If Looks Could Kill

by Julie Berry

Overview

From Printz Honor–winning and New York Times bestselling author Julie Berry, a true-crime-nail-biter-turned-mythic-odyssey pitting Jack the Ripper against Medusa. A defiant love song to sisterhood, a survivors’ battle cry, and a romantic literary tour de force laced with humor.

It’s autumn 1888, and Jack the Ripper is on the run. As London police close in, he flees England for New York City seeking new victims. But a primal force of female vengeance has had enough. With serpents for hair and a fearsome gaze, an awakened Medusa is hunting for one thing: Jack.

And other dangers lurk in Manhattan’s Bowery. Salvation Army volunteers Tabitha and Pearl discover that a girl they once helped has been forced to work in a local brothel. Tabitha’s an upstate city girl with a wry humor and a thirst for adventure, while farmgirl Pearl takes everything with stone-cold seriousness. Their brittle partnership is tested as they team up with an aspiring girl reporter and a handsome Irish bartender to mount a rescue effort, only to find their fates entwine with Medusa’s and Jack’s.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781534470811
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers
Publication date:	09/16/2025
Pages:	448
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.50(h) x 1.60(d)
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

Julie Berry is the New York Times bestselling author of the 2020 NCTE Walden Award and SCBWI Golden Kite Award winner Lovely War, the 2017 Printz Honor and Los Angeles Times Book Prize–shortlisted The Passion of Dolssa, the Carnegie Medal– and Edgar Award–shortlisted All the Truth That’s in Me, the Odyssey Honor The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place, and the Wishes and Wellingtons trilogy. Her picture books include The Night Frolic, Happy Right Now, and Cranky Right Now. Julie holds a BS from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in communication and an MFA from Vermont College of the Fine Arts. Julie lives in western New York, where she owns Author’s Note, an independent bookstore.

Read an Excerpt

Tabitha—‘The War Cry’: (Friday, September 7, 1888) <figure>

The War Cry (Friday, September 7, 1888)

Commander Maud Ballington Booth had warned me—well, all of us—that Satan would strew trials and adversities in our path to glory. I just never expected one of them to be Pearl Davenport, my roommate and companion soldier in the Salvation Army. Wherever I go, there is Pearl, and wherever Pearl goes, there am I.

I’d arrived in New York on Saturday. I spent Sunday attending rally meetings, then several days training at headquarters. By Wednesday night, I’d been assigned my base camp—the one on the Bowery—and my comrade in arms. Pearl.

I had brought a little present for my soon-to-be sister and absolute forever best friend, as yet unmet, likely to be the maid of honor at my wedding if I ever did marry: a bracelet of small coral beads. Modest and pretty. Not very expensive, but nice.

I handed her the tissue-wrapped package.

Some people look pleased when given a gift. Or, at least, they know how to fake it.

She couldn’t, Pearl explained gravely, indulge in such vanity. However, to please me, she would accept the gift and sell it to feed the poor.

And that was us, just getting started.

Maid of dishonor at my wedding. Silly, silly me to think joining the Salvation Army would ensure I’d make new friends.

I may have been somewhat snippish toward Pearl after the fourth or so little display of her precious piety. So much for new-roommate sisterly warmth. Grim politeness didn’t last a day before open hostilities broke out. Not for nothing are we called an army.

It was early Friday evening. We’d been companions for forty-six hours. We marched up and down the Bowery and surrounding streets, entering concert saloons and grimy dives before they’d gotten going for the evening, though the saloons were certainly never empty. Dressed in our military uniformsólong blue serge skirts, long matching jackets trimmed in yellow, and poke bonnets—we called people to hear the brass band performing that night at our base camp.

This time, our fortunate host was O’Flynn’s Tavern, which meant that the proprietor and patrons would be Irish Catholic and wouldn’t have any interest in a Salvation Army—or, in other words, a Protestant—message.

Men slowly craned their necks around to look at us. At Pearl.

I might as well get this out of the way. She’d said little, but I felt I could construct her life story: Pearl was a bonny farm lass from a poor but humble family who read their Bible nightly and held each other’s hands at prayer, when they weren’t ladling broth down the gullets of the sick and elderly. She was pure and holy, but with a feisty streak that fit her Army calling, and as pretty as Little Bo Peep. Strawberry blond curls and rosy cheeks. Her soul was clad in a blue gingham frock. Little lambs gamboled at her feet. (The feet of her soul. Never mind.) I didn’t know what “gamboling” looked like—not many sheep in my city home—but that’s what sheep would do around Pearl. Angels probably did too. These men at the bar would gambol if it meant they could keep company with Pearl, except that Pearl was cemented, head to toe, to Jesus, who is almost as effective as a squinty-eyed maiden aunt at keeping male suitors at bay. My aunt Lorraine thwarted my chances of winning the only boy I thought I could love in high school, not that those chances were great, mind you; in my case, I didn’t blame Jesus.

Where was I?

As always: Pearl. Right now: O’Flynn’s Tavern. Staring men. I’ll proceed.

O’Flynn’s was your basic Lower East Side tavern, the bottom floor of a tenement on a side street, below pavement level. The men looked like they’d put in a long day’s grimy work.

The barkeep was young, with a wiry frame and a thick shock of dark hair. He was handsome, in spite of the toothpick jawing away at the corner of his mouth, which thing I never could abide. He took in Pearl and me as though he thought, Well, now we’re in for some fun.

“You’re all invited, gentlemen,” declared Pearl, “to tonight’s Hallelujah Spree. Eight o’clock at the Salvation Army outpost beneath Steve Brodie’s saloon on the Bowery.”

Silence greeted this announcement.

The undaunted Pearl went on. “Tonight’s meeting will be better than any show on earth.”

“What’ve you got,” said a grizzled older man, “a circus?”

“Bigger than a circus,” cried my companion. “We’ll have music and singing, and a marching band, and preaching that’ll curl your hair!” This drew some laughs.

“That’d be quite a job, Ronnie,” said the barkeep, “seeing as you’ve got none.”

His voice lilted like a true Irishman’s. Musical.

We sang them a hymn, “I’m a Soldier Bound for Glory.”

I love Jesus, hallelujah!

I love Jesus, yes, I do;

I love Jesus, he’s my Savior,

Jesus smiles and loves me too.

Pearl is, of course, the soprano. But: our voices blend nicely, and the music always is, in its way, its own reward. A few of the patrons of O’Flynn’s closed their eyes to listen.

The chorus ended. The sullen stares wore on, and I wanted to die, but Pearl’s cheeks flushed red with triumph. She was doing heroic work. A true soldier in God’s army.

She held a handful of copies of The War Cry, the Salvation Army’s gospel newsletter, high, like Lady Liberty with her torch. “Who will buy a copy of The War Cry?” she asked the room. “It’ll be the best penny you’ll ever spend. The one that changes your life forever.”

No one wanted a copy of The War Cry.

She looked about the room expectantly.

No one wanted a copy of The War Cry.

She gave her papers a flourish like a baton. Splendid wrist action.

Strangely, still, no one wanted a copy of The War Cry.

I cleared my throat. “It has a very interesting article in it,” I said, feeling I ought to make an attempt, “about a man who got a raise in pay after he turned his life over to the Lord.”

A few coughs ensued, some waggling eyebrows from the barkeep, some shifting and pawing through pockets. Pearl sold five copies of The War Cry and collected her pennies.

Bald Ronnie rolled the paper into a tube. “See here,” he said, “what’s in this thing?”

“The latest bulletins from the battlefield,” Pearl told him.

He scratched his nose. “You mean, that war in Africa?”

“The war for souls.” She was enjoying herself, and oddly, so were the men at the bar.

“Anything in it about the election?” asked the young bartender.

“Everything you need to know,” she said, “about blessings poured out upon God’s elect.”

“‘Elect’!” crowed Ronnie. “She’s got you there, Mike.” The bartender, evidently Mike, grinned good-naturedly and dried another mug with his towel.

“Got any fighting news in it?” asked a huge fellow, getting in on the spirit of the thing. His build and mashed nose suggested a side career in basement boxing.

“Absolutely,” declared Pearl. “Every detail of the fight to win souls for the Lord.”

Now is not the time, I had to remind myself, to slink out of the room.

I sidled over to the bar and extended a hand to the barkeeper. “I’m Tabitha,” I whispered. “We might as well get acquainted.”

He grinned again. “Mike.”

“I know,” I said. “I mean, I heard.”

“Spying on me, eh?” He dried his hand on the towel at his waist and thrust it at me. “I guess we’ll be seeing a lot of you two, now, won’t we?”

I smiled in spite of myself. The voice. “Probably.”

He waved the mug he was drying in Pearl’s direction. “Who’s your friend?”

She’s not my friend. “Pearl.”

A fellow seated nearby chimed in. “Like the song. ‘Poil, the Goil with the Coils.’”

I will never get used to these New York accents.

“I’m guessing you two haven’t been working together long,” said Mike.

My heart sank. “Is it obvious?”

He leaned closer to whisper conspiratorially. “The look on your face. Like she was a rotten egg that had just burst open. Might’ve been a clue.”

“Oh.” I felt my face flood with embarrassment. “I’ll have to work on that, won’t I? Not very good for the cause, I mean.”

“P’rhaps not,” Mike agreed, “but entertaining. Pleased to meet you, Miss Tabitha.”

“And you,” I said, “Mr., er, Mike.”

“Oy, Mr. Mike,” said a young tough at the bar, “pour the ale and leave the Sallys be.”

Mike gave me a wink, then turned back to the tap and his other customers. Pearl stood at the door, watching me curiously, then exited. I hurried out after her into the twilit street.

Editorial Reviews

"Witty banter, intrepid female characters, and thoughtful meditations on faith."

Publishers Weekly

"A powerful exploration of human connection during nightmarish times."

Kirkus Reviews

★ "Berry’s call to awareness of misogyny in its many guises is strong and clear."

Horn Book

"Twisty ... A YA thriller unlike anything you’ve read before ... Dark, fast-paced, and utterly addictive, it’s the must-read of the fall."

Parade Magazine

2025-07-03
In an alternate Victorian era, unlikely allies confront monsters and murders.

It’s 1888, and misogynist Jack is on the prowl in Whitechapel, London, butchering women and consuming their organs, which he hopes will “restore him to health and life.” After one murder, he’s approached by a Gorgon, a snake-haired monster from Greek mythology with a gaze that turns people to stone. But Jack isn’t affected by her petrifying powers; he runs away and continues his murder spree. Fleeing the police, Jack boards a ship heading across the Atlantic. In New York City, Pearl Davenport and Tabitha Woodward are members of the Salvation Army, spreading God’s word. They’re roommates who have a contentious relationship—rigidly pious Pearl clashes with more easygoing Tabitha. Wanting to help Cora, a distressed girl they briefly cross paths with, Pearl and Tabitha ask investigative reporter Freyda to help locate her. Pearl falls ill while Tabitha scours the city, seeking answers and receiving assistance from surprising sources, including handsome bartender Mike and Miss Stella, a secretive older woman. All the while, an evil lurking in the city is growing closer. Berry’s exploration of Jack the Ripper’s motivations is intriguing. But the evolving relationships among the largely white-presenting characters—particularly the one between Pearl and Tabitha as they confront horrors that are softened by the compassion they encounter—offer the real appeal, accentuating the best and worst of human nature.

A powerful exploration of human connection during nightmarish times. (historical notes, bibliography)(Historical paranormal. 12-18)

Kirkus Reviews