Blurred Between The Lines

You embark on a very special journey when you discover a secret door that takes you into your favourite book! What happens next?

The thought-provoking yet extremely creative question posed to me by the Queen's Commonwealth Essay Competition Society for the 2025 edition of the competition. Having just read Holly Jackson's Good Girl, Bad Blood yet immediately falling in love, I HAD to write about it. This is my story:

The couch’s rigid frame pressed into my spine. Good Girl, Bad Blood felt heavier than lead in my hands. I craved escape.  My bedroom beckoned, promising respite on my soft bed. But the moment I shut the door, the familiar lavender and old books were replaced by a chilling miasma: acrid dust, the crackle of static electricity, and a metallic tang that reeked of blood. Crimson thread, taut and menacing, crisscrossed the walls, connecting newspaper clippings, photographs, and names like Jamie Reynolds, Nat Da Silva, Daniel Da Silva. I stumbled back, heart hammering. This wasn’t a dream. I had plunged, inexplicably, into the very book I held.

Pip materialized first, her gaze sharp and lethal, an unnerving stillness about her. Ravi and Connor followed, their faces etched with alarm. Their suspicion felt like icy daggers. "Who are you?" Pip’s voice was a honed blade.

"Dhamathi," I breathed, "I was reading… and then…"

Connor, in a moment of sheer terror, brandished a teapot. The absurdity threatened to break the tension, but the palpable dread held me captive.  "I’m not a threat!" I insisted, hands raised in supplication. "I don’t understand how I’m here." They remained motionless. Pip’s scrutiny was calculating, precise. Then, a curt nod.

"Fine. You’re in this now. Help us." There was no turning back. I was inextricably drawn into their grim investigation. That night, I crafted a Tinder profile, a lure for the shadowy figure known only as "Layla."  A match appeared. Layla Mead. Stella’s face, subtly altered. Her linked Instagram account offered a gateway. I sent a message. The response was instantaneous. 

"Hello Pip. You’re getting closer."

My stomach plummeted. I glanced at Pip, my heart a frantic drum. Before another word could be typed, Layla vanished. Every trace erased. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Tinder. It was as if she never existed. Pip reacted swiftly, accessing Jamie’s Fitbit data.  "He didn’t go far..." she said grimly. "Less than a mile." We pinpointed a decaying warehouse at the town’s edge, silent and ominous. Inside, bathed in moonlight, lay the knife. The one missing from the Reynolds’ kitchen. It was gleaming with malevolent promise.

A chilling dread settled upon us as we gathered around it. Then, Pip’s phone vibrated. A call from Joanna, Jamie’s mother. A body had been found on the A413. Pip and I raced to the Reynolds’ house, the streets a blur. Twenty agonizing minutes later, we learned the horrifying truth: the body wasn’t Jamie’s. Relief, fleeting and hollow, offered no solace, only more questions. We confronted Luke Eaton. Why did Jamie owe him £900? Luke’s answer sent the world tilting.

"Layla." he said. "Jamie was going to meet her." Then, the truly unsettling revelation: "Layla is Jamie." The pieces refused to fit.  Stunned, we absorbed the cryptic phrase Jamie had uttered: "Child broomstick." My eyes widened. "Do you mean… Child Brunswick?"

The Scott Brunswick case: a man who used his son to lure victims. That boy, Child Brunswick, had vanished into witness protection. A Reddit thread pulsed with chilling theories, some placing him in Little Kilton.  We delved deeper, following each thread.

Pip’s voice cut through the silence. "It’s Stanley Forbes."

We split up. Pip and I went to the farmhouse, posing as Layla. Ravi and Connor went to Forbes’ house. There, they found Jamie! Alive! At the farmhouse, Stanley mistook Pip for Layla. But she remained composed, cleared the misunderstanding and told him she was there to help. And he believed her. The air felt still. Too still.

Then, headlights sliced through the night. Charlie (Layla) and Flora, Pip’s seemingly quiet neighbors, emerged, their faces twisted by years of obsession. They had hunted Child Brunswick since Margate and now believed they’d found him. I tried to intervene, but I was paralyzed. Stanley crumpled as gunshots shattered the night, blood blooming beneath him. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound escaped. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t blink, couldn’t scream.

Then...I was back in my room. The book lay open. My bed was beneath me. The scent of lavender had returned. But the icy dread remained. Because I had been there. I finished the book. Stanley was dead. Charlie and Flora were gone. Pip was recovering. But nothing explained my journey into the story, or if I ever truly left.

Read my review on the actual book! Click the link below: https://dhamathisuresh.wixsite.com/website/post/good-girl-bad-blood-book-review