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The Girl in the Headlines
The headlines say she killed her family. The truth? She doesn't remember.
Andrea McNulty goes to sleep on her eighteenth birthday with a near-perfect life: she's a high school field hockey star, a doted-upon big sister, the beloved daughter of two happy parents. But when she wakes up in a motel room the next morning, unable to remember what happened the previous night and covered in blood, Andi is a fugitive.
According to the news, Andi's parents were brutally attacked in the middle of the night. Her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, her little brother Josh is missing--and Andi is the prime suspect. Terrified and on the run from the police, Andi teams up with Nate, the sympathetic boy working the motel's front desk, to find the real murderer. But while the police are getting further from the killer, the killer is getting closer to Andi--closer than she could ever have imagined.
Andrea McNulty goes to sleep on her eighteenth birthday with a near-perfect life: she's a high school field hockey star, a doted-upon big sister, the beloved daughter of two happy parents. But when she wakes up in a motel room the next morning, unable to remember what happened the previous night and covered in blood, Andi is a fugitive.
According to the news, Andi's parents were brutally attacked in the middle of the night. Her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, her little brother Josh is missing--and Andi is the prime suspect. Terrified and on the run from the police, Andi teams up with Nate, the sympathetic boy working the motel's front desk, to find the real murderer. But while the police are getting further from the killer, the killer is getting closer to Andi--closer than she could ever have imagined.
352 pages, Paperback
First published July 6, 2021
131 people are currently reading
4459 people want to read
About the author
Hannah Jayne
28 books682 followersHannah is the author of the UNDERWORLD DETECTION AGENCY CHRONICLES from Kensington books and the upcoming young adult thrillers TRULY, MADLY, DEADLY and SEE JANE RUN available from Sourcebooks, Inc. When she's not battling the demons of the Underworld or tackling a murderer at Hawthorne High, Jayne kicks her feet up in her San Francisco bay area home and attempts to share couch space with two enormous cats.
Now that you're here, kick up your feet and stay awhile...
Now that you're here, kick up your feet and stay awhile...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 372 reviews
May 9, 2022
Wake up in motel room, covered in blood and being accused of murdering your own parents without any memory about your last night was the worst way to celebrate your birthday!
18 years old Andrea McNulty wakes up in a total trash motel room reserved for Tim Esup! ( see the mind blowing puzzling name!Duh!) She’s covered in blood, suffering from short term memory loss and she thinks she might be responsible of her father’s death, putting her mother in coma and vanishing of her little brother Josh!
But don’t worry as soon as we know more about introvert, extra naive, hockey player, obedient, A-grader Andrea, we realize she cannot be a killer because throughout your reading you observe her way of talking like Disney princess and we question her real age because her extra naivety and lack of knowledge about real life made us think she might 8 instead of 18 or she has been raised in a cult, knowing nothing about actual world!
Thankfully she meets with Nate in her own age, street and literally smart boy working at the hotel, abandoned by his mother, ready to be her confidante from the beginning to solve the great mystery.
Somebody tried to kill Andrea’s parents and somebody is so successful to put blame on her! Because the entire world including her two close friends already believe she might commit such brutal crimes!
Only Nate is on her side, trying to find Andrea’s brother Josh, picking up the clues to find the missing pieces of the puzzle.
Nate is the only thing made me convince not skip the rest of my reading. He was full of wisdom as Andrea keeps crying and asking over and over why he helps her, she gets paranoid about his real motives and she says she’s so sorry to doubt him. ( it’s like a repetitive- never ending cycle but somehow I agree with Andrea: why this cool, smart, survivor guy deals with this shit show she created! )
I keep reading because I wanted to know how the author will wrap up the entire mystery. Even though the culprit(s) a little obvious and there are so many loop holes bigger than the cracks in my head, it was solid ending we may hope for!
Strengths of the book:
Promising, mysterious start, interesting plot line, fast paced story telling
Nate- absolutely likable supporting character
Intriguing whodunnit premise as Andrea races against the time to prove her innocence and find her brother
Weaknesses of the book:
Too naive, too annoying heroine who has no idea what she’s getting into, neurotically crying, questioning herself
So many unanswered questions and loop holes
Haphazard, abrupt ending ( it truly needs an epilogue!)
This is not a bad reading experience. At least there was capturing mystery push you to read the book, flipping pages faster to see what happened in that house during Andrea’s birthday party! The action packed beginning makes you excited! So I’m giving solid three, it’s average but it has so many potentials stars! I still want to read more works of the author. She found a good plot line, executing part is solid.
If the heroine wouldn’t annoy the hell of me, I could truly give more stars!
Special thanks to Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest opinions.
18 years old Andrea McNulty wakes up in a total trash motel room reserved for Tim Esup! ( see the mind blowing puzzling name!Duh!) She’s covered in blood, suffering from short term memory loss and she thinks she might be responsible of her father’s death, putting her mother in coma and vanishing of her little brother Josh!
But don’t worry as soon as we know more about introvert, extra naive, hockey player, obedient, A-grader Andrea, we realize she cannot be a killer because throughout your reading you observe her way of talking like Disney princess and we question her real age because her extra naivety and lack of knowledge about real life made us think she might 8 instead of 18 or she has been raised in a cult, knowing nothing about actual world!
Thankfully she meets with Nate in her own age, street and literally smart boy working at the hotel, abandoned by his mother, ready to be her confidante from the beginning to solve the great mystery.
Somebody tried to kill Andrea’s parents and somebody is so successful to put blame on her! Because the entire world including her two close friends already believe she might commit such brutal crimes!
Only Nate is on her side, trying to find Andrea’s brother Josh, picking up the clues to find the missing pieces of the puzzle.
Nate is the only thing made me convince not skip the rest of my reading. He was full of wisdom as Andrea keeps crying and asking over and over why he helps her, she gets paranoid about his real motives and she says she’s so sorry to doubt him. ( it’s like a repetitive- never ending cycle but somehow I agree with Andrea: why this cool, smart, survivor guy deals with this shit show she created! )
I keep reading because I wanted to know how the author will wrap up the entire mystery. Even though the culprit(s) a little obvious and there are so many loop holes bigger than the cracks in my head, it was solid ending we may hope for!
Strengths of the book:
Promising, mysterious start, interesting plot line, fast paced story telling
Nate- absolutely likable supporting character
Intriguing whodunnit premise as Andrea races against the time to prove her innocence and find her brother
Weaknesses of the book:
Too naive, too annoying heroine who has no idea what she’s getting into, neurotically crying, questioning herself
So many unanswered questions and loop holes
Haphazard, abrupt ending ( it truly needs an epilogue!)
This is not a bad reading experience. At least there was capturing mystery push you to read the book, flipping pages faster to see what happened in that house during Andrea’s birthday party! The action packed beginning makes you excited! So I’m giving solid three, it’s average but it has so many potentials stars! I still want to read more works of the author. She found a good plot line, executing part is solid.
If the heroine wouldn’t annoy the hell of me, I could truly give more stars!
Special thanks to Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest opinions.
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February 19, 2021
⤅ WHY would you write a mystery and leave like 95% of it unsolved??
I've had a pretty stressful day - just life, I guess - and sadly, this is not even the sort of book which could have lifted my spirits with compelling writing and a twisty plot. Instead, it was a thrown-together pot of red herrings, loose ends, and poor plotting.
Also, there's no romance. Overall I don't really mind, because the book deals with some pretty heavy topics and really a romance would have felt kind of inappropriate, but if I'd known that in advance I probably wouldn't have read it.
⤅ PLOT
18-year-old Andrea McNulty wakes up in a motel room covered in blood. When she turns the TV on, she discovers that there was a break-in at her house last night - and that her father is dead, mother in a coma, and younger brother Josh is missing. And she's the main suspect. After venturing outside, she runs into Nate - the guy at the reception desk - who tells her she was checked in last night under the name Tim Esup and paid for a week. But Andrea has zero memory of anything that happened last night.
The rest of the book is her trying desperately to find Josh while also evading the police and half-heartedly working out who might have done all of this.
⤅ DOWNSIDES
❌ The plot, my God. The plot is so MEANINGLESS. Countless threads are unravelled and left to dangle, leaving us hanging forever. And there are so many plot holes. Basically NOTHING is solved other than the question of who murdered her dad. And towards the end, things just devolve even further, finishing on what might be one of the most open endings in history.
❌ Andrea is super dim. And I don't even mean her rich-girl naivety, because I could buy that she's always been sheltered and pampered. What I mean is, it took me five seconds to work out that Tim Esup is Time's Up, but it took Andrea like a week and she still didn't manage it without major help.
❌ Andrea dyes her hair bright blue to evade recognition, since before she had long brown hair. But she's recognised, like, instantly. And somehow never has to think again about changing hair colour? The police are actively looking for her, surely they'd have updated their messages to say 'suspect has bright blue hair', which is pretty damn unusual.
⤅ UPSIDES
✔️ I actually felt like the portrayal of Andrea as a traumatised teenager was done pretty well. She has a lot of panicked breakdowns, but that completely fits with someone who's seen her entire family implode. So when she admits that Nate calling her cute does nothing for her, I thought that was the right call. She was in no position really to be developing a crush, even if the author mildly flirted with the possibility.
July 22, 2021
Very exciting but a few plot holes and storylines that went nowhere. Overall good YA mystery.
Andrea wakes up in a motel room covered in blood and finds out that her father has been murdered, her mother is severely injured, and her little brother is missing. The police are looking for her as a suspect in the case. Andrea connects with Nate, another fellow teenager who is working at the motel front desk. The two of them set out to try to clear Andrea's name and find out what exactly happened to her family.
This is a very fast-paced book, but for the most part Andrea kind of stumbles around blindly and ends up finding out a lot more than the police, who are portrayed as super inept and believing everything that is shown in the media. Like I said above, there are some storylines that went absolutely nowhere, people lying for no reason and then no explanation given for that. The ending situation and the true villains were a bit laughable to me, the plot holes in that storyline were big caverns. How those people could be such absolute idiots and get away with what they did was not believable at all.
This is a really quick read, and not altogether terrible. Good summer entertainment and a couple of nice twists.
I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book, all opinions are my own.
Andrea wakes up in a motel room covered in blood and finds out that her father has been murdered, her mother is severely injured, and her little brother is missing. The police are looking for her as a suspect in the case. Andrea connects with Nate, another fellow teenager who is working at the motel front desk. The two of them set out to try to clear Andrea's name and find out what exactly happened to her family.
This is a very fast-paced book, but for the most part Andrea kind of stumbles around blindly and ends up finding out a lot more than the police, who are portrayed as super inept and believing everything that is shown in the media. Like I said above, there are some storylines that went absolutely nowhere, people lying for no reason and then no explanation given for that. The ending situation and the true villains were a bit laughable to me, the plot holes in that storyline were big caverns. How those people could be such absolute idiots and get away with what they did was not believable at all.
This is a really quick read, and not altogether terrible. Good summer entertainment and a couple of nice twists.
I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book, all opinions are my own.
June 26, 2021
This one sounded so engaging, but I had a really hard time relating to Andie. I know her life was coming unglued at the seams, but she really made some bad choices. The book does do a good job of illustrating the way a media narrative can cement the way someone is perceived. That was heartbreaking and frustrating. I thought there were some admirable bits, but the overall product was better than okay, but not a book I really liked.
Thank you to Sourcebook Fire and Edelweiss+ for a DRC in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you to Sourcebook Fire and Edelweiss+ for a DRC in exchange for an honest review.
June 19, 2021
As a fan of YA thrillers and mysteries, this book had captured my attention from the get-go and also the fact that I had previously read Twisted by Hannah Jayne and had a couple more of her books on my kindle to read. I didn't know exactly what I was in for but going in blind is often when the best results occur. The Girl in the Headlines starts with a punch when Andrea - our main female character wakes up in a random hotel room and she is covered in blood. She can't remember a single thing except that yesterday was her 18th birthday, after that everything is a blur. Andrea turns on the TV and imagine her shock when she sees her name scrawled along the bottom of the screen with the words "suspected person of interest". It turns out that Andrea's dad is dead, her mother is fighting for her life and her younger brother Josh is missing and all signs are pointing to Andrea committing the crime. Of course, she can't have done it, or did she? As the book goes along, Andrea will pair up with Nate who runs the motel she is staying at to try and clear her name and also find out where her brother Josh is. During the book, we learn that Andrea wasn't her parent's actual daughter and that her parents kept some hidden skeletons from her including some tidbits about her real parents. Overall the book was a bit of a slow-paced mystery and when the ending was revealed it was easy to guess and predictable as I had kind of had an idea of the ending from about the mid-point of the story. However, in saying that if you are needing a new YA thriller author to check out, then add Hannah Jayne to your reading lists.
January 7, 2023
I don't think I have anything good to say about this. I hated the author's writing style. It felt unbelievably fake. And the ending was extremely rushed and unfinished. Also, Andrea is just plain stupid. Police dropboxes? That's not naive, just stupid.
November 25, 2021
Another fun book from Sourcebooks Fire and Hannah Jayne. The newspaper headlines say she killed her family, but the truth is, she doesn’t know if she did. Andrea McNulty goes to sleep on her eighteenth birthday with a near-perfect life: she's a high school field hockey star, a doted-upon big sister, the beloved daughter of two happy parents. But when she wakes up in a motel room the next morning, unable to remember what happened the previous night and covered in blood, she is a fugitive.
According to the news, Andi's parents were brutally attacked in the middle of the night. Her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, her little brother Josh is missing, and Andi is the prime suspect. Terrified and on the run from the police, Andi teams up with Nate, the sympathetic boy working the motel's front desk, to find the real murderer. But while the police are getting further from the killer, the killer is getting closer to Andi-closer than she could ever have imagined.
Thoughts: This premise is terrifying. I loved this plot and how mysterious this book starts. Andi wasn’t my favorite character, and I felt that she whined and complained a lot. There were also SO many things left unexplained at the end of this book. Nothing is solved except the murder, and I found this to be incredibly annoying. There is a dramatic climax that both comes from nowhere and is also predictable. 2.5 stars.
According to the news, Andi's parents were brutally attacked in the middle of the night. Her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, her little brother Josh is missing, and Andi is the prime suspect. Terrified and on the run from the police, Andi teams up with Nate, the sympathetic boy working the motel's front desk, to find the real murderer. But while the police are getting further from the killer, the killer is getting closer to Andi-closer than she could ever have imagined.
Thoughts: This premise is terrifying. I loved this plot and how mysterious this book starts. Andi wasn’t my favorite character, and I felt that she whined and complained a lot. There were also SO many things left unexplained at the end of this book. Nothing is solved except the murder, and I found this to be incredibly annoying. There is a dramatic climax that both comes from nowhere and is also predictable. 2.5 stars.
April 4, 2024
THE GIRL IN THE HEADLINES was one of my most anticipated books of the year. The story was worse than not meeting my expectations, it was terrible.
Eighteen-year-old Andi had the common sense of a six-year-old on bad day. Note to self: when trying to evade the police, don’t dye hair blue is just one example of her sheer stupidity.
The only plus for the story was that Andi was bright enough to recognize running from the cops wasn’t conducive to romance.
If THE GIRL IN THE HEADLINES could have gone the campy/fun route if it didn’t take itself so seriously. Sadly, I can’t think of a reason to recommend the book.
Eighteen-year-old Andi had the common sense of a six-year-old on bad day. Note to self: when trying to evade the police, don’t dye hair blue is just one example of her sheer stupidity.
The only plus for the story was that Andi was bright enough to recognize running from the cops wasn’t conducive to romance.
If THE GIRL IN THE HEADLINES could have gone the campy/fun route if it didn’t take itself so seriously. Sadly, I can’t think of a reason to recommend the book.
November 20, 2025
Cheesy, low stakes, but not actually bad. I actually kinda liked this, not as a thriller, but just as a book.
The only thing that kinda annoyed me was how 90% of the book, the girl was crying (to be fair, I just came from like ten books where the main characters refused to cry…), and the ending is very rushed.
The only thing that kinda annoyed me was how 90% of the book, the girl was crying (to be fair, I just came from like ten books where the main characters refused to cry…), and the ending is very rushed.
March 3, 2022
Yeah, so it’s bad. There were so many open plot holes and the ending doesn’t answer any questions!
Why did Lynelle’s dad lie?
Why did Cal lie?
What was up with Lynelle and Cal?
Why were her friends so ready to disown her?
How did the police contradict their accusations by just showing up and seeing a gun?
Did Andi actually do it?
If she didn’t, how did she end up covered in blood?
More questions:
Why was she left in a hotel unattended to for an entire week?
Why did it take half of the book for her to actually try and solve the murder?
Why is she ALWAYS crying?
Why didn’t we get some sort of epilogue detailing the fallout?
Where is the love story?
All in all, I was struck by the summary of the book and the storyline. I love a good murder mystery and I was excited to read. But there was no detail about anything and the mystery wasn’t all there. The bones were good, but the execution could’ve been a LOT better. Disappointed.
Why did Lynelle’s dad lie?
Why did Cal lie?
What was up with Lynelle and Cal?
Why were her friends so ready to disown her?
How did the police contradict their accusations by just showing up and seeing a gun?
Did Andi actually do it?
If she didn’t, how did she end up covered in blood?
More questions:
Why was she left in a hotel unattended to for an entire week?
Why did it take half of the book for her to actually try and solve the murder?
Why is she ALWAYS crying?
Why didn’t we get some sort of epilogue detailing the fallout?
Where is the love story?
All in all, I was struck by the summary of the book and the storyline. I love a good murder mystery and I was excited to read. But there was no detail about anything and the mystery wasn’t all there. The bones were good, but the execution could’ve been a LOT better. Disappointed.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 3, 2025
★★★☆☆ - 2.5
This book kind of feels purely middle of the road. I didn’t hate reading it, but I didn’t necessarily enjoy it either. I don’t think it was very well written. There were so many subplots and red herrings introduced that were never again brought up or resolved. The ending was far too rushed and the ultimate perpetrators’ motivations didn’t make sense. (Like they were very basic, preliminary motivations that could sow hatred but not so much to in any way merit murder and kidnapping, no matter whose perspective you are looking at). And even beyond that, what actually happened still isn’t answered because ✨drugs✨ (which wasn’t even considered before it was flat out told to us when it was abundantly obvious). There’s so much more I can get to, I basically have issues with every character. The book’s premise is relatively interesting but the execution kind of just… sucked. That’s all.
This book kind of feels purely middle of the road. I didn’t hate reading it, but I didn’t necessarily enjoy it either. I don’t think it was very well written. There were so many subplots and red herrings introduced that were never again brought up or resolved. The ending was far too rushed and the ultimate perpetrators’ motivations didn’t make sense. (Like they were very basic, preliminary motivations that could sow hatred but not so much to in any way merit murder and kidnapping, no matter whose perspective you are looking at). And even beyond that, what actually happened still isn’t answered because ✨drugs✨ (which wasn’t even considered before it was flat out told to us when it was abundantly obvious). There’s so much more I can get to, I basically have issues with every character. The book’s premise is relatively interesting but the execution kind of just… sucked. That’s all.
July 31, 2023
It’s been a minute since I have read a YA book, and this one had been on my shelf for far too long so I decided to pick it up!
Andi woke up in an unfamiliar hotel with blood on her hands, chest and pants. She has no memory of how she got there, or what happened the night before. She turns on the tv and sees a newscast about her family being murdered and her brother is missing. She seems to be the prime suspect, but she knows she didn’t do it!
This was a great YA book, I would say perfect for high school age. There were a few twists that surprised me, it was easy to read, and I couldn’t stop rooting for Andi to be cleared. I just wasn’t sure it would happen. I liked the ending, and felt it was the perfect length!
Andi woke up in an unfamiliar hotel with blood on her hands, chest and pants. She has no memory of how she got there, or what happened the night before. She turns on the tv and sees a newscast about her family being murdered and her brother is missing. She seems to be the prime suspect, but she knows she didn’t do it!
This was a great YA book, I would say perfect for high school age. There were a few twists that surprised me, it was easy to read, and I couldn’t stop rooting for Andi to be cleared. I just wasn’t sure it would happen. I liked the ending, and felt it was the perfect length!
December 7, 2021
I read this in one day it was so good! A lot of reviews said it ended quickly and was kind of unclear. I agree it did end kind of fast but in my opinion the end was good and solved.
June 1, 2021
****SPOILERS BELOW****
The Girl in the Headlines is a gripping novel that's full of tension. I didn't want to put it down as I read it because I was dying to know what was going to happen next. I particularly enjoyed how quickly the action happened, simply because I really, REALLY wanted to know what was next and whether Andi was the actual killer. The ambiguity is nice all throughout, and I liked the theme of belonging the novel embraces. That being said, I predicted the ending, which isn't always a bad thing or a criticism. The ending is also a bit abrupt and wraps up too nicely. Honestly, I wanted to see what happened AFTER Andi is cleared as the killer. There are a lot of unanswered questions that really could have benefited from having some sort of resolution. Like, what happens with her friend Lynelle? Lynelle was so quick to throw Andi under the bus, so what's going to happen? Will she apologize to Andi? Will Andi be done with her? Why was Jerry at the house and why did he lie to the police? What about the dick boyfriend who wasn't really a boyfriend? Did Nate actually call the cops or was that a lie?
Overall, this novel is a quick read and easy to get sucked into, which is great. I just wish there were more answers in the end instead of an abrupt, quick wrap up that doesn't address the greater parts of the novel.
The Girl in the Headlines is a gripping novel that's full of tension. I didn't want to put it down as I read it because I was dying to know what was going to happen next. I particularly enjoyed how quickly the action happened, simply because I really, REALLY wanted to know what was next and whether Andi was the actual killer. The ambiguity is nice all throughout, and I liked the theme of belonging the novel embraces. That being said, I predicted the ending, which isn't always a bad thing or a criticism. The ending is also a bit abrupt and wraps up too nicely. Honestly, I wanted to see what happened AFTER Andi is cleared as the killer. There are a lot of unanswered questions that really could have benefited from having some sort of resolution. Like, what happens with her friend Lynelle? Lynelle was so quick to throw Andi under the bus, so what's going to happen? Will she apologize to Andi? Will Andi be done with her? Why was Jerry at the house and why did he lie to the police? What about the dick boyfriend who wasn't really a boyfriend? Did Nate actually call the cops or was that a lie?
Overall, this novel is a quick read and easy to get sucked into, which is great. I just wish there were more answers in the end instead of an abrupt, quick wrap up that doesn't address the greater parts of the novel.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 16, 2021
ORIGINAL POST: http://www.nerdprobs.com/books/book-r...
**A copy of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.**
I have read four other Hannah Jayne books before. Some I loved and some I thought were okay. This led me to have high hopes for The Girl in the Headlines and Hannah Jayne did not disappoint. The Girl in the Headlines brought mystery, suspense, drama, and started out instantly with a bang.
Right from the beginning the story was intense. This wasn’t a book that started slow or built up to the intense stuff. The first sentence had me hooked and Jayne kept you in her grips the entire story. We follow Andi as she wakes up covered in blood and finding the news playing on repeat that her parents have been murdered, her brother is missing and she is the prime suspect… with no memory of anything that happened. With the help of some unsuspecting strangers, Andi journeys to find what really happen.
I really enjoyed Andi as the main character. She comes from a very upper class home, but isn’t afraid to get dirty and do what is necessary. She’s not afraid of hard work. I also really like Nate. He balanced Andi out a lot during the story and I grew to love him. I’d be friends with someone like him. I also liked that I had no idea how the story was going to end. I had suspicions, but Jayne kept me guessing. Each time I thought I might know, she threw me a curveball that had me second guess my thoughts. The story flowed really well, even when Andi had flashbacks of memory. I liked how Jayne wrote in little things from Andi’s background so we understood who she was more and more as the story went along.
The Girl in the Headlines is my favorite Hannah Jayne book to date, and remember, I have read four other books by her. It was gritty, dark, twisty, and gorged full of suspense. I loved this book from cover to cover and cannot wait to see what story Jayne writes up next. Definitely read it. You will not be disappointed.
**A copy of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.**
I have read four other Hannah Jayne books before. Some I loved and some I thought were okay. This led me to have high hopes for The Girl in the Headlines and Hannah Jayne did not disappoint. The Girl in the Headlines brought mystery, suspense, drama, and started out instantly with a bang.
Right from the beginning the story was intense. This wasn’t a book that started slow or built up to the intense stuff. The first sentence had me hooked and Jayne kept you in her grips the entire story. We follow Andi as she wakes up covered in blood and finding the news playing on repeat that her parents have been murdered, her brother is missing and she is the prime suspect… with no memory of anything that happened. With the help of some unsuspecting strangers, Andi journeys to find what really happen.
I really enjoyed Andi as the main character. She comes from a very upper class home, but isn’t afraid to get dirty and do what is necessary. She’s not afraid of hard work. I also really like Nate. He balanced Andi out a lot during the story and I grew to love him. I’d be friends with someone like him. I also liked that I had no idea how the story was going to end. I had suspicions, but Jayne kept me guessing. Each time I thought I might know, she threw me a curveball that had me second guess my thoughts. The story flowed really well, even when Andi had flashbacks of memory. I liked how Jayne wrote in little things from Andi’s background so we understood who she was more and more as the story went along.
The Girl in the Headlines is my favorite Hannah Jayne book to date, and remember, I have read four other books by her. It was gritty, dark, twisty, and gorged full of suspense. I loved this book from cover to cover and cannot wait to see what story Jayne writes up next. Definitely read it. You will not be disappointed.
September 25, 2024
3/5
The books started off great. The pace was quick and it pulled you in. Then it started to slow down and I felt like I was reading myself in circles. I figured out the whodunit about halfway through the book and then impatiently read to figure out how it would end. Could have easily been a 100 pages shorter.
The books started off great. The pace was quick and it pulled you in. Then it started to slow down and I felt like I was reading myself in circles. I figured out the whodunit about halfway through the book and then impatiently read to figure out how it would end. Could have easily been a 100 pages shorter.
January 21, 2024
3.75⭐️ everything was so good! I just felt the ending was wayyyy rushed
June 20, 2021
I was intrigued by the idea of this book, though it didn’t really deliver for me.
Andrea is just eighteen. She wakes up the day after her birthday with no memory of the day before. She is in a cheap motel room, covered in blood and when she turns on the tv she learns her mum and dad have been attacked, her younger brother is missing and she is the prime suspect.
Most people would react as Andrea does and go into a complete spin. She has no reason to mistrust the police, but why would she turn herself in when she has no memory of what happened?
For no obvious reason Nate, the young boy working on reception at the motel she wakes up in, takes Andrea under his wing. He helps her to lie low as she tries to work out how to discover details that will help clear her name.
Her supposed friends are quick to condemn her, and Andrea does so many stupid things I’m unsure how the police didn’t pick her up within hours. That aside, the story rattles along quickly and there’s a couple of theories put out that we see as potentially plausible.
Just as it seems Andrea might be getting somewhere there’s a mighty coincidence too far and Andrea ends up smack bang in the middle of a very messy situation. Everything she has been told is turned upside down…but because we know so little about her it’s quite hard to summon up more than a passing interest in her situation.
There’s a dramatic climax that comes from pretty much nowhere, and though things are explained we never really get the feeling they’re resolved.
I’m grateful to NetGalley for allowing me to read this prior to publication, and I’m sure it will have some fans, but it really didn’t work for me.
Andrea is just eighteen. She wakes up the day after her birthday with no memory of the day before. She is in a cheap motel room, covered in blood and when she turns on the tv she learns her mum and dad have been attacked, her younger brother is missing and she is the prime suspect.
Most people would react as Andrea does and go into a complete spin. She has no reason to mistrust the police, but why would she turn herself in when she has no memory of what happened?
For no obvious reason Nate, the young boy working on reception at the motel she wakes up in, takes Andrea under his wing. He helps her to lie low as she tries to work out how to discover details that will help clear her name.
Her supposed friends are quick to condemn her, and Andrea does so many stupid things I’m unsure how the police didn’t pick her up within hours. That aside, the story rattles along quickly and there’s a couple of theories put out that we see as potentially plausible.
Just as it seems Andrea might be getting somewhere there’s a mighty coincidence too far and Andrea ends up smack bang in the middle of a very messy situation. Everything she has been told is turned upside down…but because we know so little about her it’s quite hard to summon up more than a passing interest in her situation.
There’s a dramatic climax that comes from pretty much nowhere, and though things are explained we never really get the feeling they’re resolved.
I’m grateful to NetGalley for allowing me to read this prior to publication, and I’m sure it will have some fans, but it really didn’t work for me.
December 26, 2022
overall i think this book was interesting but sloppy and the plot holes that were left frustrated me to no end. i think i would have really enjoyed an epilogue where they explained a few more things, and we got a little closure?
but i think one of my biggest problems with this book is the fact that the police almost instantaneously started accusing andrea of attempting to kill her parents. i thought there would be some kind of explanation for that but there wasn’t? in what world would this freshly 18 y/o girl (who is also missing) get accused of overpowering and killing her large father, her mother, and her little brother? it just made no sense to me.
while the concept was very intriguing i would have enjoyed 10-20 more pages to sew up some plot holes. hannah jayne did a pretty good job at creating suspense, but the character work was not what i would have wanted for a story like this.
i would suggest a few other books before this one.
but i think one of my biggest problems with this book is the fact that the police almost instantaneously started accusing andrea of attempting to kill her parents. i thought there would be some kind of explanation for that but there wasn’t? in what world would this freshly 18 y/o girl (who is also missing) get accused of overpowering and killing her large father, her mother, and her little brother? it just made no sense to me.
while the concept was very intriguing i would have enjoyed 10-20 more pages to sew up some plot holes. hannah jayne did a pretty good job at creating suspense, but the character work was not what i would have wanted for a story like this.
i would suggest a few other books before this one.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 5, 2024
DNF @ 61% because of so many red-herrings and plotholes. and also cause nothing was happening. Lol I went to check some Goodreads reviews and yeah, thanks guys. Now, I don't have to sit through more confusion and annoyance. I hated Andi and god, I actually wish she was the bad guy and was on some hard drugs that made her forget everything and would explain her STUPIDITY.
Anyways, what the reviews I read all lacked, were proper spoilers like who killed the dad and stuff. My advice is to skip to Chapter 51, which will give you like two answers to your fifty million questions. Answers that definitely won't satisfy you, but hey, I'm just the messenger.
But if you're lazy like me, or you've just had enough, here are the SPOILERS, I got:
Anyways, what the reviews I read all lacked, were proper spoilers like who killed the dad and stuff. My advice is to skip to Chapter 51, which will give you like two answers to your fifty million questions. Answers that definitely won't satisfy you, but hey, I'm just the messenger.
But if you're lazy like me, or you've just had enough, here are the SPOILERS, I got:
February 17, 2022
Trigger warnings: death of a parent, blood, hospitalisation of a parent, disappearance of a sibling, child abandonment (in the past), gun violence, addiction.
3.5 stars.
The concept of this? FANTASTIC. The early stages of the story were great. Andi wakes up in a motel room covered in blood with no memory of the previous day and hears on the news that her parents are dead, her brother is missing, and she's the main suspect. Like...that's a great premise. And for the most part, I enjoyed it a lot.
I did think that it stumbled in the last third as thing got a liiiiiiiittle over the top and Andi became...a little stupider in her actions. But still, I liked the writing and the story mostly played out in a satisfying way. I *did* wish there was a little more hockey-related content given how the blurb puts her hockey playing front and centre. But that's probably just my former hockey playing self speaking.
3.5 stars.
The concept of this? FANTASTIC. The early stages of the story were great. Andi wakes up in a motel room covered in blood with no memory of the previous day and hears on the news that her parents are dead, her brother is missing, and she's the main suspect. Like...that's a great premise. And for the most part, I enjoyed it a lot.
I did think that it stumbled in the last third as thing got a liiiiiiiittle over the top and Andi became...a little stupider in her actions. But still, I liked the writing and the story mostly played out in a satisfying way. I *did* wish there was a little more hockey-related content given how the blurb puts her hockey playing front and centre. But that's probably just my former hockey playing self speaking.
May 9, 2023
Eighteen year old Andi wakes up in a hotel room with no memory of how she got there or what happened the previous night until she turns on the TV and finds out that the previous night her father was murdered, her mother is in the hospital and her little brother is missing - and she’s the main suspect.
Our main character is extremely naive, a teeny bit annoying and someone who has probably heard a lot of ‘oh, honey’ in her short eighteen years. She’s out to solve the mystery of who murdered her father, injured her mother and kidnapped her brother. And with the help of the desk guy of the hotel, Nate, she finds out the room was reserved for Tim Esup. Get it? And that’s where the search began.
I feel like it made sense to have Andrea portrayed as a naive girl, not knowing too much about the police and why she can’t just go to them for help. Coming from a good family with money, she had never had a bad ordeal with the police. The portrayal of a scared, young girl was really believable and the panic attacks and paranoia played out very well for her situation. I think the ending was just a little too rushed for me and a little more explanation would have been nice.
Our main character is extremely naive, a teeny bit annoying and someone who has probably heard a lot of ‘oh, honey’ in her short eighteen years. She’s out to solve the mystery of who murdered her father, injured her mother and kidnapped her brother. And with the help of the desk guy of the hotel, Nate, she finds out the room was reserved for Tim Esup. Get it? And that’s where the search began.
I feel like it made sense to have Andrea portrayed as a naive girl, not knowing too much about the police and why she can’t just go to them for help. Coming from a good family with money, she had never had a bad ordeal with the police. The portrayal of a scared, young girl was really believable and the panic attacks and paranoia played out very well for her situation. I think the ending was just a little too rushed for me and a little more explanation would have been nice.
January 6, 2021
Thanks to the publisher for providing an eARC of The Girl in the Headlines in exchange for an honest review.
The Girl in the Headlines is a pretty good mystery thriller. Our protagonist wakes up in a strange room with no member of how she got there, only to realize that her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, and her little brother is missing. And she's the only suspect. The concept is great, but I wish a few more things were developed early on since I like mysteries you can follow the clues in and make guesses more than mysteries that focus more on plot twists. Andi's relationship with the secondary main character, Nate, was also extremely rushed and I think the book would have been a lot better if they had some kind of baseline relationship established before the book began.
The Girl in the Headlines is a pretty good mystery thriller. Our protagonist wakes up in a strange room with no member of how she got there, only to realize that her father is dead, her mother is in a coma, and her little brother is missing. And she's the only suspect. The concept is great, but I wish a few more things were developed early on since I like mysteries you can follow the clues in and make guesses more than mysteries that focus more on plot twists. Andi's relationship with the secondary main character, Nate, was also extremely rushed and I think the book would have been a lot better if they had some kind of baseline relationship established before the book began.
February 19, 2021
Teens will love this mystery about a teen who wakes up after her 18th birthday to learn her parents have been murdered and her little brother is missing. Andi can’t go to the CG police because she is the number one suspect in the murder. With the help of Nate, the teen who works the front desk at the motel she was dumped in, Andi vows to rescue her brother and get to the bottom of what happened to her parents. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to be an early reader in exchange for my review.
May 30, 2022
This was another page turner that I could totally imagine myself reading in middle or high school. It was fun and suspenseful.
My only complaint is that the ending was a little abrupt. Otherwise, it’s definitely a YA thriller I’d recommend.
My only complaint is that the ending was a little abrupt. Otherwise, it’s definitely a YA thriller I’d recommend.
October 20, 2021
I loved this one! It was such a thrilling read with a compelling plot and characters, and I was so consumed by it whenever I was reading it.
Andi wakes up in the morning in a motel room that she doesn’t recognize with no memories of the night before. And then she sees on the news that her parents were attacked, her younger brother is missing, and she’s a person of interest to the police. Pretty soon, she’s their number one suspect.
Andi was a fantastic character, and I loved all the moments of her trying to remember, and also her doubts about herself and what she remembered or knew. It made it feel more realistic. I also liked her relationship with Nate who works the front desk at the motel. Nate’s a complete stranger who helps Andi as she tries to clear her name and find out who hurt her parents.
The pace was really good in this one, and I felt like there was a good balance between big things and small things. The writing style was easy to follow, and I was completely hooked by the story. The answers felt satisfying, and I was surprised by the culprits, but also able to look back and find small clues to lead to them.
Andi wakes up in the morning in a motel room that she doesn’t recognize with no memories of the night before. And then she sees on the news that her parents were attacked, her younger brother is missing, and she’s a person of interest to the police. Pretty soon, she’s their number one suspect.
Andi was a fantastic character, and I loved all the moments of her trying to remember, and also her doubts about herself and what she remembered or knew. It made it feel more realistic. I also liked her relationship with Nate who works the front desk at the motel. Nate’s a complete stranger who helps Andi as she tries to clear her name and find out who hurt her parents.
The pace was really good in this one, and I felt like there was a good balance between big things and small things. The writing style was easy to follow, and I was completely hooked by the story. The answers felt satisfying, and I was surprised by the culprits, but also able to look back and find small clues to lead to them.
July 22, 2022
This book is so f*cking stupid
-Our main character was insufferable
-the romance aspect wasn’t set up properly and was not able to flourish
- you could tell who the antagonists were right away
-it was boring
-the writing style fell flat
-Our main character was insufferable
-the romance aspect wasn’t set up properly and was not able to flourish
- you could tell who the antagonists were right away
-it was boring
-the writing style fell flat
December 30, 2023
the mystery never really had me engrossed and the main female lead was REALLY annoying. For being on the run she seemed to have no common sense in regards to anything
September 9, 2024
don't even worry guys I will be getting out of my slump!!
I feel like this was overall good, but just very elongated when it shouldn't have been, with a hastened ending that left me wondering so so many things...
Andi really annoyed me #sus
I feel like this was overall good, but just very elongated when it shouldn't have been, with a hastened ending that left me wondering so so many things...
Andi really annoyed me #sus
January 31, 2022
very quick but not that good lol
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