The Name of the Star

The Name of the Star
By Maureen Johnson
G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2011. 372 pgs. Young Adult

Rory decides to spend her senior year at a boarding school in London while her parents spend their sabbatical in England. Feeling uncertain being in a new culture and school is bad enough, but soon a Jack the Ripper copycat starts killing people and Rory and her schoolmates find themselves on lockdown. When Rory sees the same man twice near the scene of two crimes, she realizes that the friends with her cannot see him. Sensing something is amiss and that one of her roommates might know the truth, Rory follows her roommate and discovers a startling truth. Armed with this new knowledge, Rory works with a few others to stop the copycat Jack the Ripper.

This didn’t work for me as well as I had hoped. The writing was flat, certainly not “gorgeous” as a blurb claims it to be. The mystery is somewhat interesting and Rory has the potential to be a great character, but it didn’t come together in this.

MN