What a great idea for a novel. I am a huge fan of Helter Skelter and have been obsessed with the Manson murders since I was a teen, so I saw so much promise in investigating a teen girl finding her way through the scope of this fascinating tragedy. 
 But in the end, this book just proved why YA can be bad and not suitable for adults in search of good writing. The characters were despicable and the writing was poor. Anna tells you, in uninspired teen talk, everything she is thinking. 
 It felt like my mom, my dad, my sister, they could all just take one relationship, trash it, and go on to the next thing, start building again, and expect everyone else to be excited. To throw a freaking party. But what about me? I was the leftover from my mom's second marriage, about to get promoted to being the leftover from my dad's first. 
 Anna has no self-awareness or inner inspection, and I find that excruciating and unbelievable. I also felt like I was supposed to pity her, and I did not. I felt like I was supposed to see parallels to the girls taken by Manson, but I did not. Not really. Not in an interesting way. In a "teens sometimes go through confusing emotions" kind of way. 
 Everything was tied up in an unbelievable rom-com bow. 
 "What are you going to do?" 
 "I don't know," he said. "I think I'm going to apply to colleges next year, see if I'm good at anything." Then he smiled again and looked me dead in the eyes. "Or maybe I'll just do more of this?" Then he leaned his body into mine and kissed me again. If those were his future plans, they were find by me. 
 Ew. I didn't even want this romance to happen because I wanted so badly for someone to see what a horrible person Anna was. I was not rooting for her. 
 There were parts that I thought could be funny (Anna befriending the teen stars of a dumb sitcom Chips Ahoy!, which I actually feel like is a real show?) and reading about Hollywood and LA is so fun. But basically nothing that happened would ever happen. 
 I am tired of adults in YA being so gross and self-involved. They're so black and white! They're either totally cool and perfect or blame their children for their problems and become totally negligent. (In this book, it's the later. And I'm not even reading between the lines, here. That message is beat down on the reader's head.) 
 This was just so disappointing. Read Emma Cline's The Girls instead.