REVIEW | Marie Antoinette, Serial Killer by Katie Alender

First sentence: “In her apartment high above the streets of Paris, Gabrielle Roux stood in front of the bathroom mirror, still wearing her daringly short purple dress and sky-high platform heels.”

Marie Antoinette, Serial Killer was purely read for entertainment value. It was light and breezy; completely ridiculous; and very, very superficial. It’s not the most thought-provoking book and I was fine with that. I kind of needed that. I disliked everybody, but you know why I kept reading it? The ridiculous mystery and a secret society! MASK is about Colette Iselin who goes to Paris on a class trip, learns about gruesome murders occurring in the city, and begins to see the ghost of Marie Antoinette haunting her. She starts to investigate and realizes that her medallion has a history to it that deals with the dead queen.

Any instances where the book focuses on the ridiculous mystery and the secret society, I got incredibly giddy. I wanted to skip through the book to get to those scenes because I actually enjoyed it. The mystery is certainly not complicated, but hey, it’s better than reading about Colette bemoaning about how she’s poor or how she’s perceived by her so-called friends. I really loved when the book focused on the characters touring Paris because we get more information about this mystery about the deaths of various rich French individuals through the paintings they see in museums.

• The history.

I really enjoyed getting the bits of history about the places the characters visited. I know that some things in the history is questionable in terms of accuracy, but that doesn’t mean it makes the book less entertaining. I’m also really fascinated by family history. Seeing Colette’s ancestor’s history be told had me wanting more.

• The mystery of the secret society!

I love, love, looooveeee books with secret societies in it. I’m completely fascinated with the inner workings and to be honest, I wish I was part of one when I was in college (but I don’t think any existed there). When Colette realizes that the deaths are connected to the cornflower symbol she has seen, I was bouncing in my seat. And when “L’ordre de la Clè” (aka The Order of the Key) was said, I was shooting over the moon. I NEEDED TO KNOW MORE. I wish Marie Antoinette, Serial Killer was just about the Order of the Key. If the book was about the history of it, I would’ve enjoyed it better because I wouldn’t have to deal with any of the horrible characters.

• All the Characters!

All the characters in this book were absolutely horrible. I wanted to stab in the eyes because holy hell, they had no redeeming quality. Not even a speck in their entire body. Everybody was either selfish, shallow, spoiled, and mean or boorrrinnngg. I couldn’t find anything that made me sympathize for them or root for them, which is probably because the characters haven’t been developed at all. We barely break the surface in their development. The only rooting I did was for Marie Antoinette’s ghost to cut off everyone’s heads, even if they had nothing to do with her death.

• Colette – I wanted to like Colette, but goddamnit, she’s so awful. Why would anybody want to be her friend? She’s selfish and stuck-up; she feels entitled to have the best stuff. Her mother and brother sacrificed something to keep her in her fancy private school and pay for her Paris trip. And you know what she does? Absolutely disregard what they have done for her. She only cares about appearances, especially how she looks to her friends, which angers me a lot because your friends would not really care what/who you like and would accept you for who you are. Colette is extremely annoying and superficial, always complaining about how poor she is and how her friends wouldn’t approve of the people/things she likes. I don’t care to dwell on her anymore.
• Hannah – I can’t describe how much I hate her. She’s your stereotypical rich, beautiful mean girl who gets everything she wants and if she doesn’t, she’d manipulate people until she gets her way. She was extremely obnoxious with her unnecessary comments whenever the class did touristy things on the agenda. Why did she even go to Paris? She knew they were going to do these things. I was really disappointed with her. I wanted to see a glimmer of goodness in her or see a bit of vulnerability in her, but nope. She was extremely one-dimensional like all the characters. She didn’t bring anything to the book except to show that Colette is slighter better person, but barely.
• Jules – A French guy who dressed like an any other American? That’s fine. He likes history? Awesome! (I like dudes who like history.) BUT, he is sooooo boring. Having your personal tour guide take you around Paris and to his family’s house to eat is cute and all, but it doesn’t evoke me to fall over my feet for him. You know how the synopsis tells us that he helps Colette find out what is happening? Super misleading, ya’ll! He doesn’t play that big of a role (like how it’s implied). Yes, he does help her by enlightening her about Marie Antoinette’s history, but the real important stuff like the symbol that’s on Colette’s medallion and in Versailles? All Audrey. She and Armand was more instrumental to Colette’s investigation than Jules. I’m not even going to acknowledge the dumb attempt of a romance in this book.

Marie Antoinette, Serial Killer is one-dimensional story that makes me want to skip all the parts that does not talk about the secret society and the mystery because everything else annoyed the shit out of me. (I’m pretty you’d hate Colette as much as I do.) Aim your expectations low for this book because if it’s high, you’ll get angry. Don’t read this book seriously. Just take it as it is – a ridiculous story about a girl in Paris who finds out that she’s connected to Marie Antoinette somehow and finds out why Marie Antoinette’s ghost has been killing people.