CBR4 Book 67: "Becoming Bindy Mackenzie" by Jaclyn Moriarty

Page count: 496 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: June 20th, 2012
Date finished: June 21st, 2012

Because it's been nearly three months since I read the book, I'm going to include the book blurb from the author's own website:

The Motive
Bindy Mackenzie is the most perfect girl at Ashbury High. She scores in the 99.99th percentile in all her classes. She holds lunchtime advisory sessions for her fellow students. She keeps careful transcripts of everything said around her. And she has been Kmart casual Employee of the Month for seventeen months straight. No wonder somebody wants to kill her.

The Suspects
Bindy is horrified to learn that she must take part in the Friendship and Development project - a new class meant to provide a "life raft" through "the tricky seas of adolescence". Bindy can't see how airheaded Emily Thompson, absentminded Elizabeth Clarry, mouthy Toby Mazzerati, malicious Astrid Bexonville, silent Briony Atkins, narcissistic Sergio Saba and handsome, enigmatic Finnegan Blonde could ever possibly help her. (Well, maybe Finnegan could).

The Crime
But then Bindy's perfect life begins to fall apart. She develops an obsession with the word "Cincinatti". She can't stop feeling sleepy. She fails an exam for the first time ever. And - worst of all - she just doesn't care. What could be the cause of all these events? Is it conspiracy? Is it madness? Is it...murder?

The Truth
Lots of people hate Bindy Mackenzie - but who would actually kill her? The answer is in Bindy's transcripts. The detectives are the members of her FAD group. But Bindy has made every one of them into an enemy...and time is running out. 

Another great book in the Ashbury/Brookfield series, written entirely in diary entries, notes, e-mails and quite a lot of Bindy's insanely detailed transcripts. This may have been the hardest of the books for me to get into, because Bindy really is a rather unlikable girl, even though she is completely oblivious to the fact. However, Moriarty is a gifted storyteller, and soon, I couldn't help but feel sorry for Bindy and got caught up in the mystery at the centre of the novel. Is someone actually trying to kill Bindy? Or has the pressure of being the cleverest girl in school finally got to her, and she's losing her mind as a result?

Moriarty has done a brilliant job of continuing her epistolary style, while creating an engaging suspense/mystery novel for teenagers. Yet again she brilliantly depicts teenage life, and I'm so glad I discovered these books. I still have one more to go in the series, and I'm saving it until the days get long and dark, so I have something to comfort myself with.