Luckiest Girl Alive

Spoiler Alert: Your past can define you - unless it doesn't break you first.

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Having been compared to Gone Girl, and Girl on the Train, this thriller deserves its own recognition. Exciting, twisted and dark, there is much more than meets the eye with this story. To describe this book (without giving too much away) I would say it is Heathers mixed with Girl on the Train, with just a bit of Mean Girls, and contains heavy parallels to the real life events at Columbine in 2001. Luckiest Girl Alive, proved that what you see on the surface can be very much deceiving. The story follows TifAni FaNelli and the perspective of the story switches back and forth between her 14 year-old self, who faces some very traumatic obstacles, and present day self, in which she has “everything.” I like the perspective change because, well, naturally her view as a teenager interested me the most. However both points of view, offered a twisted, dark, and witty narration of her life and the doubts she has. I recently finished J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye ( one of my favorites, review will be up soon) and I couldn't help but notice similarities in Holden and TifAni's view points. Both are pessimistic and even depressed at times, however they put on an act for those around them. They are also both extremely intuitive and observant -- they know what makes people tick. I just thought that was an observation worth saying. But back to the story -- In her past, TifAni is put through something no one should be put through, and after surviving is dubbed the “Luckiest Girl Alive.” So lucky in fact, it’s suspicious. The book was interesting, perplexing, and tragic. Tragic what Ani had gone through, and tragic that she thinks she has to “have it all” in order to truly be safe. In the end she leaves her fiancé, who never understood, and decided she didn’t need to be "Ani Harrison" anymore - a version of herself she'd dreamt up in hopes of finally putting her past behind her. Instead she realizes that her past defines her - and she can't pretend it never happened. She made the brave decision to be herself, good and bad, and face what happened. Although I liked this ending, her being strong and turning away from the easiest fate, I wanted more closure. I had to tie up loose ends in my own head -- but I think that was the whole idea. The Luckiest Girl alive is one of my personal favorites - 10/10 would recommend. The title actually is insanely ironic if you think about it, because it had me thinking and probably all other girls after reading TifAni's story, that I was the luckiest girl alive.

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Favorite quotes: “Moving on doesn’t mean you don’t talk about it. Or hurt about it. It’s always going to hurt,” ~~ “All my life, I’ve found it difficult to advocate for myself, to ask for what I want. I fear burdening people so much.” ~~ “My favorite strategy is to feign inferiority and encourage my enemy’s arrogance.” ~~ “Sometimes I feel like a windup doll, like I have to reach behind and turn my golden key to produce a greeting, a laugh, whatever the socially acceptable reaction should be.” ~~ “But faith doesn’t mean that to me anymore. Now it means someone seeing something in you that you don’t, and not giving up until you see it too.” ~~ “That would be the most surprising lesson I’d learn at Bradley: You only scream when you’re finally safe.” ~~ “It’s okay to be insufferable as long as you’re aware that you’re being insufferable. At least that’s how I justified it to myself.”