We Were Liars

Found this book thanks to the ginormous amount of hype surrounding it. “Thrilling” the reviews said. Smart. Riveting. Stunning ending. Adding to that - it's a stand alone. No series; no 2 more parts of trilogy to get through. It's less than 250 pages, so why not.

I liked it. It's a decent coming of age story. Mostly. I should have warned myself after seeing the dust jacket that warned the reader not tell anyone the ending. Seriously? That alone got me thinking there was no way the end was going to be that shocking. None whatsoever. (Little Bee did the same thing and I was even less impressed with that book) Unless all the characters turn out to be aliens living in Jersey. Or the main character is really a patient at a mental institution and has created this whole other identity that the doctors use to try to bring him/her back to reality (oh wait...I already read that book and saw the movie).

I was right. I figured out the big shocking truth hmm. The only place the teens ever go is Cuddledown. The only person who ever talks to/sees them in present tense is Cadence. What teen alive doesn't even send a text in response to something sent to them? Bet they're ghosts/part of her subconscious. Granted I wasn't sure of the circumstances, but still. Sure there was the 2 second feeling of “HA! I figured it out!” but that almost instantly changed to “huh. I figured it out.” Disappointing.

The other thing that drove me crazy was the writing style. Oddly worded phrases. Cut up sentences like someone was playing with one of those magnetic poetry kits you have on your fridge, punctuation optional.

So muchin lovethat equally desperate measuresmust be taken.

Apparently putting all those words on one line would have changed the story. There is also a fair amount of purple prose. Some of it is understandable as our rich and privileged narrator definitely has a flair for the dramatic. But even for her it's often over the top. There's a scene near the beginning that I had to read 3 times before I grasped that she hadn't actually been injured; that it was Cadence expressing her feelings in the most gruesome, theatrical way possible.

So putting aside the twist I figured out and the choppy structure and the screaming neon violet descriptions, what was there to like? I did say 3 stars after all. The details of what actually happened the night of the accident. I had come up with numerous theories - none of which were anywhere near happy and some were out in left field - so it was nice to have ends tied into fraying knots (fraying because there were some parts that were a bit implausible). I'd rather have that than a bunch of loose ends. Teens even if they weren't likable (this is goes for all of them, including Gat) trying to be adults, thinking they were doing the right thing, the best thing to bring back what they cherished the most. The family politics with its King Lear references was closer to reality than many want to think about. The almost discussions of race, money, love, kindness, faith, and seeing the world for what it really is. Sure it would have been nice if those themes had been really talked about instead of just touched upon, but that would have been too much to squeeze into so few pages.