Author: E. Lockhart
Series: N/A
Published: 13 May 2014 by Hot Key Books
Length: 240 pages
Source: library
Summary : A beautiful and distinguished family.
A private island.
A brilliant, damaged girl; a passionate, political boy.
A group of four friends—the Liars—whose friendship turns destructive.
A revolution. An accident. A secret.
Lies upon lies.
True love.
The truth.
Review: Cady is one of the Liars, the younger end of a family that meets every summer to spend the holiday at the summer home. At some point, she loses her memories. Two years later, she wants to find out what happened.
I was really looking forwards to this and everyone really enjoyed it and watching somep ople's reactions during the liveread made me think it was going to be amazing. Sadly for me it wasn't.
I think I missed something at the start but I really don't get why everyone loves this. It's slow. The writing, while stripped back in places, seems boring too. The story doesn't seem to go very fast, and the forbidden love aspect is not my favourite as a trope anyway and this book didn't change my mind on it.
I didn't connect or like any of the characters. They seemed too detached from me and I didn't really care what happened to them. Cady is a bit whiny and the rich WASP background comes through and she comes off as pretentious in places, something I'd had enough of with Leo from The Go Between which I read at the same time.
I really enjoyed Gat's comments on race and racism, being Indian and surrounded by white people. The repeated retellings of fairy tales were also really good.
I also think that the style, full of metaphors and winding around, is the kind of thing that could be praised in a literary sense. It just wasn't my kind of thing.
The ending is good, I suppose. It didn't seem like a huge thing to me though, and when it was revealed, I just shrugged and read on. I think it's because I disconnected with the whole story so I didn't really care.
Overall: Strength 2 tea to a book I didn’t get into at the start which meant I didn’t enjoy the whole thing.
During Cady's 15th summer on the island, she had an accident. She doesn't remember what happened, just that she gets terrible headaches. Lockhart weaves a suspenseful tale, building to a wallop of a surprise ending. Books mentioned in this post We Were Liars E. Lockhart New Hardcover $17.99
We Were Liars
by E. Lockhart (Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House). 2014. Review from ARC.
The Plot: Cady, nearly eighteen, had a terrible accident two years before. She is still recovering, still not herself. Cady is hoping that a summer spent with her three best friends, the "Liars," will make things better. Or, that it will be a start to being the person she used to be.
Love, friendship, loyalty, family. This is what Cady thinks she is returning to. Cady thinks her summer will be about healing and friendship, brought to her by being with those she loves.
Instead, she is going to learn the truth.
The Good: Cady tells us her story, and she frames it not in who she is but in who her family is. "
Welcome to the beautiful Sinclair family. No one is a criminal. No one is an addict. No one is a failure."
She is a Sinclair. And "
we were liars."
The Sinclairs are a rich family. No, even richer than that. Her grandfather took family money and made even more. Each of his three daughters has a trust fund. The family summers on an island, an island that is home just to the family. In addition to the family home, each daughter has her own house. No one else lives on the island, well, except for the help during the summer. Oh, they are rich, and beautiful, and privileged.
It all looks so picture perfect. Part of that perfection is the tight, best friend bond between Cady and her cousins, Johnny and Mirren. Each the eldest child of one of the three daughters. They are together each summer, reuniting from the places and lives they live during the rest of the year. Gat, the nephew of Johnny's mother's boyfriend, joins the group. Somehow, four becomes the perfect number and each summer is better than the year before. Until Cady's accident.
We Were Liars is Cady's return to the island, to her best friends, after almost two years away, because of her accident and her parent's divorce. Her accident has caused terrible migraines and memory loss; she is an unreliable narrator, to say the least. That she and her friends were called the liars is another clue to how much, and when, they should be believed.
Part of why I adored
We Were Liars is because Lockhart does such a beautiful job of creating the nostalgia a teenager feels for their childhood, and of the magic of innocent summers. Even if you're not a privileged teen going to a private island, childhood and summer and friendships are true for all of us. Before there is a chance to be wrapped in that warm cocoon of memory, though,
We Were Liars lets us know that how we remember childhood does not mean that is how our childhood was. There are hints from the first that the perfect family is not perfect, but as Cady's summer passes, and as she begins to remember the events of two summers ago, the flaws and cracks of the family are revealed. (It is, in essence, what happens once you move from the children's table to the adult table at family holidays.)
Is the grandfather loving, or is he using his money to control his daughters and grandchildren? Is Gat, the almost-cousin, included among the Sinclairs or is he always an outsider because of the color of his skin? Are the sisters close, or competing to get more of the family money? And what secrets do the cousins keep from each other? Are Cady and her cousins fated to repeat the familiar family patterns, or can they break the bonds of family ties?
This exploration of identity, of the truth behind the illusion, was wonderful. It may be heightened because the money is more, but the Sinclairs are hardly the first or only family who wonders what the neighbors think; who don't discuss unpleasant truths; who fight over a family heirloom because it represents love. A first read may result in thinking the Sinclairs are so wealthy that they and their problems are "other," too removed, but as time passes and Cady and her family haunts you the way they did me, you realize -- the problems are the same for many of us.
I first wrote this review after I read the book, and in rereading it, and remembering
Liars, there is more I want to say. I kept on thinking about the Sinclairs and their money, and gradually thought less about the wealth and more about the privilege. How the privilege both gave the Sinclairs opportunities but also limited when, and how, those chances were pursued. And that the exaggeration of that privilege -- so much money! servants! travel! their own island! -- is necessary to show that privilege exists and what, exactly, it means.
I loved the language Lockhart uses in
We Were Liars. Here is Cady, describing her beloved "liars": "
Mirren. She is sugar. She is curiosity and rain. Johnny. he is bounce. He is effort and snark." Gat: "
He is contemplation and enthusiasm. Ambition and strong coffee." Truth be told, I'd love to have Cady describe me, her choice of words are so perfect.
Cady's secret. Her accident, and what happened, so that "
the last two years [were spent] in a shell of headache pain and self-pity." I don't want to reveal too much, because what matters is not just "what happened" but when, and how, Cady remembers. Remember the "we" were liars -- so it's not just Cady's own secrets.
I adore Cady, her voice, her character. That she is an unreliable narrator makes it that much better. And the plot, the structure, of trying to understand, along with Cady, just what happened. And here's a confession: I cannot say, at the end of the day, that I liked Cady. But I can say I loved her.
This is a
Favorite Book Read in 2014. (Technically, yes, I read the ARC in 2013, but work with me, people.)
It's spring! The sun is shining. The flowers are in bloom. The Blazers are winning (fingers crossed). We're in a good mood. So for our latest round of Required Reading, we lined up our 25 favorite funny novels. Whether biting, riotous, savage, or slapstick, each of these books consistently makes us laugh. ÷ ÷ ÷ [...]
Wickedly funny, Disreputable History is Frankie's tale of scandalizing her conservative boarding school by disrupting longstanding paradigms of gender, religion, and linguistics. A clever young adult novel, this book will connect with any reader who has felt "it's just the way things are" is unfair. Social change can be hard, but Frankie shows it can [...]
This week's theme is Self-respect. In Monday's guest post, featured author E. Lockhart wrote:
"Ruby goes from calling herself a leper (really grodie and unloved) to calling herself a roly-poly (only a little grodie and even beloved by certain bug-fond weirdos). A bit of progress, right."
Sometimes we all judge ourselves harshly. Have you experienced that? How did you change that mindset and up your self-respect factor like Ruby does over these four books?
Perhaps you've heard about this
Rock the Drop thing, where we'll be dropping books in public places on Thursday to celebrate YALSA's Support Teen Lit Day, and we hope everyone will join us!
Here's even more incentive: If you
Rock the Drop, send us an email (
readergirlz AT gmail DOT com) or a photo or a video (just let us know you've rocked it, really), and
you'll be entered to win a full set of featured author E. Lockhart's Ruby Oliver series! We'll choose a winner at random on Friday.
Good luck!
This month, readergirlz is honored to feature renowned young adult author E. Lockhart! We're discussing her book The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks.
Read the January issue of readergirlz. There's a playlist for the book, plus book guide questions and party ideas.
Drop by the readergirlz blog to discuss the book with other readers, ALL MONTH LONG!
And don't forget to join us for the LIVE! chat with E. Lockhart on Wednesday, January 20th at 6 pm PST/9 pm EST.
Other news at readergirlz this month:
Last bit of author-in-residence excitement with Beth Kephart...
Beth Kephart is the amazing author of several books (including the delicious mystery NOTHING BUT GHOSTS), and she's been our author-in-residence since December. We have one last chat with her on January 6 at 6 p.m. PST/9 p.m. EST. Don't miss it!(TOMORROW!)
See more about the Writer-in-Residence program at http://www.readergirlz.com/residence.html.
We introduce our next author in residence, Elizabeth Scott...
Elizabeth Scott wrote LIVING DEAD GIRL; SOMETHING, MAYBE; and STEALING HEAVEN. We are going to have a great time exploring her work and her writing process.
I head up the readergirlz Street Team, and this year we welcome some new members. The 2010 Team:
These fabulous folks can help guide you through the wonderful world of YA books:
Miss Erin,
Priya, Silence, Vanessa,
Sarah,
Enna Isilee.
By: Aubrey,
on 12/9/2014
By: Nina @ Death, Books, and Tea,
on 9/11/2014
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By: Lizzy Burns,
on 5/6/2014
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By: Melissa Walker,
on 4/14/2011
This week's theme is Self-respect. In Monday's guest post, featured author E. Lockhart wrote: 
By: Erin,
on 1/5/2010
This month, readergirlz is honored to feature renowned young adult author E. Lockhart! We're discussing her book The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks.
By: Yours Truly,
on 4/22/2009
By: Kate Hall,
on 10/13/2007
Wow! Lots of author news! I'll remember to tune in on your live chats!
Hey! I'm back!
And I have a question. Let's say I wanted to review books as well that redergirlz features. How do I do that? Do I go out and buy them or what?
Christy: So what you're saying is you'd like to review some of the books you see featured at readergirlz? Yeah, you can buy the books, or else you can go to your library and check them out there. If your library doesn't have them, you can request them, and they should be compliant about getting them in.
Ooh okay I understand now! Haha thanks!