Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart

The story of a young woman whose diabolical smarts are her ticket into a charmed life. But how many times can someone reinvent themselves? You be the judge. Imogen is a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook, and a cheat. Jule is a fighter, a social chameleon, and an athlete. An intense friendship. A disappearance. A murder, or maybe two. - Publisher's blurb

To start off with I was very confused. The book seems to start almost at the end, and works its way back to the beginning, although it seems to leap all over the place at different points of the story in order to keep certain parts a mystery for as long as possible. Normally I hate this in books, and while I still don’t love this style of writing, I couldn’t put the book down. It does mean that you might read a whole chapter thinking ‘This is pointless. What does this have to do with anything?’ And you don’t find out until the next chapter why you had to sit through all of that. So it definitely has its flaws.

Also, Jule the narrator is completely unreliable! And a pretty awful human being. But to be honest almost everyone in this book is, so I guess it is to be expected.
So Genuine Fraud is basically the Talented Mr Ripley. Only starring a female and written for teens.

Posted by Sas

Catalogue link: Genuine Fraud