Pretty Little Liars

I was actually shocked by how much I liked this. To start with, let me sum up what my usual taste is. I grew tired of YA books before high school so I haven't read any for many years. I was prepared for an immature, underdeveloped and bland plot BUT I was wrong, delightfully so.
The books starts with a chapter that takes place around three years before the current setting and it wasn't promising. But it builds and adds to surprisingly deep characters with huge issues.
Hanna, one of the four girls, is a teenager struggling with parental abandonment, self esteem issues and she's running into a lot of trouble with the law. Not to mention, her relapsing back into bulimia if she had ever been in a true remission of the eating disorder.
Spencer, perhaps the girl with the least chapters or mentions in the book. Many in the reviews have found her unsympathetic based on their perception of her sister. She's competitive, saddled with parents whose love is obviously conditional and who would leave her all alone in emotional shock because they're angry with her . Spencer is a brat almost constantly- the most paranoid about her grades and about this “A” person. But we see Spencer's been pitted (although it is not known if it was intentional or if either sister realizes it, or wants to call a cease-fire to their war) against her older sister her entire life. With this information, you can piece together pretty quickly that Spencer's attraction to her sister's boyfriends might be a further escalation of this conflict, made by the warped mind of a screwed-up teenager . It's unforgivable but Spencer is still sympathetic after cheating with her sister's fiancee, going into emotional shock but being left alone by her parents in her yard .
Aria has the second most chapters in the book, I would say. She's a weird character and not what I expected. She's not a punk princess but an entitled girl.
Emily is the most sympathetic and has the most chapters. She's at least bisexual though it may be strictly lesbian (I couldn't tell from the text) and a young athlete. Befriending the new girl sends her on a wild ride with huge consequences.