In this one, we finally figure out what Aria did in Iceland. Took them long enough. And honestly? Feels kind of out of character for her and I didn’t like it. I mean sure, everyone else’s secret was a bit wild but I don’t know Aria’s wasn’t my favourite.
So while she was in Iceland, she ended up talking to this guy Olaf and he was telling her about this rare Van Gogh painting that some rich person kept to themselves so they decided to steal it.
I guess it is fitting to Aria’s personality but like I couldn’t see her actually stealing something lol. Anyway yeah, so Aria bails when alarms sound and Hanna comes to her rescue. She never hears from Olaf again until A sends her an article that he is missing. Yikes.
It wasn’t my favourite storyline but basically, A gives Aria a forgery of the Van Gogh making her believe it’s the one that was stolen and she was going to jail. Naturally, nothing else comes of this, it’s just something to make Aria sweat.
While this is going on, the girls all decide to get away from A by meeting up in this panic room at a property Spencer’s soon-to-be stepdad owns. They also get burner phones so that A is not able to text them anymore because that always works so well. A does manage to contact them a few times in the real world without text though because A is unstoppable.
The girls also decide to step up their game in finding out who A is. Well, they think it’s Alison, but they figure she has to be getting help since she can’t do everything alone. So their main suspect is Noel and I’m not gonna lie he has made the most sense. Plus he was shady on the TV show so I wouldn’t be surprised if he was involved. But Noel is Aria’s boyfriend so she refuses to believe he is suspicious. Even if he did sign her up to be the host of the prom decorating committee where the theme is Starry Night, exactly like the painting she supposedly stole in Iceland.
To help get more information, Spencer decides to reach out to this conspiracy theory blog that was writing about Alison’s disappearance case. Seems hella sketchy and suspicious but Spencer thinks this guy is legit and he provides some useful information to her.
For example, he says that since Alison managed to escape the fire, she probably needed medical attention and had someone helping her privately since she couldn’t go to the hospital. They go investigate where a private nurse is supposed to live but it ends up being a trap. This is when Spencer wonders if maybe Chase, the guy who runs the blog, isn’t who he says he is.
Things escalate further with them when Spencer begins to suspect he is A after he reveals he knew about Jamaica, even though Spencer had never told him that. So she runs away from him on the way to prom lol.
In the end, Chase reveals he is not who he said he was, he is actually Chase’s brother who is pretending to be him because the real Chase is embarrassed about his scars from when he was attacked by his own stalker in the past. It’s so farfetched and I’m rolling my eyes at this story but Spencer seems to forgive Chase, especially when he has evidence Alison might be alive. His evidence is some blurry surveillance video stills of someone who vaguely resembles Alison, not exactly solid proof but it’s something. It’s enough to get him back in Spencer’s good books anyway.
As for Emily, she’s decided to break Iris out of the Preserve because if anyone was going to know something it was going to be her. Iris was Alison’s former roommate at the Preserve as well as Hanna’s. At first, I did think Emily was going to fall for Iris too because that’s just what she does but the two remain platonic and even kind of friends.
At first, I didn’t want to trust Iris, I mean she seemed like the kind of person to take advantage of Emily and she was sort of but I was waiting for when she made a break for it and didn’t want to return to the Preserve or something dramatic. But really, she just wanted to live a bit of life and have fun, and I guess shoplift lol but hey, it could have been worse.
Iris reveals to Emily that Alison had a boyfriend when she was at the Preserve, she never mentioned his name but Iris would know him if she saw him. Iris said she only ever met him once, and it isn’t until they are at prom when Iris sees Noel’s prom king photo that she tells Emily that’s who Alison was dating. Yikes. A big red flag against Noel.
Meanwhile, Hanna has volunteered at the burn clinic again because that was where Graham – Tabitha’s ex from the cruise ship – was staying and the girls wanted to be the first ones to know when he woke up so they could find out what he was trying to tell Aria.
While Hanna is there, she makes friends with a girl called Kayla, they seem to really hit it off and bond which is nice. Hanna tells Kayla all about being nominated for prom queen and also about how she is really concerned about her friend Graham.
Cut to prom night when Hanna gets a call about how Graham has woken up so she rushes to the burn clinic to try to speak to him, all she manages to get out of him is that the person who set the bomb off on the ship’s name began with an N. This is because shortly after this Graham dies, which is just Hanna’s luck. But also what is suspicious is that Kayla was in the room with him.
At the same time, Aria confronts Noel about Alison because she had a feeling he wasn’t being honest with her and he revealed he had visited her at the Preserve and that he felt sorry for her. He clearly didn’t know the full story, but he tried to explain what he could to Aria but she didn’t want to hear it. The other girls show up soon when they find out Aria has run off with Noel because they also think he’s dangerous and manage to rescue Aria.
The next day, Hanna goes back to the burn clinic and finds out that Kayla had actually been murdered a few days ago, her body was found at the back of the clinic. This means that the girl that Hanna was talking to wasn’t Kayla at all but actually Alison?! Damn, the plot twist I was not expecting. I can’t believe Alison would have killed someone to impersonate her at the hospital. Then again, that’s exactly something she would do because she’s psycho.
Alison also leaves a note for Hanna to go to the school so the girls decide to go but also call the police because they are worried about what they might find. What they find inside the shed is Noel Khan, tied up and badly beaten up. Yikes. Looks like he’s not part of the A team at all…
And that’s where we end things. Naturally, the girls look suspicious AF for finding Noel in that situation and they are prime suspects. And A confirms to us that there are two of them working together to take down the girls, it’s just not Noel.
At this point, I have no idea who is helping Alison. I didn’t want to believe it was Noel because when the girls guess it’s someone they are usually wrong lol but he was making the most sense. Plus he did seem suspicious but that’s because the book wants you to believe he is you know?
Based on my knowledge from the TV show I can’t picture who it could be, mainly because Wren isn’t around anymore and has no connection to Alison. It also would be weird if it was Wilden because in the books he’s not even a cop anymore and is in a relationship with Melissa lol. I don’t know anyone else that they’ve really mentioned, I mean Naomi was in the clear from the last book too. So yeah, who knows? I guess we keep reading to find out.
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