book, Pip starts a podcast of the story from the last book. For me, this felt very unnecessary. In the first book, I enjoyed the investigation part of it. To me, the case was closed and I wanted to move on. Then this guy, Jamie disappears and Pip doesn’t want to help at first because she put too much of herself in the last investigation. She mentally cannot handle doing it again which is totally valid of course but it does make me wonder why on earth she is doing a podcast. That doesn’t seem like a smart move. I fell easily into the story, it was a fun way to meet the characters from the last book again. The book is a bit longer than the last one but there is not much page filler so it didn’t bother me at all.

Pip then starts the investigation into Jamie’s life anyway. She puts episodes out while working on the case but she says something about how a witness needs to be interviewed separately so that they are not influenced by someone else’s account. While valid, this doesn’t work for an online podcast. It’s already out there, people are already influenced. Her work doesn’t work in a podcast format. Especially when she doesn’t put everything out at once and she seriously suspected people like this one police officer. Of course, he is angry, Pip opened the gates for online harassment. It’s as if she doesn’t seem to think about the consequences of her actions. We see this when she puts an audio file online of Max Hastings that she took where he admitted to being a vile human being. I get where she is coming from and it’s wrong of course that these people get away with such things. But if you illegally record someone and put it online you will be the one in trouble with the police. She also says that she doesn’t trust the police because Max Hastings was declared innocent when he was not innocent. The thing is, that is not the police’s fault that was the courts, the judge, or the jury was responsible for that. It’s important to acknowledge this if you want to implement change.

I find it very odd that the police don’t care about a missing person. I always feel they always work hard at finding people even adults. Maybe that’s just the view I have because obviously, we do not hear about those people that aren’t talked about. I do think the critique of the police is a bit much in the book. Pip is working on an active case messing up who knows what along the way on the other hand they are not doing anything and at least she is. It’s a difficult thing I suppose. I find it interesting that everyone in her town accepts her as some sort of private investigation police but not affiliated with the police women.

This book would be so much better if we followed a new officer at the police station instead of a girl in sixth form. I get this is chosen because it is YA. But it’s a dangerous precedent to set. Yes, you can look around online and listen to podcasts but don’t go out solving murders. It is dangerous and shouldn’t be done. She could have been a police volunteer and this critique wouldn’t be so critical. I am afraid that children who read this will think it’s alright to do such an investigation when it is very dangerous to do so.

It’s a fun book and easy to read. It was a bit predictable but it was good overall. It was a fun read, not so great as the first one but a worthy sequel.

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