FULL REVIEW AT THE My Precious Blog www.thecallawayfam.blogspot.com 
 SUMMARY 
 When Mallory murders her boyfriend in self defense, her life is thrown into turmoil. Her parents decide the best thing to do is send her away to a boarding school for her safety and possibly a new start. But Mallory feels a ghost-like presence haunting her, it unfortunately will not be deterred by her relocation. Of course, the girls at the new boarding school are less than welcoming. The only solace she finds is from an old family friend. But will he be enough to help her find her way back to a normal life for herself? 
 BACKGROUND 
 From Goodreads...Megan is a scientist - turned - teacher - turned stay-at-home-mom - turned -writer. She is not nearly as indecisive as she sounds. She lives near Charlotte, NC, where she volunteers as an MIT Education Counselor, does the mom thing by day and writes by night. 
 Her first novel, Fracture was published in January 2012 by Walker/Bloomsbury. Hysteria, a YA psychological thriller, will be published in February 2013. Vengeance, a companion/sequel to Fracture, will follow in 2014. 
 SETTING PACE AND STYLE 
 This book has a boarding school setting. Pacing is brisk, but plot movement suffers from lateral motion instead of marching forward in many places throughout the story. Written in a back and forth fashion, shifting from past memories of the murder to present times during the story, Hysteria sometimes is a little frustrating. The reader is left hanging, desiring more. Tones are dark and serious. The story is told in a first person narrative through the eyes of the main character Mallory. 
 CHARACTERS AND PLOT 
 Mallory, the main character in the story came off as a mentally unstable, deeply troubled teen. I really struggled connecting with her on an emotional level or with her plight, which is sad because she came upon excruciatingly hard times. 
 Her best friend in the world, Colleen, completely different story, I felt something for her. She was strong, stood up for herself had a sense of self confidence every teenager dies to possess. I liked how she stood by Mallory, saw her through her ups and downs, being supportive and dependable the entire time. 
 Reid, Mallory's old and new love interest was also a respectable character, a strong shoulder to lean on, helping Mallory come to terms with her pseudo-insanity. The relationship between Mallory and Reid always involved tension. It never felt like they really could get comfortable with each other, though. I felt they were very close to breaking through it all towards the end. 
 Mallory's parents should be handed the worst parents of the year award. I totally questioned why they would suddenly send her away to a boarding school when she was in such a crisis, it just seemed - WRONG. This compounded her problems, even though they felt it was for her safety, it sure seemed like a bad move to me. Furthermore, the girls at the boarding school were insanely unstable! I didn't like the psycho and secretive way they acted from the get go, plus their treatment of Mallory was appalling. 
 PLOT: A girl murders her boyfriend in self defense, then has to deal with the aftermath. 
 RECOMMENDATION 
 Guys and gals will equally enjoy reading Hysteria. If you are looking for a thriller with a splash of paranormal involved, search no further, Hysteria is that book. Those readers who like boardings school, but don't mind mean girls will also enjoy this story. Hysteria is not for the weak stomached, it does speak fairly graphically about the murder, so steer clear if you get squeamish about descriptive bloody scenes. 
 PERSONAL NOTE 
 Hysteria is a book about a teenaged girl desperately attempting to rationalize the cold, hard truth she single-handedly bears the responsible for snuffing out another human's life. That particular someone happened to be her "boyfriend", someone's brother and worst of all someone's son. She feels extremely guilty, trying in desperation to come to terms with what happened and to find a way to forgive herself. 
 A boarding school is the main setting for this story, something I have an insatiable appetite for. Sadly this book left me disappointed as the entire student body, or at least the ones introduced in the story all appeared to be somewhat psychotic, with the exception of Reid, the MC's love interest. He seemed to be the only person at the school who kept people somewhat grounded. 
 Part of the story, written in italics, told about the main character's past. Its revealed in random bits and pieces throughout the novel, helping to fit together the night of the murder, since the main characters memory of that night is sketchy. This drew me into the story, a great ploy to pique my interest and keep me reading, my quest for answers kept me turning pages. What I had problems with is plot wasn't cohesive. The author held many great ideas, I just felt like her execution fell short. Mainly in that the story moved more sideways than forward. I struggled to find the main idea or theme, behind the story until the very end. 
 RATING 
 This novel earns Three Rings. I deducted two rings for plot execution struggles and poor decisions on the family front. 
 3 out of 5 Rings 
 (Good - Kept me Flipping Pages)