I have not written a book review in a such a long time that it almost feels alien to me. In advance I apologise that the following review may be all over the place and make no logical sense. The reading slump I have been in was so bad that I didn’t finish a single book in October until the 7th. There we so many good books in front of me but I could focus and enjoy any of them. For that reason I have also run short of blog posts but very quickly I have managed to write a few poems! Now the reading momentum has kicked in again, I think the motivation to write again will too.

Blurb:

We are liars.

We are beautiful and privileged.

We are cracked and broken.

A tale of love and romance.

A tale of tragedy.

Which are lies?

Which are truth?

You decide.

We Were Liars is an astonishing book full of very deep themes and dark metaphors. It completely surprised me, for when I saw reviews on bookstagram I very much expected it to be a soppy romance. I suppose that was an element, but the incredible writing overshadowed it. My favourite quote from the novel is “Silence is a protective coating over pain”. I am quite a silent person and I notice that a main reason for my silence is because so much goes on inside my brain. Sometimes this chronic overthinking becomes so painful that we can’t handle it anymore.

The family drama in this book made it stand out from the normal YA contemporary. Through the perspective of Cady we can see what a large effect strong family bonds can have on people. In this book it was hugely negative. Relationships were broken and never mended, abused and never apologised for. 

My rating: 3.5/5 stars

I have deducted one star because I think the plot too quickly jumps to the dilemma. There is no time to feel attached to the characters before disaster strikes. The character’s problems in this book are incredibly serious but I could not cry at any point because I had no time to resonate with them. On Goodreads I have rated it a 4 star but really it was only 3.5. I think that this book was amazing but something about it did not make me feel that emotional! 

An amazing feature of this book was the short stories Cady wrote. They cleverly reflected what was going on in her life but retold as a fairytale (although they weren’t that magical). A quote I can clearly remember is this: “If you want to live in a world where people are not afraid of mice, then you must give up living in palaces”. Obviously this demands context but I would not like to spoil it for you! As the book is only 225 pages long, it wouldn’t be a burden to go and read it for yourself. I 100% recommend you read it, even though it wasn’t 5/5 stars for me!

Have a great day,

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