Exclusive: Read an excerpt from A Better Bad Idea by Laurie Devore

From the author of How to Break a Boy and Winner Take All, Laurie Devore’s A Better Bad Idea is a gripping and propulsive YA thriller described as Courtney Summers meets Where the Crawdads Sing. 

Now, you probably don’t need much more convincing than that sentence to add this book to your spring must-read list right now. (Or, at least I didn’t.)

An atmospheric tale full of broken people, this is a story about what we’re willing to do when we’re desperate and how far we’re willing to go to get out of a bad situation.

A Better Bad Idea follows Evelyn Peters, a girl who is desperate for a way out of McNair Falls, the dying Southern town in which she’s spent her life since she was born. The dying town where her little sister is in danger from their mother’s terrifying abusive boyfriend. The dying town where she finds herself desperate to connect with anyone, even fallen golden boy Ashton Harper, longtime boyfriend of the girl Evelyn can never stop thinking about ― beautiful, volatile, tragically dead Reid Brewer.

Until a single night sends Evelyn and Ashton on a collision course that starts something neither of them can stop. With one struck match, their whole world goes up in flames. The only thing left to do is run―but leaving McNair Falls isn’t as easy as just putting distance between here and there and some secrets refuse to stay left behind.

A Better Bad Idea will hit shelves in mid-March, but those looking forward to the story can check out an exclusive excerpt below right now.

Read an excerpt from A Better Bad Idea below.

"Tuesday, October 6, 2019, 11:43 p.m.Nine Minutes AfterThere’s not much left of the old moonshine still buried deep in the woods past our trailer—the spot Mama calls the Old Home Place. Half of a shelter remains; two collapsed wooden poles have caved the tin roof in on one side. Some barrels and pipes rust away. Mama says my granddaddy used to run shine out of here, but it’s not like Mama hasn’t been known to lie.I clutch my bottle close to me, aware—so aware—of everything wrong in that moment, from the cold air choking my lungs to the bruise blooming on my hip, right where my sweater meets my jeans.“You’re not supposed to be here,” I say.“Hey.” Ashton toasts me with a flask. “That’s usually the line people use after they get to know me.”Ashton Harper, I think, like the rest of it has been erased. Ashton. Ashton Harper.And then I think, Reid.“Are you”—he twitches back a piece of dark hair that has fallen into his eye—“okay?”I can’t stop staring at him. I watch the way his eyebrows come together. The way he licks his lips.I take a pull from the bottle of vodka, sitting with the words. “That’s a hell of a question,” I say at last.He’s watching me carefully, too, and I get a small thrill from it, despite the circumstances. He’s never watched me before.“What are you drinking?” I ask him, edging slightly closer.He almost smiles, like he doesn’t mean it. “Tennessee’s finest.”“Cheers.” I’m close enough now to tap my bottle against his flask, and we both drink, but he’s still looking at me.“You sure you’re okay? Your eyes kind of have that look.”“What look is that?” I return, desperate to keep him engaged but afraid to give away too much. Sure, I may have just downed more gulps of vodka than I ever have, but I can’t respond with real words, can’t show myself, especially not now. That’s dangerous.“Wild,” he says. He licks his lips again, and I like when he does that. “Seen that look a time or two.”“Tragedy,” I tell him, wise and mysterious. Please like me like you liked Reid, I think. Like me, like me, like me. “It’s always chasing me.”“I know the feeling,” he says.No, he doesn’t.Not like I do.Here’s how Ashton Harper looks: Imagine perfect pale skin and dark hair highlighted light brown in the moonlight, just long enough to be swept back, and a sharp jawline and dark lashes lining eyes like a storm. Imagine someone who looks so attainable but so beautiful all rolled up into one and a voice laced with southern in the best way possible, clipped vowels and forgotten syllables, dipped in bourbon and peaches and honeysuckle.Imagine the boy Reid Brewer fell for.Imagine Ashton Harper.“How long does it take?” I ask him.“The real question is how much does it take,” he answers enigmatically. “And the truth is, I still haven’t found enough to do it.” He rubs his boot across the ground. “Outrun tragedy and all that.”I tilt my head to the side. “Oh.”I stare down at his foot, the only part of him moving, and then I laugh, almost completely by accident, a sharp sound and then an intake of breath.“Are you . . . laughing?” he asks me.“Sorry, it’s just . . .” I look up, meet his eyes. “It’s a little melodramatic, isn’t it? For you?”“I don’t know.” He takes a drag from his flask like he’s really thinking about it. “I mean, here I was out at this abandoned still all alone, right? Am I being melodramatic if no one’s here to see me?”“If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it?”“Exactly,” he says. “I am a tree alone in a forest, holding on by a thread. Like, here’s what I figure—maybe I am melodramatic as all hell, but if it’s on my own time, it’s nobody’s business but mine. I’m not crying in the hallways at school or church or everywhere. I tried that whole running-around, tearing-the-world-apart thing, and it got me nowhere. Didn’t drive the thoughts away any faster and was a hell of a lot less efficient in terms of having other people trying to fix my problems. So here I am.”Because here’s what happened to Ashton Harper: He was perfect and he could’ve had anything he wanted, but he wanted Reid Brewer because she was not anything, she was everything. And when she died, he broke because he loved her so much. Of course he did, because she was bright and shining and wild and he’d tame her with a look. They were going to be together forever and ever because the sun rose over Reid Brewer and set behind Ashton Harper because they were never looking any other way but at each other.“That’s not really true, though, is it?” I ask.“How do you figure?”“Well, you’re not alone, are you? You’re with me.”He grins, this time for real."

A Better Bad Idea hits shelves on March 16, 2021. Be sure and check back here at Culturess for more coverage closer to the novel’s release!