Offering four equally sympathetic viewpoints, Knowles (Lessons from a Dead Girl) eloquently expresses the pain of lost innocence (“Their words made me feel beautiful. Irresistible. Even powerful ...

Knowles promises more than she delivers in her first novel, which opens with a bold move. Leah Greene is dead; “It's over,” says the 17-year-old narrator, Lainey, in the first chapter.