The Reader Bee: E. Lockhart

Friday, May 2, 2014

Review: We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18339662-we-were-liars

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.

We Were Liars is a modern, sophisticated suspense novel from National Book Award finalist and Printz Award honoree E. Lockhart.
Read it.
And if anyone asks you how it ends, just LIE. (Goodreads)

I was really looking forward to starting E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars, as it seems to be one of the more popular upcoming releases this year. I can’t say that the book was exactly what I was expecting, but it did make for a pretty enjoyable read. I’m going to try to write this review as vaguely as possible, as to not give away any spoilers.

I want to start off by saying that there is a LOT of characters in this novel. I had to put forth a bit of effort to keep up with everyone. A few characters stood out more than the rest, but for the most part, most of them were really unlikable. It was kind of awkward reading the story through the main characters viewpoint, as she was pretty confused about everything that was going on herself, but I think that added a lot of the mystery to the book.

The writing style was really different and unique—almost poetic, in a way. The storyline was very dark and addictive; I couldn’t stop reading because I HAD to know what happened to the main character, and what the family was keeping from her. I dove into this story not really knowing what to expect, especially after reading the somewhat vague synopsis. That, however, was probably a good thing, because the story definitely kept me guessing all throughout the pages. The ending of the book was a bit of a shocker. It was pretty much the opposite of what I was expecting to happen, although now that I think back, I totally should have seen it coming. The ending did feel a bit abrupt, but I’m thinking that the author may have wanted it to be that way for a particular reason.

I think the one thing that I really enjoyed the most about the story was the setting. How awesome would it be to have your own personal island, and everyone in the family has a house there. That would be really cool, as long as I got to pick which family members lived on the island. Haha!

Overall; if you are into mysterious, thriller type reads, then you should definitely check out We Were Liars. I think a lot of people will really appreciate the unique writing style, and the super mysterious storyline.