Title: We Were Liars
Author: E. Lockhart
Publisher: Hot Key Books
Pages: 242
Format: Kindle
Source: Personal purchase
Description:
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.
My thoughts:
We Were Liars was an unexpected surprise for me. And the feelings it left me with were a mixture of those I had for the movie The Dreamers and Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in a Castle. If the book was revised and renewed as a short story, it would be perfect. First of all, it attracted my attention because it took place on an island owned by a single family. I've always (and still do) dream of purchasing my own island, and I found myself saying, "If I were a Sinclair, I'd have that!" Of course, this I wished before I got to know our protagonist Cadence and her cousins, "The Liars," and how the family sees the world, the dynamics among them and all that. At the end of the book, I decided they should just give me the island and do whatever they want on land.
Joking aside, here's how the story goes: the Sinclair Family spends their summers on their private island near Martha's Vineyard. On the island, there's a main house that belongs to Grandma & Grandpa Sinclair, and their daughters have their own houses as well, one of whom is Cadence's mother. Every summer, they're all on the island and seem to have a fun time. However, something happens when Cadence is 15 years old. It's something we don't find out until the end of the book. The reason why is Cadence is the one telling us her story, and whatever has happened she cannot remember. As she tries to figure things out, we get to witness the Sinclair Family's dynamics.
They go through the problems that every family goes through. However, they leave you saying, "you've got money; you've got real problems, friend!" Why?
Grandpa Sinclair is the one that controls the money. He tries very hard to have a say in whom his daughters marry, what kind of life they lead, whom his grandchildren can fall in love with, who's good enough for them. His daughters are used to spending their father's money, and even though they got married and started their own families, they haven't done anything toward earning their own living. While Grandpa Sinclair manipulates them using his money, they use and manipulate their own children in hopes of getting on his good side. You'll see at the end of the book what the children have been dragged into because of all this.
