Since moving to the town, a lot seems untold as Ellery and her brother leave California and embrace the culture and occurrences that hold a bitter past for their maternal grandmother. Their mother is in rehab leaving the two to spend time in a place that they barely know yet already scarcely with past occurrences. The disappearance of their aunt and some similar incidences seem to hold a number of things that the residents of this town seem to prefer to keep in the dark. the writing and the pacing had me feeling like I was binge watching an addictive Netflix series. If that's not an indicator of a good book then I don't know what is. At first, I only cared about Bronwyn’s and Nate’s POVs, they seemed the most plausible of them all and I was rooting for them to be together, like seriously. They were completely adorable and, oddly enough, perfect for each other. There are a couple of characters in the book that are said to be depressed and one of them was Simon, the boy who died. The final plot twist is that Simon wasn't murdered, but killed himself. Again, I think that some of Simon's feelings that surround his depression could be very relateable to teenagers, but I had three huge issues with how his suicide was portrayed. I feel like one of maybe four people in the world who just... really did not enjoy this book? I've been putting off this review for weeks because I just don't know where to start. I have so many friends who raved about this book to me, so I was so disappointed by it.

Karen McManus did a great job with this book. It's amazing—she basically took most of the typical high school stereotypes, yet gave her characters a little more depth than you'd expect. Even though you probably will have suspicions of how the plot will unfold (and most of those suspicions will be correct), it's still interesting the way McManus pulls everything together. I couldn't get enough of this book, and even though the story wrapped up, I wouldn't have minded if it ran longer. Everyone wanted that bastard dead, he was spreading everyone’s dirty laundry on social media, not directly giving names, but accusing them of various things in a manner that I can only describe as petty and annoying. Like, I would’ve punched him in the mouth several times if I’d ever laid my eyes on him on the school hallways.No but seriously, these are the type of characters, I wouldn't associate with at all when first reading about them, but like???? honestly, I'm willing to turn myself in if it means having them free and unharmed. i love them so much oh my god. All 4 end up in detention with Simon Kelleher, the guy who runs a gossip app that ruins reputations with its secrets. All four of them have a secret to hide and would do anything to keep it hidden. But at what cost? Because by the end of detention Simon is dead, but who did it? As a huge fan of "The Breakfast Club", I loved the concept of five characters with different personalities meeting in detention from the get go, and I'm incredibly happy to report that my high expectations were even exceeded! Bayview High...detention...be there! The Breakfast Club vibe is strong when we start out with a rather unlikely group of kids meeting for detention. This is not your typical bunch of kids that frequent such punishments, in fact I think only one of them has had this joyful experience and that is Nate. I loved how the students were classified into their "groups" they associated with. The beauty, the brain, the criminal and the athlete...I mean we all know these groups really do exist in high school. What did I love most? As a thriller genre reader, this book was a breath of fresh air. It had such a unique storyline and honestly I did not guess the ending. I had no idea who was to blame for only 4 students making it out alive! Everyone had a reason to want Simon silenced, but who actually silenced him forever?!!

After all, there was one thing that Simon was right about all along. Secrets have a way of working their way to the surface. And Bayview still has plenty left to behold. I, personally, don’t. Give me darkness and thrills and creeps and gore. Do not give me baseball drama and romantic miscommunication and phones getting taken away, please. I’m not interested. Well, I can 99% gaurentee your search has come to the end because let me present to you this bookwhich lives up to the damn hype and everything you can possibly want in a thriller. One of Us is Lying gives an account of five students who walked into detention, but only four manage to leave alive. The mysterious killing leaves a lot of questions unanswered meaning that someone among the group was responsible for the murder.This is the recipe this book was made of and since I enjoyed solving the murder mystery I decided that I won’t go into detail all too much. The title obviously keeps you guessing throughout. The level of suspense was perfect and I never knew who and what to trust and believe. I kept thinking about possible solutions even when I wasn't reading. I thought I had discovered every possible solution, but I was still surprised at the end! mental illness rep: Nope nope nope. Let's please not use mental illness as a motive or in such a degrading way. _____ is depressed, and using that as something to explain why a person did something horrible, is not something I ever want to read. Villainizing all the characters with mental illnesses and degrading them to just that, is an automatic no for me. So I add it to my GR queue and avoid and avoid and avoid ! She insisted I add it during the christmas holidays to my tablet...in fact she added it from the library as I would not read her hard copy and she watched me read and grimace and roll my eyes and she would pinch me hard. "Jaidee you love it don't lie" she'd squeal. I would look at her and shake my head in dismay. Beyond all of that... honestly, the writing is just not that good, and the "twist" is so predictable it hurts.

What other bits and pieces were total home runs? Well, I can’t forget to mention the utterly top-notch twist that I absolutely did not see coming. Then there was the *chef’s kiss* redemption arc for villainess Vanessa and the warm and cuddly found family trope that is always a slam dunk for me. So whole this full-circle narrative did leave some pieces uncharacteristically up in the air, the finale did provide the perfect closing scene to be sure. Everyone's a target. And now that someone unexpected has returned to Bayview, things are starting to get deadly. And outsider Simon, creator of the notorious gossip app at Bayview High, won't ever talk about any of them again.

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

i cant wait to see what kind of books mcmanus writes next! hopefully its more of this, please and thank you! I don't read too many contemporaries but gosh-dang was I glued to this plot - the way the clues were revealed slowly and steadily. It was thrilling. Addy's POV is very shallow and portrays a terrible relationship and girl drama. (But she has a good growth arc.)

But nothing has settled for the residents of Bayview. Not now someone has started playing a sinister game of Truth or Dare. Even though I figured out the twist I still think the above reasons is what made this book so good. Even though I predicted the whodunit less than halfway through, I still ended up genuinely enjoying the story. Now Nate is trying to maintain a long-distance relationship with Bronwyn, who is struggling to balance her new life at Yale with her memories of Bayview.Every time I walk into the living room my wife is watching Pretty Little Liars or Revenge or Riverdale or Veronica Mars or . . . well, you get the idea. Sometimes I watch a bit with her. As I started this book I immediately thought “this book will be perfect for her – it’s the same type of thing”! This wasn’t entirely original, I think I’ve heard of some other handful of stories similar, but it was entertaining nonetheless. If One of Us Is Lying was a television series, I would binge-watch it wholeheartedly. It's been a while since I've gotten so into a book I've devoured the majority of it in one sitting when I haven't been on a plane. This hooked me completely, and I'm surprised how much I liked it. After a typical day in a typical American high school, five teenagers enter detention but only four make it out alive. Simon, notorious due to his gossip-style blog that revealed all the dark and dirty secrets his fellow students never thought would see the light of day, had made many enemies. But which one would want to see him dead? Which one of them is lying? Second, a side character was also said to be depressed and she was his accomplice. She framed his death on the other 4 students by planting evidence. Through her, depression is villainized once again.