All Fall Down by Ally Carter

All Fall Down by Ally Carter
"Grace Blakely is absolutely certain of three things:

1. She is not crazy.
2. Her mother was murdered.
3. Someday she is going to find the killer and make him pay.

As certain as Grace is about these facts, nobody else believes her -- so there's no one she can completely trust. Not her grandfather, a powerful ambassador. Not her new friends, who all live on Embassy Row. Not Alexei, the Russian boy next door, who is keeping his eye on Grace for reasons she neither likes nor understands.

Everybody wants Grace to put on a pretty dress and a pretty smile, blocking out all her unpretty thoughts. But they can't control Grace -- no more than Grace can control what she knows or what she needs to do. Her past has come back to hunt her . . . and if she doesn't stop it, Grace isn't the only one who will get hurt. Because on Embassy Row, the countries of the world stand like dominoes, and one wrong move can make them all fall down."- summary from Amazon

Oh, I have missed Ally Carter's writing; I didn't know how much though until I started reading All Fall Down. I've read several of Carter's books, and kind of lost track of her two series and I may need to go back and read more while I wait for the second book of this new series Embassy Row.

It's everything you expect from an Ally Carter book- high stakes situations, lots of humor, and quite a few hot guys. The difference with this book though is that it's definitely darker than her previous books and deals with the main character's mental instability extremely well. Grace vacillates between being so convinced of what happened and being so doubtful of her memories, and what really happened is a huge twist, which Carter handles deftly. The reader really goes along on this roller coaster of a ride, and I really felt for Grace and what she went through.

Of course, there's also a great cast of characters, which Carter is also very good at developing. These are characters you immediately want to spend time with and get to know. The interactions just flow so well and make the novel go by way too fast. I particularly loved the main group of friends Grace makes on Embassy Row- Noah (LOVE!), Rosie, and Megan; they're all incredibly smart, funny, and all-around amazing.

Overall, a fantastic start to a new series and I am extremely eager to get my hands on Book 2. Go out and buy this book now!

FTC: Received ARC from publisher. Link above is an Amazon Associate link; any profit goes toward funding contests.