Only If You're Lucky - Stacy Willingham

 Only If You're Lucky - Stacy Willingham

Publication Date:  January 16, 2024

She read.

Margot and Eliza were best friends and planned going off to Rutledge College together.  That is, until Levi moved in next door to Eliza, causing a rift in the girl’s friendship. He was with Eliza when she accidentally fell to her death. Margot went off to Rutledge on her own where she spent a nondescript year until she met Lucy who invited her to room with her and two other girls in a house next to and owned by a fraternity.  There’s something mysteriously alluring and dangerous about Lucy who fast becomes Margot’s new best friend.  And then Levi turns up as a pledge at the fraternity….

I read Willingham’s All the Dangerous Things and liked it.  However, I  had a difficult time engaging with this novel.  The characters were not very likable, although many were quite sad,  and all the obsessing just didn’t draw me in.  As timelines went back and fourth, I thought it was a slow burn with a lot of repetition.  I kept waiting for the twists and as the story spiraled downward in the last part of the book, I finally found the tale more compelling.  The novel was a good commentary on the pain and danger inherent in the desperation to belong and the question asked in a Truth or Dare game, “if you knew you could get away with murder, would you do it?” quite thought provoking.

There are many readers who will really like this book…it just didn’t quite do it for me. However, I am looking forward to reading  Willingham’s next work.

Thanks to #netgalley and @stmartinspress #minotaurbooks for the ARC

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