Secrets emerge as a Texas beauty pageant turns deadly in this rich and addictive novel with a jaw-dropping twist from psychological suspense author Kelsey Cox.
2000:Isabelle Whitmore vanishes at Sherman Ranch in Anhalt, Texas, without a trace.
2025: The Lone Star Princess Pageant is about to begin, but this year it’s offering more than an annual dose of rhinestone heels and plunging necklines. Competition is stiffer than ever ―and long standing grudges are about to resurface. Ingrid fled Anhalt in the wake of her sister Isabelle’s disappearance and has now returned, just in time for a construction crew to start digging up Sherman Ranch; the pageant brings up past traumas that Melanie can’t forget; Cat, newly sober, starts to feel threatened in ways that bring back old demons; and Sarah Lynn, who comes from a long line of pageant winners, knows that losing is not an option.
When old resentments and new confrontations reach their boiling point, temperatures drop to deadly degrees as a record-setting storm brings down the state’s power grid. With everyone trapped under one roof, scores will be settled, and more than one person will end up dead.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/240019831-pretty-dead-things
i bought this book and here is my honest review
Small town drama surrounding the local Miss Lone Star Princess Pageant, apparently someone would kill for the title. Izzy went missing 25 years ago and her family never got the answers or knew where she was. friends turned on each other, and Izzy’s boyfriend Ben was the main suspect for the town. But when local teens were trespassing where they weren’t supposed to be they under covered the remains of Izzy, days before the pageant. but now that she’s been found more questions than answers were brought to the surface. will the family get answers now that she was found all these years later or will someone else be added to the Miss Lone Star Princess Pageant death list. omg this was such a great mystery read I never saw the ending coming defiantly keeps you on your toes
Kelsey Cox received her MFA in fiction from Purdue University and works from home in the Texas Hill Country. You can often find her writing at Mammen Family Public Library, chasing around her two young daughters, or watching British mysteries with her mom and aunts. On nights when bedtime goes as planned, she enjoys curling up on the sofa, glass of wine in hand, and a book with complicated characters and a killer twist in her lap.