My first mystery/crime novel (but likely not my last)
This book is a good blend of almost everything. It’s a YA contemporary novel with young adults dealing with issues/problems/challenges in the world of 2017. It is also a mystery crime novel which kept me guessing until the end.
I have never finished or read a crime novel before but after reading One Of Us Is Lying by Karen McManus I am almost sure the crime section/genre haven’t seen the last of me 😀
One Of Us Is Lying
Karen McManus
358 pages
Rating ★★★★
The plot of One Of Us Is Lying is quite simple actually. Five students, Simon, Bronwyn, Nate, Cooper and Addy, are in detention. But only four of them get out alive. During the detention Simon, who runs a gossip app, dies and the remaining four students become suspects in a murder investigation.
What can I say, I actually really liked this books. I think it has something to do with the fact that, as earlier mentioned, this book is a good blend of everything. It isn’t just a simple crime novel it is also a novel about four teenagers trying to deal with their lives. I think this might be the reason I liked this book so much.
I will just make a quick note on the narration. This book is told by all four students as a first-person narrator. I am always a little wary of stories told from more than one perspective But in this case, it worked perfectly. I felt I got to know the characters way better and hey it’s a crime novel from the perspective of the suspects so I guess this is the way to do it. Anyway on to what I thought of the characters.
I will make a comment on all four characters so there may be some spoilers regarding character development and so on, but now you are warned anyway! 😉
The first character you meet/read through is Bronwyn. She is the typical geek. She works hard and she is good in school. I liked her and I think she was stubborn and kinda cute. I especially found her developing friendship and relationship with Nate really cute! (I mean who doesn’t love those late nights phonecalls?) Maybe their relationship was a bit too cliche; bad boy and good girl. But considering they had a past as childhood friends it made it more believable. I shipped them 😀
Nate was my favourite character, he was really cool. He had a quite sad backstory with his family situation with both parents being alcoholics but there was something about him (and not that he was the “bad boy”) that I really liked. I recall when I read this book all I thought was don’t let it be him. I couldn’t bear it.. or maybe I could… won’t spoil anything. Anyhow one scene in this book where I just loved Nate was when he stood up for Cooper! That was just so well done! I would love to see that on the big screen.
Speaking of Cooper he was probably the character I liked the least. I am not saying I didn’t like him he just didn’t have that big impact on me. Maybe it was the hole untouchable baseball star controlling dad thing, I don’t know. But he grew on me through the book and he had more debt than I thought.
The last character of the four suspected students is Addy. She was the one who made the greatest character development. She went from being just an accessory to her boyfriend (if you can be such a thing haha) to being an independent young woman. I was not that fond of her in the beginning. To me, she was a bit insignificant but she turned out to be quite the opposite.
If I should mention one bad thing about this book it would be the synopsis on the front/back of the book. It made the characters seem like totally stereotypes when there were way more to them than just their labels as geek, criminal, jock and princess. Something like that can make me not want to pick up a book… so don’t do that again Karen McManus! 😉
If I have to stay on the negative, I have also read that some readers found the murder to be predictable. I had my guesses too of course but I was still surprised when it was uncovered. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that this was my first crime novel that I was easily fooled… 😀
Anyway overall really great book! I am looking forward to what Karen McManus will come up with in the future, 4 stars to One Of Us Is Lying from me!
Nicoline <3
Have you read One Of Us Is Lying? Who was your favourite character and did you guess who the murder was? Have you read any similar books you could recommend?
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