Guest Review from Erin: We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

Hi Everyone! Today I've got a review for We Were Liars, a book that I'd been hearing about a lot over this past summer! I finally got a chance to read it!

From Goodreads:



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.

Erin's Thoughts:

We Were Liars was definitely not what I expected.  Other than reading the book flap, I tried not to learn too much about what the book was about because I heard that the less you know going into the book, the better.  So, of course, if you feel the same way, feel free not to read this review, but I will do my best not to give anything away!

But I'll go on.  I'm not sure exactly what I had in mind, but, like I said, it's not what I thought it would be.  We Were Liars deals with the lives of the rich Sinclair family.  It takes place during the summer and only during the summer, so although years go by, Cadence (the main character) only relays the adventures she's experienced during summer.  The book deals a lot with the politics of rich families -- her mother and her aunt fighting for money, houses, inheritance, her grandfather lording over them and taking advantage of them, her mother using her to get close to her grandfather -- which, I would not have thought interesting, but found myself pretty intrigued by.  And I think a lot of that is that E. Lockhart is a great writer.  Definitely not the style/book I usually read, so I felt it was a bit more eye-opening for me.

There is a HUGE twist toward the end of the book.  And while it certainly was a twist that I didn't see coming, I did not feel amazed by it.  I've been thinking about it for a while and I still can't figure out why I didn't get that WOW feeling.  Instead, when I read it, it was almost as if I was indifferent to it?  More like it was happening, but I didn't feel an emotional connection to it? I'm really curious about this, so I'd love to hear anyone else's reaction and how you guys felt about it.

And kind of random, but one part that sticks with me the most is when Gat (Cadence's friend) is talking about Wuthering Heights and comparing himself to Heathcliff.  I don't know why, but that part struck me and I find myself thinking about it from time to time.  I think it was a great comparison/analogy that really got me thinking and it is very well done; it didn't sound pretentious or preachy when I read it, which sometimes do feel when there are references to literature.

Overall rating:


A lot of that has to do with the fact that I don't find myself particularly interested in these kinds of subjects/books.  We Were Liars is a great book and I think that is well worth reading.  It's also a short book (~250 pages), so it would be very easy to invest in or read within a day if you wanted.  It's definitely a different book than I usually hear about, so give it a try and see how you like it!!

Erin @The Romance Bookie

Comments

  1. I didn't like this book much at all. I thought the twist was kind of dumb, and I didn't like any of the characters at all. :P

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