I read The Cheerleaders while working an 80+ hour week, during which I got to do my actual work of teaching English for not quite 6 hours per week. It was… not a great time. Let’s just say I really valued the short snatches of reading that week, and this was a great pageturning story to read in an exhausting work-sleep-work cycle.

Five years ago, a series of tragedies killed the entire Sunnybrook cheerleading team. With a high body count, there are bound to be some gross moments. Not gonna lie, this pushed the boundaries for me (remember, I have a really low tolerance for guts and gore) but by the time a murder was described, I was already sucked in by the mystery and the main character, Monica. Monica’s the little sister of one of the dead cheerleaders, and she’s torn between wanting to investigate here suspicions and not wanting to ever think about what happened, which makes a pretty compelling protag.

The Cheerleaders has a Pretty Little Liars or People Like Us feel. Teen friendships and secrets take the forefront, and I actually believed in the friendships here.  I also liked how almost everyone kept quiet about all the really messed up deaths in their perfect small town. I really like manners novels and I really like mysteries, and this combines two styles I like, with everyone pretending things are fine and carefully never mentioning the Really Huge Secrets.