Deadly

“No one here gets out alive.”

First priority is once again to explain what the hell was going on at the end of the last book, whilst simultaneously trying to add all the new gibberish we’ve learned into the increasingly unlikely back-story. Aria interrogates Noel in his hospital bed with the assistance of a cardiac monitor which doubles as a true-love lie detector and flashes hearts whenever he talks about Ali, which is presumably standard medical equipment in Rosewood. Apparently he has been secretly seeing Ali for years, throughout the incarceration in the Plot-Creating-Teen-Girl-Mental-Institute up the road, the part when her evil twin sister stole her life, the murder of Courtney-when-she-was-Ali, the investigation of Ali’s murder and the numerous blackmail plots, but didn’t mention it so as not to cause trouble. Personally if I was visiting a girl half a mile from her home whilst the investigation of her murder was happening next door, I might think of speaking up. But not Noel. It was too much of a bother.

Luckily we don’t have to think too hard about this gibberish, as it doesn’t matter anymore since we’ve started a new book. All that matters is that it wasn’t Noel helping Ali after all, it was one of the other secret boyfriends she was seeing whilst concealed from the world for 4 years in an asylum. But who? All we know about “Helper A” (yes, we’re officially calling them that) is that they have a deep voice and their name begins with N. Unless of course they have been using an alias whilst committing the series of heinous crimes attributed to them. In which case, it doesn’t.

So, the investigation begins. Spencer and her internet boyfriend Chase go and search an empty house which Chase suspects Ali is at, because he saw it on the web or summat. She isn’t, although her evil laugh is. Hanna sleeps with her sex-beast boyfriend Mike as a reward for him working out after only six books that Ali is still alive and stalking them. This in mainly notable for it being described as both Hanna and Mike’s first time, which is news to me. Not in the case of Mike, he is exactly the type of misogynist tragedy case who I would expect to remain a virgin indefinitely. But if Hanna is still a virgin then I’ve been seriously misreading these books. Meanwhile Emily goes to the mental institute apparently just to ask the staff if they know who “Helper A” is, which they don’t. However she does learn that Iris the random mad girl has disappeared. Which in fairness is hardly out of character. And Aria decides to escape the ‘A’s by going to Amsterdam, forgetting that her omniscient and eternally funded enemy has already proved able to follow her anywhere, however unlikely it might seem to the reader and/or possessor of common sense. But as it turns out she gets arrested almost immediately for crimes against narrative and character, so that’s the end of that plan. Meanwhile great chunks of each chapter are taken up with flatly re-stating all the many, many stupid things that have already happened, thereby reminding me how ridiculous this story is. Why does Shepard even want me to keep up with her? Surely droning on and on about all the idiotic, evil and inexplicable things Ali has done over the course of these books only serves to emphasise the complete illogicality of events? Why is any of this happening anyway? Ali apparently didn’t even know the PLLs, since it turns out that the whole time they were friends with her she was actually her own evil twin. Why doesn’t she spend some time destroying the parents who had her committed, or her super-loving brother who didn’t notice that she’d been swapped with her twin and then suddenly disappeared from the story? Why won’t it just stop?

But it doesn’t. It just gets stupider. The residents of Rosewood are out in force waving placards and protesting about the local serial killer, even though I’m pretty sure serial killing is already illegal and therefore a protest is somewhat superfluous. The local media continue aggressively harassing super-rich teen girls, even within their gated community and on the grounds of their exclusive school. Spencer gets in trouble because A has photoshopped a picture of her trashing her stepfather’s show home, using yet more of the super computer skills she developed at some unstated point. In fairness, I suppose it’s more realistic than magic hacking. Not only are Spencer’s parents not suspicious at this unsolicited photograph of their daughter but the police force also find nothing odd in an anonymous tipster informing them that she totally bought some drugs last year at some point, and rush to arrest her. They’re equally quick to respond to similarly mysterious photographs of Hanna’s stupid car accident (from which the others have been photoshopped out, for some bizarre reason) and Emily kissing a girl who may or may not be a known criminal, whilst she may or may not have been on the run. This is of course undisputable evidence of aiding and abetting, as even the FBI agree, and consequently all four of the girls are in simultaneous police custody. Again.

Once more, the police pop them all into the same cell, for ease of conspiracy. Fortunately they’re too stupid to do anything except list all the many, many things they’ve done which could have led to their arrest. Eventually Spencer suggests that they ask the FBI for immunity from prosecution for all their serious misdemeanours, in exchange for them revealing the absolutely nothing they know about Alison. Incredibly Agent Fuji immediately approves this, without checking with her superiors or questioning what the FBI will tell the many victims of the girls’ crimes. So now everything is fine, the police will catch Ali and however many helpers they now think she has, and the girls can go home, shut up and leave me alone. Which could have happened eight books ago if the girls had just gone to the police in the first place instead of committing a series of unnecessary criminal acts in order to provide fodder for blackmail.

The PLLs head home with their instantly provided 24-hour security guards to live happily ever after. This leaves us with a main storyline of Emily’s sister coming home and being mildly rude to her, which I’m not exactly on the edge of my seat about. Apparently she received a note from A saying that Emily is about to commit suicide, and has returned to check that it isn’t true. Which it isn’t. So that’s alright then. To be honest, it hasn’t been one of A’s best tricks. Meanwhile Aria gets a job in an art shop, Spencer and her boyfriend clean up a house, and Hanna’s relatives receive the same pretend threats of suicide as those of the other girls, although Hanna is the only person stupid enough to let at least one person believe they’re actually true. To be honest, this isn’t the most exciting PLL book. Meanwhile Spencer finds a keychain from some fancy car in the trashed house (a clue!), just after it’s been thoroughly checked by the forensic team.

The dullness continues. Hanna has a chat with her parents. Spencer goes for coffee with her boyfriend. Aria goes to work, and meets a sexy artist who immediately starts boasting to her about all the celebs he totally hangs with and trying to get her to sleep with him by describing her totally original “surreal” paintings of her ex in various different colours and looking a bit melty as “amazingly deep.” Hanna does a PSA about drink-driving for her father, and as an afterthought gets a bar shut down for serving her alcohol.
The threats from A keep coming, but no actions back them up. Everyone wears clothes I don’t understand (Sperry Top-Siders?) and eats things I’ve ever heard of (sugary crullers?). Spencer’s boyfriend offers to write some love poetry for her. The PLLs dream about a future where Ali is caught and they all become celebrity victims and get to go on Oprah. Then, suddenly, some action. Agent Fuji and the FBI swoop on Rosewood and arrest all 4 PLLs again, for the bloody Tabitha murder, which will never go away. Plus, dramatic revelation: the texts and letters from A have been forensically analysed and it turns out that the PLLs are all A!. Well, either that or Ali has been hacking into their phones and computers (which she has) and cunningly wearing gloves when sending blackmail notes to avoid leaving fingerprints. But that seems a bit far-fetched.

So the girls are back in custody again. Although at least this time one of the parents thinks to get them a lawyer. The other 7 parents still don’t seem terribly helpful though. The latest development is that apparently a surveillance video has turned up showing the four girls violently beating Tabi to death with pieces of driftwood. How Ali has faked this I don’t know, but I presume it involves 3 helpers (official name: “Team A”), some very good quality wigs, access to the exact clothes the girls were wearing that night and the private beach on which the murder allegedly occurred, and a desperate suspension of disbelief. To be honest it would be more realistic if I turned out that the PLLs had smashed Tabi’s head in and then forgotten about it due to group amnesia. It’s not as stupid as Hanna’s suggestion of PLL clones anyway.

Bail posted, the girls head home. Emily’s girlfriend who she may never see again due to her being on the run from the law takes time to text and tell her she’s disappointed. Not because of the murder charge. Because she’s somehow got hold of a photograph of Emily dancing with another girl, and is some type of domestically abusive control freak who thinks she has the right to get on her high horse about it. Then Emily and her sister beat each other up and in the process smash a bunch of hideous kitsch china figurines, which I think sounds quite funny, but manages to upset her mother so much she has a heart attack. Spencer’s boyfriend breaks up with her, which is presented as an equally serious problem. Hanna’s dad stops speaking to her because she’s hurt his political campaign, and also because he’s a great big baby. Emily’s criminal girlfriend is traced and arrested due to her cyber-harassing of Emily for dancing with another girl, which is somehow Emily’s fault. Aria forgets to do anything for a few chapters except consider pleading insanity, before remembering that the only mental institute in the area is chock-full of her mortal enemies. Eventually things get so bad that the girls are forced to take drastic action and ask previous suspects Melissa and Officer Wilden for help. Fortunately Wilden is more than happy to illegally access police sound-analysis software, which is available freely on the internet since his years-old password is still valid. This is not how police IT works. Ali has considerately provided a sound recording of herself laughing, as she so loves to do, with mysterious clue sounds in the background. These are crowd noise and the voice of an announcer saying “Mo Mo”. However before any further information can be gleaned the system suddenly decides Wilden is an unauthorised user and kicks him out of the software. This isn’t how any IT works.

The four idiots return home to wait and see if any more clues fall into their laps. Emily calls the mental home again and finds out that Iris is still missing and the staff still don’t know who any of Team A are. Also, she suddenly has a brother, Jake. Has he ever been mentioned before? Emily’s not interested either way since, in a plot development simultaneously incredibly predictable and totally unbelievable, she decides that she might as well actually go and kill herself, as A has been suggesting throughout the book. Accordingly she heads off to a picturesque local bridge. However her resolve has gone by the time she gets there, and she calls Spencer to come and save her from the brink of death, showing a flair for dramatics I’d not previously noticed. A lot of Emergency Services time is wasted, and Emily is fine. Then the girls suddenly think that maybe they could question Noel about the multitude of secrets he knows regarding Ali, which they have been aware of since before the book even began. After only 28 chapters! Pretty swift thinking for our beloved protagonists.

It turns out that Noel has had a secret way of contacting Ali along, but didn’t tell anyone because…I dunno. Noel is a bit weird, to be honest. He and the four PLLs immediately head off for a secret meeting with Ali at the public library, which could have been held in Chapter 1 and saved a lot of bother. However, being who they are they fuck the whole thing up completely and waste yet another chapter. Then it’s off to court. The hearing takes about 15 seconds before it’s decided that they will be extradited to Jamaica the following day after a last night of freedom at home, flights to be arranged and paid for by their families. Surely this isn’t how matters actually work in US courts? Then as they leave court the anti-murder protesters turn up again, and the girls suddenly realise that the shouted “Mo mo” on Ali’s considerate clue message was actually the first two syllables of the embarrassingly pathetic chant “No more murder!” Luckily Hanna knows exactly where the marchers were at the very minute Ali made that call many weeks previously: on the street outside her father’s offices. Which means she must still be there now! Of course!

And so the four criminals awaiting deportation and trial sneak out of their respective houses unobserved and rush off unarmed to confront Ali and her team of psycho killers. They discuss options and decide that the best plan is to break into the most suspicious-looking building on the road (i.e. the creepy, run-down one that smells of dead animals). Inside they find a man with a gun who has apparently been masquerading as every single male person any of the four girls have ever met: Jackson the bartender who served Hanna, Derrick Emily’s best friend when she lived in a completely different city, Phineas the guy who sold Spencer drugs at university, Olaf the Icelandic master criminal and Tripp, who Iris was in love with. Although actually his name is Nick. Which begins with an N. Like the clue!! There’s a brief problem when Hanna remembers that she met Olaf, and should therefore have realised that he was the same person as Jackson, but she also realises that she is too stupid to recognise people and so everything’s fine story-wise except for how the hell this guy could possibly have been in all those places at once. But before anyone can ask that Ali jumps in with a gun and demands that the chapter ends.

Ali’s plan is to gas the PLLs in the basement in front of an Ali shrine, hoping it will look like the suicide she’s been going on about for the whole book. But whilst she’s busy taunting Emily for having fancied her twin five years ago Nick manages to suffocate by accident. And then the police turn up just as everyone collapses.

It turns out that the police had been after Nick all along, even though they’d closed the case and decided that the girls had made everything up. He is now in custody but Ali has escaped and no one saw her because for fuck’s sake! Also the murder video is now a proven fake, with no explanation, and Ali has provided a new video showing Nick committing the murder, although I’m not sure why. Then we get an epilogue showing Ali escaping to her Even-More-Secret-Hideout that Nick didn’t know about, and wickedly plotting to get some plastic surgery to fix her burns and then return to destroy the PLL’s yet again. Don’t know why she didn’t do this before, since apparently Nick’s trust fund has provided her with infinite sums of money. Don’t know who Nick, Master of Disguise, was or why he decided to dedicate his life to Ali and super-evil. Don’t know what happened to the rest of “Team Ali”. Don’t know why any of this happened. Don’t care.


Worst Names
Bo (m)
River (f)
Nico (m)
Asher Trethewey (m)
Immaculata University (not a person. Just the Virgin Mary’s alma mater)
Maxine Preptwill

Most Stereotyped Depiction of a Dutch Person’s Office

The inside of the office smelled like apple pie. On the wall were drawings of the dykes around Amsterdam and a photo of a little girl in huge, yellow wooden shoes.

“a silverhaired man in a pinstriped, three-piece suit …He looked like someone out of The Sopranos”

“I invited Nico to Sunday dinner once … My parents looked at me like I was out of my mind. They were sure there was going to be a police raid on the house.”

“And you know a little Dutch, so that’s helpful.”
“I learned when I was in Iceland,” Aria boasted.

“phallic-looking pipes protruded from the back wall”

“Mr. Clark. Mr. Clark?”
… A long-haired brunette … chased a man across the lobby. When she caught up to him, he raised his face, and Hanna almost gasped.
It was Mr. Clark.”

The whole place smelled vaguely of grape Popsicles.

“when Aria was younger and afraid to go to sleep because she thought a giant eel lived in her closet.”

“Do you think he’s carrying a flamethrower?”

“When they were living in Iceland, Ella had broken her leg while trying to catch a lost baby puffin up a tree.”

“…she’d asked Aria to drive their Saab to the grocery store. Never mind that Aria was only fourteen and had never driven in her life.

“It’s chill.”

“Have you seen the prisons in Jamaica? They’re filled with snakes. And they, like, force you to do gravity bongs there. It’s one of their torture methods.”