Lies Lies Lies by Adele Parks
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Thank you to the publisher, Harlequin Trade Publishing, for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
The Gist
I really like mystery and thriller stories. Give me something that gives me the spooks and I’m all yours.
However, recently I have noticed a change, or rather shift, in genre categorizations.
A few times now I started reading a thriller/mystery novel with the appropriate gusto only to find out that the book should have been labelled a psychological or domestic drama.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not as if those types of stories aren’t good. It’s just that when I’m anticipating one story but I’m getting another, it’s a little confusing or off-putting.
The Details
Let’s start with the characters, shall we?
We have two protagonists, so to speak. Although, the majority of the narration is done from Daisy’s point of view, with a journal-type feel to it.
We hear her thoughts and get an insight into her emotions and struggles as she navigates through a marriage that clearly wasn’t meant to be and is way beyond fixing.
The second protagonist is her husband, Simon.
These sections in the story are narrated from the third-person point of view, yet still give an enormous amount of details and insight into what got his knickers twisted into such a knot.
I’m making a little light of this part of the story, but in reality, the struggles he faces, and the repercussions of his addiction are devastating and no laughing matter.
I will comment on this further a little later.
I thought both main characters had the same fundamental issue, story-telling wise, in that both were unable to communicate even in the slightest.
I understand from the comments Daisy made about Simon’s behaviour that his struggles have been ongoing for years and that they had rough patches in their marriage before.
Ok. I get that. But why do they all of a sudden stop talking to each other when the story begins?
It gets tiring to read about each character’s struggles and suspicions of the other person without the slightest possibility of them ever communicating them.
To make matters worse, about halfway through the book, Daisy decides to communicate even less with her friends.
The reader is witness to scenes between Daisy and one friend or another and most of those scenes the reader gets to read about Daisy’s internalized dialogue and comments.
It got boring.
Furthermore, there was no real progression in the story. There was a lot of repetition and rehashing of what we had already read about and chewed through on more than one occasion.
On the other hand, this story contains a handful of trigger points that would have been great building blocks for further commentary and exploration.
Some of these trigger points came a little to close to home and left me feeling blue and depressed.
If the story was meant to do that, then it certainly accomplished it very well. I had only hoped for a little more substance to them.
With the next two comments I will probably sound like I’m contradicting what I just said, but bear with me.
I appreciated the raw and unabashed truth the author gave to Simon’s alcohol problem.
The few scenes that showed him at his worst did not hold back. I think that level of honesty is necessary when tackling such an intense subject matter.
I also appreciated reading about a mother’s struggles with having and raising a child.
I don’t have any kids of my own and for years we have been dished this idealistic portrait of the mother raising her children, looking flawless and enjoying every spit-up and playdate.
This portrayal of the perfect mother so prevalent up until very recently has caused a lot of insecurities in women and mothers. It is refreshing to finally see the reality behind this absurd idea of perfection.
I found the writing in general very engaging. I had the feeling the protagonists, especially Daisy, were only addressing me. It was a one-on-one conversation.
Sadly, it wasn’t enough to compensate for the slow plot development and repetitiveness.
The Verdict
Overall, I had high hopes for Lies Lies Lies and the first 25% were promising enough to hold my attention and fuel my motivation. Alas, it couldn’t sustain it and I felt let down.
I still find that it was raw and gritty, yet it could have been so much more. I’m giving it extra points for addressing difficult topics.
I would suggest it to anyone looking for a domestic drama.
About the Author
Adele Parks was born in Teesside, North-East England. Her first novel, Playing Away, waspublished in 2000 and since then she’s had seventeen international bestsellers, translated intotwenty-six languages, including I Invited Her In. She’s been an Ambassador for The ReadingAgency and a judge for the Costa. She’s lived in Italy, Botswana and London, and is now settledin Guildford, Surrey, with her husband, teenage son and cat.
