The major characters in the book carry deep secrets that they are terrified of others discovering. The book’s many secrets serve as both a way of bonding the characters together and as a potential weapon for division, since everyone is afraid of their secrets being exposed. While Spencer, Aria, Emily, and Hanna are sad when Ali goes missing, they also feel relieved because she “knew more about them than anyone else did” (18). They know their secrets can’t be exposed. However, when their old secrets start resurfacing again three years later in the form of messages from the mysterious A, who also seems to know their growing number of new secrets, the girls once again become paranoid and afraid. In many ways, they’re constantly burdened by their secrets and aren’t always able to be themselves because of them.

One of the biggest secrets is “The Jenna Thing” (16), which is known only to Spencer, Aria, Emily, and Hanna, as well as Alison. Back when they were all friends in seventh grade, a prank gone wrong permanently blinds Jenna—a former classmate at Rosewood and a neighbor of Ali and Spencer’s. At the time, Ali said that their secrets, the biggest of which is

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