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The St. Ambrose School for Girls
The newest student at the elite St. Ambrose School for Girls must navigate a sinister social clique and the treachery of her own mind in this “complex psychological thriller” (CrimeReads) that is perfect for fans of Megan Miranda and Layne Fargo.
When Sarah Taylor arrives at the exclusive St. Ambrose School, she’s carrying more baggage than just her suitcase. She knows she’s not like the other girls—if her shabby, all-black, non-designer clothes don’t give that away, the bottle of lithium hidden in her desk drawer sure does.
St. Ambrose’s queen bee, Greta Stanhope, picks Sarah as a target from day one, and she is relentless in making sure Sarah knows what the pecking order is. Thankfully, Sarah makes an ally out of her roommate Ellen “Strots” Strotsberry, a cigarette-smoking, devil-may-care athlete who takes no bullcrap. Also down the hall is Nick Hollis, the devastatingly handsome RA, and the object of more than one St. Ambrose student’s fantasies. Between Strots and Nick, Sarah hopes she can make it through the semester, dealing with not only her schoolwork and a recent bipolar diagnosis, but Greta’s increasingly malicious pranks.
Sarah is determined not to give Greta the satisfaction of breaking her. But when scandal unfolds, and someone ends up dead, her world threatens to unravel in ways she could never have imagined in this delicious, “riveting, twisty read” (Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author) that will stay with you long after you turn the last page.
When Sarah Taylor arrives at the exclusive St. Ambrose School, she’s carrying more baggage than just her suitcase. She knows she’s not like the other girls—if her shabby, all-black, non-designer clothes don’t give that away, the bottle of lithium hidden in her desk drawer sure does.
St. Ambrose’s queen bee, Greta Stanhope, picks Sarah as a target from day one, and she is relentless in making sure Sarah knows what the pecking order is. Thankfully, Sarah makes an ally out of her roommate Ellen “Strots” Strotsberry, a cigarette-smoking, devil-may-care athlete who takes no bullcrap. Also down the hall is Nick Hollis, the devastatingly handsome RA, and the object of more than one St. Ambrose student’s fantasies. Between Strots and Nick, Sarah hopes she can make it through the semester, dealing with not only her schoolwork and a recent bipolar diagnosis, but Greta’s increasingly malicious pranks.
Sarah is determined not to give Greta the satisfaction of breaking her. But when scandal unfolds, and someone ends up dead, her world threatens to unravel in ways she could never have imagined in this delicious, “riveting, twisty read” (Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author) that will stay with you long after you turn the last page.
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First published July 11, 2023
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About the author
Jessica Ward
1 book166 followersJessica Ward lives in the South with her incredibly supportive husband and her beloved golden retriever. After graduating from law school, she began working in health care in Boston and spent many years as chief of staff for one of the premier academic medical centres in the nation.
She also writes as J.R. Ward and is the author of the Black Dagger Brotherhood and Fallen Angels series.
She also writes as J.R. Ward and is the author of the Black Dagger Brotherhood and Fallen Angels series.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,297 reviews
March 29, 2024
Happy release day!📚🎈
Slow-burn dark academia with a realistic approach to bullying, depression, suicide, and bipolar disorder. These are truly sensitive subjects that may disturb you as the tension and mistreatment from the mean girls of the school escalate. Oh boy, you'll want to punch each of those bad *itches so bad and protect Sarah from their dirty schemes.
The mistreatment of LGBTQ students also made me incredibly angry!
If you cannot handle these triggering subjects, this book may not be a great fit for you.
I enjoyed Sarah's characterization and her journey towards finding her inner strength, especially considering her struggles with depression and bipolar disorder. Her inner fight felt genuine, and I truly appreciated her personal growth and resilience more than the book's murder mystery.
Overall, it was a promising, thrilling, and psychologically intense dark academia read that I mostly enjoyed. I'm rounding up my 3.5 stars to 4 for its realistic portrayal, even though I despised those mean girls, starting with Greta!
Special thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for providing me with a digital review copy in exchange for my honest thoughts.
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Slow-burn dark academia with a realistic approach to bullying, depression, suicide, and bipolar disorder. These are truly sensitive subjects that may disturb you as the tension and mistreatment from the mean girls of the school escalate. Oh boy, you'll want to punch each of those bad *itches so bad and protect Sarah from their dirty schemes.
The mistreatment of LGBTQ students also made me incredibly angry!
If you cannot handle these triggering subjects, this book may not be a great fit for you.
I enjoyed Sarah's characterization and her journey towards finding her inner strength, especially considering her struggles with depression and bipolar disorder. Her inner fight felt genuine, and I truly appreciated her personal growth and resilience more than the book's murder mystery.
Overall, it was a promising, thrilling, and psychologically intense dark academia read that I mostly enjoyed. I'm rounding up my 3.5 stars to 4 for its realistic portrayal, even though I despised those mean girls, starting with Greta!
Special thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for providing me with a digital review copy in exchange for my honest thoughts.
Follow me on medium.com to read my articles about books, movies, streaming series, astrology:
medium blog
June 11, 2023
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Of all the things my illness can take from me, I never expected it would be my credibility. And certainly not when such a thing matters most.
I was really surprised to find that this is author J.R. Ward. Please don't hate on me...her paranormal romance stuff isn't my kind of thing. BUT...she hits it out of the park with this literary thriller that is also part coming of age. I love a good dark academia tale, especially one with a mean girls twist...Boy, we ladies sure can be vicious.
Sarah, our main character is infatuated with the RA/English teacher at her new boarding school, until he does something she doesn't agree with. She is a very young fifteen-year-old and her fantasies/delusions about him, death and many other teenage angst issues were very real to her. I loved the way the author wrote these scenes. Sarah has a lot of self-loathing and the narrative of this one was very complex because Sarah is bipolar, her illness is a character with its own personality, thoughts and feelings. There is, of course, a death but we don't know who the killer is and there are a lot of red herrings along the way. This is a slow burn but I found it worked here, with the gothic vibes and unreliable narrator. It added to the tension and helped me to get to know the characters.
I liked this book a lot more than most as many reviewers have said the mental illness aspect isn't realistic. I am here to tell you, it is. People with severe bipolar disorder can and do behave like Sarah. She was portrayed very realistically as were her behaviours and the limits of her medications. Well done to Jessica Ward for branching out to thrillers.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the Advance Readers Copy.
Of all the things my illness can take from me, I never expected it would be my credibility. And certainly not when such a thing matters most.
I was really surprised to find that this is author J.R. Ward. Please don't hate on me...her paranormal romance stuff isn't my kind of thing. BUT...she hits it out of the park with this literary thriller that is also part coming of age. I love a good dark academia tale, especially one with a mean girls twist...Boy, we ladies sure can be vicious.
Sarah, our main character is infatuated with the RA/English teacher at her new boarding school, until he does something she doesn't agree with. She is a very young fifteen-year-old and her fantasies/delusions about him, death and many other teenage angst issues were very real to her. I loved the way the author wrote these scenes. Sarah has a lot of self-loathing and the narrative of this one was very complex because Sarah is bipolar, her illness is a character with its own personality, thoughts and feelings. There is, of course, a death but we don't know who the killer is and there are a lot of red herrings along the way. This is a slow burn but I found it worked here, with the gothic vibes and unreliable narrator. It added to the tension and helped me to get to know the characters.
I liked this book a lot more than most as many reviewers have said the mental illness aspect isn't realistic. I am here to tell you, it is. People with severe bipolar disorder can and do behave like Sarah. She was portrayed very realistically as were her behaviours and the limits of her medications. Well done to Jessica Ward for branching out to thrillers.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the Advance Readers Copy.
to-read-maybe
January 1, 2023my wish for 2023 is for publishers to stop comparing every single upcoming academia-adjacent title to The Secret History because chances are, beyond the academia trappings, they have nothing in common with it.
July 11, 2023
Jessica Ward’s undoubtedly a more than capable writer but I found myself unable to fully connect with her variation on the “mean girls” school story. Set in the early 1990s, the novel’s narrated by Sarah Taylor. Sarah’s a scholarship girl who’s reluctantly enrolled at an exclusive, New England boarding school. The school community is dominated by predatory, wealthy Greta and her loyal entourage, and it’s not long before Sarah is singled out as one of their prey. Sarah is a potentially interesting character but I found the portrayal of her experiences with a form of bipolar disorder a little heavy-handed and many of the supporting characters tipped towards stereotypical – a prime example was the misunderstood, sporty, closeted lesbian. Overall, it wasn’t clear to me what kind of novel this was actually intended to be, it started out as an apparent attempt to overcome the conventions of the subgenre - introspective, punctuated by detailed literary references and wry observations - but then morphed into a rather melodramatic crime story that I found less than convincing. Another major stumbling block for me was the incredibly slow pace, I felt there was far too much padding in the earlier sections –repeated information about Sarah and her fragile, mental state - while the villainous Greta was too thinly drawn – and the contrast between Greta’s role as exploiter and her exploitation by a male staff member was awkwardly framed. It’s an interesting piece and I appreciated its ambitions but ultimately just not the right fit for me.
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Little Brown for an ARC
Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Little Brown for an ARC
dnf
August 23, 2023DNF @about 35% I just kinda hate her and also why is there a male RA at this all girl’s high school? And I’m sure admin is going to be SHOCKED that he’s sleeping with students too
November 29, 2023
This isn’t a bad book, but based on the description I was expecting a thriller and I did not consider this one a thriller. It’s a slow burn coming of age drama where someone happens to be killed. I also feel like it should be said that this book is incredibly sad. The main character doesn’t have a lot of luck as an “outsider weirdo” person with bipolar who doesn’t fit in with anyone at the private all girls school in the 90’s. The writing was good, but I had to push myself to finish the story. The last 25% moved more quickly, but it took a lot to get to me 75% done. Sarah is starting school at a private all girls school after her mother submits an essay she wrote and she is granted a scholarship. Unfortunately for her she doesn’t fit in with her all black non-designer clothing and one pretty and popular girl Greta seems to take an instant disliking to her and picks on her consistently. But as the semester goes on the drama amps up ending in someone dying.
September 19, 2023
God! This book was boring.
Jessica Ward normally writes under the name JR Ward but if I didn't know that I would have assumed this book was a debut. The plotting moved at a snails pace. The characters were cardboard cutouts. The main character Sarah Taylor's personality was being poor and depressed...neither of those are personality traits and yet this author thinks they are. Her mother was a much more interesting character. So was the bad guy/ bully. This book would have been much more interesting if it was told from thst characters point of view. I think this book was supposed to be about loneliness and bullying but since the 15 year old bully was being sexually assulted by a grown man I had a hard time disliking her. The sexually abused child is the bad guy and the predator was the heartthrob....Yikes.
I won't be reading anything else by this author but this book has mostly good reviews so I'm obviously in the minority. I'm glad this book is over.
Jessica Ward normally writes under the name JR Ward but if I didn't know that I would have assumed this book was a debut. The plotting moved at a snails pace. The characters were cardboard cutouts. The main character Sarah Taylor's personality was being poor and depressed...neither of those are personality traits and yet this author thinks they are. Her mother was a much more interesting character. So was the bad guy/ bully. This book would have been much more interesting if it was told from thst characters point of view. I think this book was supposed to be about loneliness and bullying but since the 15 year old bully was being sexually assulted by a grown man I had a hard time disliking her. The sexually abused child is the bad guy and the predator was the heartthrob....Yikes.
I won't be reading anything else by this author but this book has mostly good reviews so I'm obviously in the minority. I'm glad this book is over.
July 7, 2023
. . . there are only two types of girls here. The ones who play sports and the ones who dress like getting a date is their sport even though there are no boys around to compete over.
It's Sarah's first year at hoity-toity St. Ambrose, and she has a dark secret. Teen queen Greta lives just across the hall, and gets her kicks by tormenting other girls. Sarah is this year's target, and the pranks are nasty. Sarah's roommate had to deal with Greta the previous year, and offers this advice, "Just don't give 'em what they're looking for and they'll get bored. They only like chew toys with the squeakers still in 'em." But her roommate has her own secret to keep hidden.
How far can things go before something really awful happens?
I wasn't sure what to expect from this one. I thought perhaps there might be something a bit more sinister going on than just a tale of mean girls, bullying, and perverts, but it turned out that was honestly enough to hold my interest. The author's characters and dialogue are both believable, and she throws in the occasional quip that made me snort, like - ."What is this, Clue, girls' school edition? Her main character, Sarah, goes off on some wild tangents, and delivers a few lengthy speculative soliloquies that I could have done without, but otherwise this was an engrossing and entertaining read.
This title will be released on July 11, 2023.
Thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for the advance read.
It's Sarah's first year at hoity-toity St. Ambrose, and she has a dark secret. Teen queen Greta lives just across the hall, and gets her kicks by tormenting other girls. Sarah is this year's target, and the pranks are nasty. Sarah's roommate had to deal with Greta the previous year, and offers this advice, "Just don't give 'em what they're looking for and they'll get bored. They only like chew toys with the squeakers still in 'em." But her roommate has her own secret to keep hidden.
How far can things go before something really awful happens?
I wasn't sure what to expect from this one. I thought perhaps there might be something a bit more sinister going on than just a tale of mean girls, bullying, and perverts, but it turned out that was honestly enough to hold my interest. The author's characters and dialogue are both believable, and she throws in the occasional quip that made me snort, like - ."What is this, Clue, girls' school edition? Her main character, Sarah, goes off on some wild tangents, and delivers a few lengthy speculative soliloquies that I could have done without, but otherwise this was an engrossing and entertaining read.
This title will be released on July 11, 2023.
Thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for the advance read.
April 17, 2023
I was immediately drawn to this book based on the description and cover art however it was a huge swing and a miss for me. Firstly, the author uses an unnecessary amount of metaphors for the most mundane things such as describing the floor tiles as looking like squares of brownies. This went on endlessly on every page which completely distracted me from the story. Secondly, I expected the book to be more of a murder mystery but the actually murder didn’t take place until the last 20% or so of the book. All in all I found the book difficult to get through and the ending to be very odd. Thanks to Net Galley for providing me with an advance copy of this book.
June 11, 2023
Tough to rate… bullies, bipolar, bizarre.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The story is a study of mental illness, it seems. The author created a character who is severely bipolar and crafted a story around her illness; trying to live her life, and navigating through good days and bad.
Manic episodes are all-consuming. Blanking out. Losing track of time, obsessive thoughts, suicidal tendencies and actions, and so much more consumed our main character.
She’s brilliant, however, and finds herself at a new school trying to survive. The author creates a story that has you feeling deeply connected to Sarah through her depression, fears, and hatred by others.
She’s different and stands out. She has no people skills, and that blatantly shows as she attracts attention in different ways in the story. Negatively and positively.
It’s really hard to describe the feeling you are going to go through with the plot. There’s bullying to extreme degrees. Death and destruction of people. You’re not sure where the story is going and the author does keep you compelled to keep turning those pages.
Shocking turns of events left me speechless and saddened that the author chose to go this route. Especially with the ending. That’s where my conflict comes in.
On one hand, the author is brilliant and clearly crafts an interesting intricate depiction of a person with a mental imbalance. We feel her pain, her shame, and her introverted actions, yet is desperate to have even one friend.
But on the other hand, the story is heavy and can be depressing which could be a lot to take emotionally for some readers. So just be aware of that.
I’m vacillating on the rating because of the authors writing skills and Ward’s extraordinary storytelling ability. The St. Ambrose School for Girls is an intense psychologically complex story that leaves you feeling conflicted at the end.
I would definitely be interested in reading this author again. She’s wicked talented but this one just didn’t cut it for me as I need heavy, emotionally tolling, crime-filled stories to end with some sort of uplifting lightness as a balance.
* copy received for review consideration
* Full review - https://amidlifewife.com/the-st-ambro...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The story is a study of mental illness, it seems. The author created a character who is severely bipolar and crafted a story around her illness; trying to live her life, and navigating through good days and bad.
Manic episodes are all-consuming. Blanking out. Losing track of time, obsessive thoughts, suicidal tendencies and actions, and so much more consumed our main character.
She’s brilliant, however, and finds herself at a new school trying to survive. The author creates a story that has you feeling deeply connected to Sarah through her depression, fears, and hatred by others.
She’s different and stands out. She has no people skills, and that blatantly shows as she attracts attention in different ways in the story. Negatively and positively.
It’s really hard to describe the feeling you are going to go through with the plot. There’s bullying to extreme degrees. Death and destruction of people. You’re not sure where the story is going and the author does keep you compelled to keep turning those pages.
Shocking turns of events left me speechless and saddened that the author chose to go this route. Especially with the ending. That’s where my conflict comes in.
On one hand, the author is brilliant and clearly crafts an interesting intricate depiction of a person with a mental imbalance. We feel her pain, her shame, and her introverted actions, yet is desperate to have even one friend.
But on the other hand, the story is heavy and can be depressing which could be a lot to take emotionally for some readers. So just be aware of that.
I’m vacillating on the rating because of the authors writing skills and Ward’s extraordinary storytelling ability. The St. Ambrose School for Girls is an intense psychologically complex story that leaves you feeling conflicted at the end.
I would definitely be interested in reading this author again. She’s wicked talented but this one just didn’t cut it for me as I need heavy, emotionally tolling, crime-filled stories to end with some sort of uplifting lightness as a balance.
* copy received for review consideration
* Full review - https://amidlifewife.com/the-st-ambro...
July 11, 2023
Thanks to Netgalley and Gallery Books for gifting me an early copy. Below is my honest review.
This one has some content/trigger warnings: mentions and depictions of suicide attempts/suicidal thoughts, mental illness/bi-polar disorder, bullying.
I gave this one four stars. I took a star off because I figured out the killer really early, even though the murder doesn't occur until very late in the story. I also felt like the story moved pretty slowly and focused a lot on Sarah's mental illness. I appreciate that the author worked very hard to depict bipolar disorder in an accurate and respectful manner, but sometimes the long bunny trails into Sarah's imaginary meanderings became a distraction from the actual story for me.
Overall, I was really impressed with Jessica Ward's ability to switch from her usual PNR worlds to this realistic and intense dark academia story. I'd definitely recommend this one to anyone who likes a gritty, dark, boarding school type story with a mystery thrown in.
This one has some content/trigger warnings: mentions and depictions of suicide attempts/suicidal thoughts, mental illness/bi-polar disorder, bullying.
I gave this one four stars. I took a star off because I figured out the killer really early, even though the murder doesn't occur until very late in the story. I also felt like the story moved pretty slowly and focused a lot on Sarah's mental illness. I appreciate that the author worked very hard to depict bipolar disorder in an accurate and respectful manner, but sometimes the long bunny trails into Sarah's imaginary meanderings became a distraction from the actual story for me.
Overall, I was really impressed with Jessica Ward's ability to switch from her usual PNR worlds to this realistic and intense dark academia story. I'd definitely recommend this one to anyone who likes a gritty, dark, boarding school type story with a mystery thrown in.
December 12, 2022
Wow I loved this book! I was completely immersed in Sarah (Sally's) world as she found her way at the St. Ambrose School For Girls.
Sarah was an unlikely candidate for the prestigious school but her star chasing mother submitted an essay of hers without her knowledge. Before she knew it, she was an Ambrose girl. She doesn't fit the part due to her goth look and predilection for black. But what Sarah really wants to hide is her bi-polar diagnosis and her stints in mental hospitals. She decides to keep to herself and does not speak up when the local queen bee sets her in her sights. What happens next is a bit predictable, but I enjoyed every page.
This isn't a perfect book, but the characters are well drawn and interesting and I loved spending time at the school. If you like thrillers set in academia this is a fabulous book for you!
#Gallerybooks
Sarah was an unlikely candidate for the prestigious school but her star chasing mother submitted an essay of hers without her knowledge. Before she knew it, she was an Ambrose girl. She doesn't fit the part due to her goth look and predilection for black. But what Sarah really wants to hide is her bi-polar diagnosis and her stints in mental hospitals. She decides to keep to herself and does not speak up when the local queen bee sets her in her sights. What happens next is a bit predictable, but I enjoyed every page.
This isn't a perfect book, but the characters are well drawn and interesting and I loved spending time at the school. If you like thrillers set in academia this is a fabulous book for you!
#Gallerybooks
December 16, 2023
The St Ambrose School for Girls by Jessica Ward was more like a 3.5. It was a story about mental illness and not fitting in. A girl hoes to a school for girls and knows immediately she doesn’t fit in. I am the book it says she is bipolar. I would peg bipolar with psychotic features borderline on possible schizoid effective disorder. The book was good. Enjoyed the storyline. But it skipped around leaving the reader a bit confused.
gave-up-on
January 7, 2023I'd like to thank the publisher and NetGalley for giving me a chance at reading this book.
I made it to 25% into this book until had to stop. Nothing was happening it. There was some incredibly long chapters of absolute nothing that neither moved the plot along or got to anything remotely creepy. There is also little to no dialogue or character development.
Character MAYBE has her clothing destroyed by the girl across the hall when she found bleach in the washer but she has no proof of this. Character MAYBE thinks she is being bullied by the girl across the hall when she makes a comment about how good it was that she has a body that does not require her to diet... Main character is obsessed with the girl across the hall and spies / follows her and her friends home from the CD store. Character MAYBE has a strange crush on her married dorm supervisor.
I expected something like Heathers but even Heathers got to the point faster than this book did in terms of our characters and the situation at hand and what was to happen to the aggressors. I think this book needs to go back to the drawing board before presenting it for reading - there is just a lot of nothing happening to get me interested or care about the journey the main character is going on.
I made it to 25% into this book until had to stop. Nothing was happening it. There was some incredibly long chapters of absolute nothing that neither moved the plot along or got to anything remotely creepy. There is also little to no dialogue or character development.
Character MAYBE has her clothing destroyed by the girl across the hall when she found bleach in the washer but she has no proof of this. Character MAYBE thinks she is being bullied by the girl across the hall when she makes a comment about how good it was that she has a body that does not require her to diet... Main character is obsessed with the girl across the hall and spies / follows her and her friends home from the CD store. Character MAYBE has a strange crush on her married dorm supervisor.
I expected something like Heathers but even Heathers got to the point faster than this book did in terms of our characters and the situation at hand and what was to happen to the aggressors. I think this book needs to go back to the drawing board before presenting it for reading - there is just a lot of nothing happening to get me interested or care about the journey the main character is going on.
January 24, 2025
4.5 you guys were right 😭 I absolutely loved this one
July 24, 2023
Accidental YA. There was a point a few months ago where I went down the list of “coming soon” books at the library and added just about everything to my holds. Had I considered the title for even a moment I probably could have surmised the audience, but I think I saw “Heathers meets The Secret History” in the blurb and felt that was good enough. It was not good enough; this novel is an insult to its influences.
Normally I don’t give 1-star ratings to books with an intended audience very different from myself. There are exceptions to every rule, however, and this one earns its scorn. To keep it brief, the bulk of the content is mired in stereotypes, many of which come off as cliche. The worst of them are highly problematic, to borrow vocab from the targeted demographic. Is there a Bechdel Test for minority groups? The shoehorned-in black character is such a lazy caricature the book would probably be less offensive without any people of color at all. The way the author discusses sexuality is equally lazy. A boarding school in the early 90s is an easy setting to explore issues of race, class, sex, gender, power, etc., but the author seemed disinterested.
Worst of all is how mental illness is depicted. Much of the story consists of internal monologue of an adolescent girl who is being medicated for bipolar disorder. I understand that everyone’s mental health manifests differently both inwardly and outwardly, but none of it rang true to me or my own experiences. A good chunk of the middle of the novel is an almost stream-of-consciousness suicide plot, laying out specific methods and possible outcomes. It’s so off the mark and without any redeeming commentary that I’m surprised it was published given the intended audience. The conclusion reached is no deeper than “suicide would make people sad,” much like the closing message is “murder is about the friends we made along the way.”
Initially I was put off by the repeated weird and anachronistic mentions of Nirvana. I wish that had remained my only quibble. The author’s note at the end is probably the cringiest thing I’ve read this year. They talk about how the character “came to” them, despite having no real-life experience with mental illness. A complete fucking joke.
Normally I don’t give 1-star ratings to books with an intended audience very different from myself. There are exceptions to every rule, however, and this one earns its scorn. To keep it brief, the bulk of the content is mired in stereotypes, many of which come off as cliche. The worst of them are highly problematic, to borrow vocab from the targeted demographic. Is there a Bechdel Test for minority groups? The shoehorned-in black character is such a lazy caricature the book would probably be less offensive without any people of color at all. The way the author discusses sexuality is equally lazy. A boarding school in the early 90s is an easy setting to explore issues of race, class, sex, gender, power, etc., but the author seemed disinterested.
Worst of all is how mental illness is depicted. Much of the story consists of internal monologue of an adolescent girl who is being medicated for bipolar disorder. I understand that everyone’s mental health manifests differently both inwardly and outwardly, but none of it rang true to me or my own experiences. A good chunk of the middle of the novel is an almost stream-of-consciousness suicide plot, laying out specific methods and possible outcomes. It’s so off the mark and without any redeeming commentary that I’m surprised it was published given the intended audience. The conclusion reached is no deeper than “suicide would make people sad,” much like the closing message is “murder is about the friends we made along the way.”
Initially I was put off by the repeated weird and anachronistic mentions of Nirvana. I wish that had remained my only quibble. The author’s note at the end is probably the cringiest thing I’ve read this year. They talk about how the character “came to” them, despite having no real-life experience with mental illness. A complete fucking joke.
July 16, 2023
DNF ~ (Chapter 12, 3:47:21, 32% completed) The story line was so monotone. I checked reviews to see if I was alone in my boredom and lack of interest. I decided to skip to the end of the book and read the last 6 chapters (Chapter 32, last 13%, -1.34:35 remaining). Horrible ending. I’m glad I didn’t read the whole book. Especially, thankful that I borrowed it from my awesome library and didn’t waste money on top of the several hours.
July 13, 2023
This book has a really pretty cover. I would pick it up off a shelf based on that any day. But I don’t have anything nice to say about the story within its pages so I’m just going to skip that part of the review.
Wouldn’t recommend.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Book Club Favorites for the gifted copy.
Wouldn’t recommend.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Book Club Favorites for the gifted copy.
July 8, 2023
3.5/5 stars
This is dark academia/ mature dark YA told in an adult tone dealing with serious subjects.
This is a coming of age story. The narrator is 15 year old Sarah. The book is set in 1991 in a Massachusetts boarding school.
The writing is beautiful. However the book does start off slowly. Some of the story is hard to read as an adult. This book is definitely not for young teens. The story deals with extreme bullying, mentions of suicide, depression, and the heroine deals with severe mental illness.
This is a heavy story that has a 15 year old unreliable narrator, but doesn't read like YA.
The author's note was fascinating as I was intrigued to find out her writing process with this book. I
This book is an interesting character study of a brilliant girl dealing with mental illness. But the story was darker and more disturbing than I was expecting.
I really enjoyed Sarah's friendship with her roommate. And I appreciate the care that the author took to make the mental health aspect accurate. This is a hard book to rate. But it is definitely a book that I will think about for a while.
Thanks to netgalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for allowing me to read this book.
This is dark academia/ mature dark YA told in an adult tone dealing with serious subjects.
This is a coming of age story. The narrator is 15 year old Sarah. The book is set in 1991 in a Massachusetts boarding school.
The writing is beautiful. However the book does start off slowly. Some of the story is hard to read as an adult. This book is definitely not for young teens. The story deals with extreme bullying, mentions of suicide, depression, and the heroine deals with severe mental illness.
This is a heavy story that has a 15 year old unreliable narrator, but doesn't read like YA.
The author's note was fascinating as I was intrigued to find out her writing process with this book. I
This book is an interesting character study of a brilliant girl dealing with mental illness. But the story was darker and more disturbing than I was expecting.
I really enjoyed Sarah's friendship with her roommate. And I appreciate the care that the author took to make the mental health aspect accurate. This is a hard book to rate. But it is definitely a book that I will think about for a while.
Thanks to netgalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for allowing me to read this book.
August 26, 2023
I admire Jessica Ward. I think the first four novels of the Black Dagger Brotherhood series are some of the best horror/romance I've ever read by any author, ever. I've met this author in person and she's incredibly generous, genuine, and committed to her fans.
But this book did not work for me. The poor girl at a private school setup just didn't ring true. The school seems to have about four students. Nobody ever seems to be learning anything. It's like a really bad, overwritten mash-up of THE BELL JAR, A SEPARATE PEACE, and THE CHOCOLATE WAR. For movie fans it's also got a sort of HEATHERS meets WILD THINGS meets GIRL INTERRUPTED meets THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY thing going on. And towards the end a few plot points get dragged in kicking and screaming from AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY by Theodore Dreiser. The whole story is one long gloomy downer, with a ton of loose ends and about three paragraphs of eye-rolling sentimentality at the very end.
This is a very hard book to read. The first-person narrator is totally unreliable, and totally in love with the sound of her own voice. Expect long, long digressions where she hallucinates and you've got to sit through three pages of unconnected ramblings. At the same time, every single character is a laugh out loud cliche. The popular mean girl. The sleazy male authority figure who hits on all the girls. The forlorn old-maid teacher who desperately wants to connect with her students. The tough jock with the heart of gold. The hard-working token black kid on a scholarship. None of these people are new. Nothing ever happens at Saint Ambrose that couldn't have happened in a bad TV movie forty years ago. But throw in a few hallucinations and mention Guns and Roses and Nirvana a couple of times, and suddenly it's literature!
You can't call this a good Young Adult novel. The moral lessons (if that's what they are) are all very dark. Smoking is cool. Beating people up is okay. Lying to cover up for your buddies is always the right thing to do. On the other hand, older adults will be bored to tears and feel ripped off because none of the bad characters ever seem to have any fun. We keep hearing that mean bad girl Greta and sexy male teacher Nick are having an affair, but unlike in WILD THINGS, we never get to see any of it. There's tons of furtive rule-breaking, but no acts of rebellion and no open defiance. And there's not one sexy moment in this entire book! That's kind of a let down, given that Jessica Ward has written five or six of the sexiest vampire romance novels in history. How would you like it if Mick Jagger came over to your house all dressed in leather and then just started reading aloud from THE BELL JAR?
Those are the big things, but there were a zillion minor details that bothered me as well. Sarah's supposed to be as poor as a church mouse. But before she came to Saint Ambrose she had her own psychiatrist and did time at several mental hospitals. Who was paying for all that? Saint Ambrose is supposed to be an uptight Christian school full of snobs, where lesbians are not allowed. Yet they give a dirt-poor girl a full ride solely on the basis of one essay, all about how she tried to kill herself. That makes no sense at all! And lastly, what's with all the smoking?
Almost a hundred years ago, there was a book called STUDS LONIGAN about a bad boy named Studs. Studs starts smoking young, like at fifteen. And for a few years, he's tough, just like Strots in this book. But Studs lives long enough to see his health absolutely destroyed. He tries to quit, but it's too late. And he realizes that he threw his health away for nothing. How come nobody figures that out in this book? Nobody takes a health class at the Saint Ambrose school? What is Jessica Ward's agenda? Her main character dresses in black, hates boys and sex, and endlessly shrieks about how pretty girls who like boys are evil and worthless. Studs Lonigan would spot her problem right away. Studs was always being hit and screamed at by nasty women in black. In those days they called them nuns. What really hurts is that J.R. Ward is fully on board with all the sexual repression and hypocrisy that James T. Farrell was trying so hard to expose. She's okay with young people poisoning themselves, as long as they hate their own bodies and stay away from the opposite sex.
Like I said, I admire this author very much. But this book let me down on so many levels.
But this book did not work for me. The poor girl at a private school setup just didn't ring true. The school seems to have about four students. Nobody ever seems to be learning anything. It's like a really bad, overwritten mash-up of THE BELL JAR, A SEPARATE PEACE, and THE CHOCOLATE WAR. For movie fans it's also got a sort of HEATHERS meets WILD THINGS meets GIRL INTERRUPTED meets THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY thing going on. And towards the end a few plot points get dragged in kicking and screaming from AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY by Theodore Dreiser. The whole story is one long gloomy downer, with a ton of loose ends and about three paragraphs of eye-rolling sentimentality at the very end.
This is a very hard book to read. The first-person narrator is totally unreliable, and totally in love with the sound of her own voice. Expect long, long digressions where she hallucinates and you've got to sit through three pages of unconnected ramblings. At the same time, every single character is a laugh out loud cliche. The popular mean girl. The sleazy male authority figure who hits on all the girls. The forlorn old-maid teacher who desperately wants to connect with her students. The tough jock with the heart of gold. The hard-working token black kid on a scholarship. None of these people are new. Nothing ever happens at Saint Ambrose that couldn't have happened in a bad TV movie forty years ago. But throw in a few hallucinations and mention Guns and Roses and Nirvana a couple of times, and suddenly it's literature!
You can't call this a good Young Adult novel. The moral lessons (if that's what they are) are all very dark. Smoking is cool. Beating people up is okay. Lying to cover up for your buddies is always the right thing to do. On the other hand, older adults will be bored to tears and feel ripped off because none of the bad characters ever seem to have any fun. We keep hearing that mean bad girl Greta and sexy male teacher Nick are having an affair, but unlike in WILD THINGS, we never get to see any of it. There's tons of furtive rule-breaking, but no acts of rebellion and no open defiance. And there's not one sexy moment in this entire book! That's kind of a let down, given that Jessica Ward has written five or six of the sexiest vampire romance novels in history. How would you like it if Mick Jagger came over to your house all dressed in leather and then just started reading aloud from THE BELL JAR?
Those are the big things, but there were a zillion minor details that bothered me as well. Sarah's supposed to be as poor as a church mouse. But before she came to Saint Ambrose she had her own psychiatrist and did time at several mental hospitals. Who was paying for all that? Saint Ambrose is supposed to be an uptight Christian school full of snobs, where lesbians are not allowed. Yet they give a dirt-poor girl a full ride solely on the basis of one essay, all about how she tried to kill herself. That makes no sense at all! And lastly, what's with all the smoking?
Almost a hundred years ago, there was a book called STUDS LONIGAN about a bad boy named Studs. Studs starts smoking young, like at fifteen. And for a few years, he's tough, just like Strots in this book. But Studs lives long enough to see his health absolutely destroyed. He tries to quit, but it's too late. And he realizes that he threw his health away for nothing. How come nobody figures that out in this book? Nobody takes a health class at the Saint Ambrose school? What is Jessica Ward's agenda? Her main character dresses in black, hates boys and sex, and endlessly shrieks about how pretty girls who like boys are evil and worthless. Studs Lonigan would spot her problem right away. Studs was always being hit and screamed at by nasty women in black. In those days they called them nuns. What really hurts is that J.R. Ward is fully on board with all the sexual repression and hypocrisy that James T. Farrell was trying so hard to expose. She's okay with young people poisoning themselves, as long as they hate their own bodies and stay away from the opposite sex.
Like I said, I admire this author very much. But this book let me down on so many levels.
August 22, 2023
Slow burn that descends into a crawl. Although there are funny, poignant, and disturbing moments, the dinosaur pace of development ultimately makes this coming of age story feel like one will not finish it before old age settles in.
March 8, 2024
how are you going to lure me in with the description of heathers x the secret history and then give me NOTHING? so disappointing. 2 stars.
November 29, 2023
Review coming soon.
September 25, 2023
Sarah Taylor is whacked out of her mind. But she knows it... Most of the time. She has been a mental hospital patient twice already and is still in high school. Her BPD (Bipolar disorder) has her reliant on Lithium. Her brain convinces her that she is fine sometimes.
Now add in a new all-girls school... Umm, why would you do this to anyone, let alone someone with mental illness..... Bring on the toxic mean girls drama and everything cliche about an all-girls school, including a HOT English teacher RA who LIVES in the same dorm as the girls. Sure, he's married, but his wife is away saving the world.... Also, of course, there are girl crushes...
Greta makes Regina George look like an amateur in toxic bullying. Sarah is this term's victim.
Strots the protector roommate helped save this one from being too much in Sarah's head. Sarah's extreme mother added another layer.
Much of the book's narration is inside of Sarah's unreliable brain. Yet, it works for the most part. (Except for that end scene that is entirely unnecessary and is terrible for the overall book).
Overall, besides the end getting a bit OVER THE TOP, this one works as an excellent psych thriller.
Trigger Warning: Suicide attempts, thoughts, and ideology. Statutory Rape. Bullying. Abuse of medication and painkillers. Toxic homophobia. Murder and underage smoking.
I am left at 3.5-4 Stars.
Now add in a new all-girls school... Umm, why would you do this to anyone, let alone someone with mental illness..... Bring on the toxic mean girls drama and everything cliche about an all-girls school, including a HOT English teacher RA who LIVES in the same dorm as the girls. Sure, he's married, but his wife is away saving the world.... Also, of course, there are girl crushes...
Greta makes Regina George look like an amateur in toxic bullying. Sarah is this term's victim.
Strots the protector roommate helped save this one from being too much in Sarah's head. Sarah's extreme mother added another layer.
Much of the book's narration is inside of Sarah's unreliable brain. Yet, it works for the most part. (Except for that end scene that is entirely unnecessary and is terrible for the overall book).
Overall, besides the end getting a bit OVER THE TOP, this one works as an excellent psych thriller.
Trigger Warning: Suicide attempts, thoughts, and ideology. Statutory Rape. Bullying. Abuse of medication and painkillers. Toxic homophobia. Murder and underage smoking.
I am left at 3.5-4 Stars.
Want to read
May 24, 2024there’s got to be at LEAST one lesbian in this book 🫡
March 21, 2023
A beautiful fractured mind in the midst of the teenage hellscape that is St. Ambrose School for Girls. Sarah must manage what plays within her mind as well as those who plan to viciously toy with her in reality. A somber, and at times terrifying, look into the course of thought of a young girl with bipolar disorder. Ward has created a modern teenage classic with a gothic attitude, a compellingly sinister pecking order where money is no object, and a family name can fix everything. And the rules? Well, those can be more than broken. If you have the right last name.
~Tanja
*ARC provided by Gallery Books via Netgalley
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~Tanja
*ARC provided by Gallery Books via Netgalley
Follow me on
Instagram✿Twitter✿Facebook✿Pinterest✿TikTok
February 9, 2024
I was so excited to read this book, but unfortunately, the synopsis is more interesting than the actual book.
As someone with severe mental illness problems, yes, I understand it's because her mind is going a million miles a minute, while daydreaming bad things about the Brunettes and Greta. And just so you know, if you're on Medicaid, there's no co pay. Don't know where you got that information from, and I'm happy for you never to have needed it.
I got over 200 pages in, and still nothing.
I usually do not do this, but I just can't waste another minute on this dreadful story. I have decided not to finish. It's just not for me.
Literal definition of a slow burning book.
As someone with severe mental illness problems, yes, I understand it's because her mind is going a million miles a minute, while daydreaming bad things about the Brunettes and Greta. And just so you know, if you're on Medicaid, there's no co pay. Don't know where you got that information from, and I'm happy for you never to have needed it.
I got over 200 pages in, and still nothing.
I usually do not do this, but I just can't waste another minute on this dreadful story. I have decided not to finish. It's just not for me.
Literal definition of a slow burning book.
July 15, 2023
Sinister, atmospheric, and unpredictable!
The St. Ambrose School for Girls transports you back to 1991 and into the life of Sarah Taylor, a fifteen-year-old girl with severe self-loathing and mental health issues that reluctantly heads to an elite private girl’s school in Greensboro Falls, Massachusetts, where all she wants to do is muddle through and be left alone, but when the poplar mean girl gets her in her sights everything starts to spiral out of control, secrets are exposed, reputations are ruined, and someone ends up dead.
The writing is tight and intense. The characters are damaged, secretive, insecure, and selfish. And the plot is a suspenseful, twisty, coming-of-age tale filled with friendship, drama, deception, jealousy, hatred, abuse, callousness, desperation, cruelty, and revenge.
I’m always intrigued when an author decides to write something a little different than what they’re well known for and so I was excited when I received this one. Would I say it’s as memorable as the novels found in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series? Probably not. Did I love it as much as one of my all-time favourite series, The Bourbon Kings? Definitely not. But Ward wasn’t writing it to be like either of these. And so, do I think The St. Ambrose School for Girls is an engrossing, tight, edgy, dark academia novel that’s highly entertaining and worth a read? I sure do.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.
The St. Ambrose School for Girls transports you back to 1991 and into the life of Sarah Taylor, a fifteen-year-old girl with severe self-loathing and mental health issues that reluctantly heads to an elite private girl’s school in Greensboro Falls, Massachusetts, where all she wants to do is muddle through and be left alone, but when the poplar mean girl gets her in her sights everything starts to spiral out of control, secrets are exposed, reputations are ruined, and someone ends up dead.
The writing is tight and intense. The characters are damaged, secretive, insecure, and selfish. And the plot is a suspenseful, twisty, coming-of-age tale filled with friendship, drama, deception, jealousy, hatred, abuse, callousness, desperation, cruelty, and revenge.
I’m always intrigued when an author decides to write something a little different than what they’re well known for and so I was excited when I received this one. Would I say it’s as memorable as the novels found in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series? Probably not. Did I love it as much as one of my all-time favourite series, The Bourbon Kings? Definitely not. But Ward wasn’t writing it to be like either of these. And so, do I think The St. Ambrose School for Girls is an engrossing, tight, edgy, dark academia novel that’s highly entertaining and worth a read? I sure do.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.
July 10, 2023
DNF’d at 30%. I feel like the author spent more time researching metaphors and compiling ways to describe absolutely mundane, irrelevant things rather than a substantial plot. I just felt like screaming, “I. DO. NOT. CARE!” the entire time the “story” was taking place. Way too slow. Way too stupid.
July 28, 2023
My main question is why was this sold as adult when every character is fifteen? I mean, I get there's cussing and murder and scandal, but uhhh, I've read a lot worse in actual YA books. It's just weird to me. Otherwise, it was a good book.
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