We are back again with our Pretty Little Liars. And we have quite a few things to unpack so let’s get down to business shall we?

First off, Aria. Her drama didn’t really add anything to the main story so we can talk about it briefly. Basically, Ezra comes back. Yeah I know. I thought we were done with him but no, Aria sends him an email saying she misses him and next thing you know, he’s back in Rosewood.

He is still his old creepy self and it turns out while he and aria were apart he has written a book about her! And instead of Aria finding this really inappropriate and weird she loves it and thinks it’s romantic. Ugh. I admit it’s only marginally less creepy than in the TV show because at least he didn’t know Aria was a minor when they met and wasn’t obsessed with her because of Alison. But even then…a teacher writing a love story about his student is crossing so many lines.

It’s kind of brushed off as no big deal though because when Aria says she has some criticisms about it, Ezra turns into a whiny defensive baby and won’t listen to her. So there’s that.

Plus when Ezra suggests the idea of Aria introducing him to everyone as her boyfriend he doesn’t see any problem with it. Like yeah okay he’s not her teacher anymore but everyone in Rosewood knows he used to be. He doesn’t see anything wrong with the situation yet Aria sees some sense to it and doesn’t think it’s a good idea.

Again Ezra gets pissy about this with Aria and so they break up lol. Good riddance. Not to mention Ezra ends up making out with Klaudia, the Finnish exchange student who Aria accidentally pushed off a ski lift lol. Looks like Ezra will always be a creeper hitting on minors. Well it’s stated Aria is eighteen in this book but even then that doesn’t really make it okay.

And at the end of all that Aria and Noel get back together. So really Aria’s storyline amounted to nothing. Boring.

Hanna’s story is also in the love department as she starts a romance with the son of her dad’s political enemy. It’s supposed to be romantic and all star crossed lovers until Hanna sees a news article about him being a serial dater. Yawn. To get back at him she decides to tell her dad the drama she found out from the guy she was seeing. Oops. That’ll teach him not to mess with Hanna.

Didn’t get to see the fallout of what her dad will do with the information but I imagine it’s coming. So I guess we sit tight and see. Kate doesn’t even use this information against Hanna because apparently she’s been cheated on before too so I guess that’s nice?

Then there is Spencer and Emily. They are tied together this time around because of one girl. Kelsey.

In this book we find out that Spencer had spent the summer on some pills trying to ace her AP classes to get into Princeton. Her and her friend Kelsey got hooked on them and while all of Spencer’s other friends thought it was a bad idea, she didn’t listen.

Unluckily for Spencer, the girls get caught by the police with the pills and so Spencer decides to save her ass by getting Hanna to plant the drugs in Kelsey’s room and pin the whole thing on her. Harsh.

Spencer thought she was free from that whole situation and that she was getting into Princeton early admission. Only she gets a letter to say that there was a mix up and they accidentally accepted two people with her name and now she needs to work extra hard to secure her place.

This sends Spencer into a whole guilt trip frenzy as she channels her guilt of what she did to Kelsey into her performance of Lady McBeth. All for her to find out that A was messing with her. Cool.

Another reason Spencer was spiralling is because Kelsey reappeared in her life after leaving juvie. She is back at school and working on some orchestra thing with Amelia, Spencer’s step sister to be, so Spencer is constantly on edge. She also believes that Kelsey is A, especially after stealing her phone and finding out that she was in Jamaica that spring break. So she thinks Kelsey saw what happened, figured out Spencer is why she went to juvie and is out for revenge.

It’s a bit far fetched considering the other girls weren’t really involved in the drug bust, well Hanna was but how was Kelsey meant to know? But at the same time it makes more sense than other A theories that floated about on the TV show.

Spencer tells the girls her theory and shows them a picture of Kelsey to be on the lookout and this is when Emily discovers she knows her.

Emily ended up going to a party and meeting Kelsey. The two hit it off right away and were having a good time and it looked like Kelsey could have been Emily’s new love interest. It turns out Emily has a thing for bold women who are a little daring and a little dangerous. Who knew?

But then Spencer and Emily fight about Emily spending time with Kelsey and then Emily ends up telling Kelsey that Spencer is the one that turned her in for the drugs and sent her to juvie. Uh oh.

Spencer then gets a text from A which contains a photo of Tabitha on the beach in Jamaica the night that Aria pushed her and she thinks Kelsey is the one that sent it. Especially when she runs into Kelsey and she asks Spencer if she got her text, this leads to Spencer attacking Kelsey making her look like a psycho.

This then sends Kelsey off the rails and she drives Emily out to the quarry – the same one where Mona tried to kill Spencer – and it looks like Kelsey is trying to kill Emily in the same way…until it is revealed that Kelsey is trying to kill herself?

So the girls theory about her being A is wrong. Naturally I didn’t think Kelsey was A but the girls did have every right to believe that she was. Turns out that Kelsey ended up relapsing on drugs after finding out Emily was friends with Spencer and was mad at her for keeping a secret. Things spiralled out of control for her when she found out that Spencer sent her away to juvie. But the girls ended up saving Kelsey’s life and she wrote them apology letters for what happened.

Kelsey ends up being put into the Preserve, the same institution where Courtney/Alison once stayed and that Hanna also had a stint in. They also discover that Tabitha went there too…so many coincidences. And of course A is still around so it’s not going to be that easy to get rid of her.

And that is where we end things. Naturally it got a bit dramatic at the end but I think it was lacking something for me, I guess I just wasn’t convinced that Kelsey would suddenly be so sucidial? It seemed out of left field for me but yeah.

Oh! And also they keep mentioning Aria doing something unspeakable in Iceland and I hope we find out that soon. I also feel like there’s more to the Emily pregnancy story that we are missing. She can’t just give up a baby at sixteen and go back to life like nothing happened, especially not with A around…so yeah lots of mysteries still be to revealed. Fingers crossed they are good reveals because I’ve been enjoying them so far.

After two months we are back with some more Pretty Little Liars! And the tea is GOOD so let’s dive in.

The story starts off with our four favourite girls, Spencer, Aria, Emily and Hanna on spring break vacation in Jamaica they are having the best time until a blonde girl at the resort catches their eye. Each girl has an interaction with this blonde who goes by Tabitha and they can’t help but feel there is something familiar about her…she reminds them of Alison – not their Alison, the one they were friends with and died, but Alison the twin who tried to kill them in a fire months before…yikes.

Fast forward to a year later and the girls have drifted apart after their holiday, it is clear something happened between them and this Tabitha girl but we don’t know what yet. And even if A has disappeared from their lives the girls aren’t exactly having a good time they all are facing their own issues as always because being a teenager is hard.

Though to be honest, the person that was probably having the worst time of it is Emily so we can talk about her first. Naturally, she seems to be the one we feel the most sorry for after the whole Alison thing because Emily was in love with her.

But not only that but the biggest bomb about Emily was dropped so casually in this book like while the girls are in Jamaica, Emily is assumed to have some sort of food poisoning or something as she is always throwing up. And it is also mentioned that she quit swimming again for a while which seems unlike her. I mean she was going to quit for five minutes when she started dating Maya but that didn’t go anywhere. Turns out the reason she was being sick is because she had morning sickness and that she actually ended up getting PREGNANT when she slept with Isaac that one time so she had a baby!! LIKE WHAT?! I was not expecting that, honestly, I was so shocked. Naturally, it’s a big secret – one that Emily wouldn’t want people to find out not even her parents know, she spent the summer with her sister so she is the only one that knew. Well, until Emily told her new best friend Chloe.

Chloe is a new girl in town and she moved into the Cavanaugh house. Spooky. As we know both of the Cavanaugh children died which is wild like first Toby committing suicide and then Alison killing Jenna…no wonder the parents wanted to get out of town. Anyway, Chloe and Emily hit it off really well and become friends. Chloe confides to Emily that she had a bit of a drinking problem before which is her big secret but not exactly on the same scale as Emily’s.

The two don’t really stay friends for long though, because it turns out Chloe’s dad is a proper predator. Like this just seems to be a bit of a theme in Rosewood and should we even be surprised? But basically, Chloe’s dad says he can help Emily get a swimming scholarship and he does, but he also makes a move on Emily and it is so gross. So Chloe sees Emily and her dad in a comprising position and as always blames the victim aka Emily. Which puts the girls on the rocks. Emily begs Chloe to keep her baby secret and she agrees but only if Emily keeps the secret about her dad being a creep…and that’s where we leave them. Not sure what comes of any of this but I imagine it’ll blow up soon enough.

Especially because A comes back to threaten the girls after Jamaica. We all know with A around secrets don’t stay buried for long…

But let’s move on to Spencer. Her mom is dating someone new, Mr Pennythistle. We hate him from the get-go naturally. He has two children, one is Amelia who is the younger sister and a brown-noser and annoying and the other is Zach who is a year or two older than Spencer. Spencer and Zach end up hitting it off right away and we see some weird flirtation happening between the two basically step-siblings…gross.

We find out after Spencer tries to kiss Zach that he is actually gay. Or so he says, I think he’s still trying to figure it out. But the night that Veronica and Mr Pennythistle announce their engagement, Spencer and Zach get drunk and pass out in Zach’s hotel room together. Mr Pennythistle finds them the next morning and freaks out about the situation since now they really are going to be step-siblings. Spencer thinks the best way to solve the solution is to out Zach to his father but instead of Mr Pennythistle being relieved he is actually just angrier and naturally, Zach isn’t too happy either.

Where we leave this mess is that Mr Pennythistle is sending his son to military school because he’s a clear homophobe and Spencer feels terrible. I am not sure if Veronica is still going to go through with the engagement but she probably will. She tells Spencer that it’s not their place but if they’re all about to become a family it kind of is their place…so yeah we see what happens with that.

Next, we have Hanna whose Dad is running for state senate or something? Seems a bit random, not that I really remember what he did before that. Anyway, the family films an advert for the campaign and it turns out audiences really responded to Hanna as they find her more relatable than Kate who seems too perfect. This is great news for Hanna but it’s not all great.

At the taping of the advert, Hanna meets this photographer guy who says she would make a good model, so she decides to meet up with him and get some photos taken. Totally innocent right? Well Mike – her boyfriend, because who can forget she’s dating Mike Montgomery? – thinks it’s a bad idea and they break up. Which is sad, But Hanna thinks she’s justified when the photoshoot with the photographer goes well.

Until she ends up back at the guy’s studio and she’s goofing around and her dress slips down and the guy gets some sleazy shots of her with her bra out. This leads him to blackmail Hanna with the photos because the last thing she needs is this getting out and ruining her dad’s campaign.

Hanna decides to pay the guy off using money from her dad’s campaign and she ends up blaming someone who works on the campaign for the missing money. She thinks she’s gotten away with it and all is well, but no this is A country we live in. And she is more than ready to expose Hanna as the thief and liar she is. Super fun.

And that brings us to Aria. Oh, Aria ended up in one of the worst positions right up there with Emily. At first, it seems petty, Noel’s family is hosting a foreign exchange student for a while and it turns out to be a European Goddess named Klaudia. This doesn’t make Aria feel good about her relationship with Noel, especially when she hasn’t slept with him yet and now he is going to be sharing a house with this blonde Finnish bombshell…not fun.

At first, Aria ends up bonding with Klaudia, she thinks they are friends and Klaudia is just misunderstood. Until she finds out that Klaudia has been texting about her and Noel to her friends back home. Turns out Aria’s suspicions were right and Klaudia thinks Noel is too good for Aria and she’s trying to steal her boyfriend. Poor girl.

This ends up with the girls fighting when the Kahn boys invite Aria and Klaudia to go skiing with them and Klaudia explains to Aria clear as day that she is going to sleep with Noel. The girls end up squabbling while on a ski lift and Aria ends up accidentally shoving Klaudia off of the lift. Yikes.

Klaudia ends up okay, well as okay as someone can be when they fall off a ski lift. Thankfully she was near the top so she only broke her leg but everything else about her is perfectly fine. Including her memory of what happened on the ski lift. So things are not looking good for Aria and Noel at least while Klaudia is around.

It is pretty harsh of Aria to push Klaudia off the ski lift but at the same time she was defending herself because Klaudia had pushed her first…still doesn’t look good to your boyfriend to find out this happened especially when Noel already thought Aria was jealous of Klaudia…so we see what happens with that. Though honestly not that interested in that drama.

Because Aria doesn’t even have time to process what goes on with Klaudia before she’s getting a text from Spencer telling her to come over quickly because the girls are finally going to have to face up to what happened in Jamaica.

Turns out that after the girls encountered Tabitha in Jamaica she had invited them out to a crow’s nest lookout point at the resort. The girls decide to go and see what she wants and it seems to them that Tabitha really is Alison in disguise and she has brought them to the top of this resort to finish what she started when she started that fire and kill them once and for all.

Before this happens, Aria ends up pushing Tabitha over the edge first and the girls scramble to the beach to find the body but there was none…until now. A year later, there is a breaking news story about a body being found in the water in Jamaica. The body belonged to a girl who really was called Tabitha and she was apparently from New Jersey. The police are ruling her death as an accident but it doesn’t make the girls feel any better about the situation.

Now they know they didn’t kill Alison and that it was just some innocent girl…yikes. And naturally, A is there to remind the girls that she’s just getting started.

So yeah, a lot to unpack in this one. Mainly, who was this Tabitha girl? Was it Alison? Or was it someone Alison paid to antagonize the girls for her? It’s clear to me Alison didn’t die in the fire like everyone suggested but where is she now? And is she A? I mean I wouldn’t put it past Alison to hire some girl to pretend to be her in front of her old friends and not even bat an eye that she ended up dead. After all, she killed her own twin, Ian and Jenna so I mean it’s plausible.

Regardless of what the truth is, I’m kind of glad to be back in the PLL world I missed it. I mean thought the series was wrapped up pretty nicely before so I wasn’t sure what was coming next for the girls but I am really enjoying it. I thought it might feel a bit tired or unnecessary but the new mystery has me intrigued. We will see where it ends up this time but it’s safe to say I am fully invested in finding out.