In my early twenties, I worked in a maximum security, Category A men’s prison. I got to know the prisoners, who were usually polite, funny, and, for want of a better word, ‘normal,’ even if guilty of terrible crimes. It made me realize you can’t simply tell if someone is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ by looking at them. It left an indelible mark on me: a fascination with people who lie easily and fool the world. My fascination grew when I became a journalist, but writing fiction has given me the freedom to truly explore liars of all types and try to understand them.
Barbara is a deliciously deceptive, vicious character wrapped in a seemingly mild-mannered 60-year-old woman. I loved how she both hated being overlooked and used her almost invisibility as an older woman, taking advantage of it to manipulate the object of her obsession–the foolish Sheba. When Sheba, a teacher, embarks on an affair with a pupil, it’s the opportunity Barbara has been waiting for.
Reading this book is a little like the cliché about watching a car crash in slow motion because there is an undeniable inevitability about Sheba’s fall from grace and destruction. Yet I couldn’t look away; I was too fascinated. Ultimately, they are two characters who are unpleasant in their unique ways, but they create an irresistible story when combined.
A lonely schoolteacher reveals more than she intends when she records the story of her best friend's affair with a pupil in this sly, insightful novel
Schoolteacher Barbara Covett has led a solitary existence; aside from her cat, Portia, she has few friends and no intimates. When Sheba Hart joins St. George's as the new art teacher, Barbara senses the possibility of a new friendship. It begins with lunches and continues with regular invitations to meals with Sheba's seemingly close-knit family. But as Barbara and Sheba's relationship develops, another does as well: Sheba has begun a passionate affair with an…
Why people lie is often as interesting as the lie itself for me. This book lays this out as Korede finds herself being a protective big sister to the beautiful Ayoola, a woman with an unfortunate hobby of bumping off men she dates. Despite the darkness of the subject matter, it’s a story full of humor as Korede finds herself telling lie after lie and getting in way over her head to cover up her sister’s murders.
I’ve got two sisters (none of us serial killers!), and it’s funny how much of this tale is relatable! It’s fresh and sharp, with a rich vein of humor that had me chuckling through much of it.
Sunday Times bestseller and The Times #1 bestseller
Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2019 Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2019 Winner of the 2019 LA Times Award for Best Crime Thriller Capital Crime Debut Author of the Year 2019 __________
'A literary sensation' Guardian
'A bombshell of a book... Sharp, explosive, hilarious' New York Times
'Glittering and funny... A stiletto slipped between the ribs and through the left ventricle of the heart' Financial Times __________
When Korede's dinner is interrupted one night by a distress call from her sister, Ayoola, she knows what's expected of her: bleach, rubber…
None of them knew what was coming, and none of them will ever be the same again...
Detective Jelani is a tough, veteran cop. His younger partner, Detective Madigan, is brash and confident. But they were not prepared to become embroiled in a series of cosmic events they could never…
The twists! The turns! The head-spinning lies! The problem with being an author is that I often know within a few pages exactly how a book will end. Although it doesn’t bother me (because the journey is just as important as the destination, in my opinion), it’s always really exciting when I come across a book where I have no clue WTF is going on.
The layers of deception, half-truths, lies, manipulations…they had me wondering where on earth this was going. I defy anyone to work out everything that’s going on.
ALICE FEENEYS NEW YORK TIMES AND INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
“Boldly plotted, tightly knotted—a provocative true-or-false thriller that deepens and darkens to its ink-black finale. Marvelous.” —AJ Finn, author of The Woman in the Window
My name is Amber Reynolds. There are three things you should know about me: 1. I’m in a coma. 2. My husband doesn’t love me anymore. 3. Sometimes I lie.
Amber wakes up in a hospital. She can’t move. She can’t speak. She can’t open her eyes. She can hear everyone around her, but they have no idea. Amber doesn’t remember what happened, but she has a…
He’s charming, he’s intelligent, and he’s a professional conman who is out to steal his new best friend’s life. And I can’t get enough of Tom Ripley! I absolutely love an anti-hero, and I like nothing better than getting a look inside a psychopath’s mind. I’ve read this book at least five times.
The writing is tight as a drum, Italy is brought to life, and it’s understandable why Tom falls in love with it…and Dickie. He falls in love so much he wants to become Dickie. The more Tom is backed into a corner, the more clever, audacious, and vicious he becomes. It’s no surprise to me that this book is such a classic.
It's here, in the first volume of Patricia Highsmith's five-book Ripley series, that we are introduced to the suave Tom Ripley, a young striver seeking to leave behind his past as an orphan bullied for being a "sissy." Newly arrived in the heady world of Manhattan, Ripley meets a wealthy industrialist who hires him to bring his playboy son, Dickie Greenleaf, back from gallivanting in Italy. Soon Ripley's fascination with Dickie's debonair lifestyle turns obsessive as he finds himself enraged by Dickie's ambivalent affections for Marge, a charming American dilettante, and Ripley begins a deadly game. "Sinister and strangely alluring"…
At the age of forty-nine, Laurie Woodford rents out her house, packs her belongings into two suitcases, and leaves her life in upstate New York to relocate to Seoul, South Korea. What begins as an opportunity to teach college English in Asia evolves into a nomadic adventure.
Okay, it’s not told by a liar, but it is a fascinating nonfiction deep dive into psychopaths, how many there are, what makes someone a psychopath, the impact it can have on coming across one, and so much more. This is a subject that I can’t seem to get enough of–perhaps because I’m a really bad liar! I couldn’t put it down, and after reading the book, I bought the audiobook version, too.
Psychopaths realize pretty early on in their lives that they aren’t like other people and have to find ways to pretend to be. It’s not that they’re bad people. It’s just that they think differently from most of the population, so they learn early on to disguise that by studying and mimicking everyone else. Their ‘otherness’ fascinates me, I suppose not least because I’m quite an intuitive, emotional person.
What if society wasn't fundamentally rational, but was motivated by insanity? This thought sets Jon Ronson on an utterly compelling adventure into the world of madness.
Along the way, Jon meets psychopaths, those whose lives have been touched by madness and those whose job it is to diagnose it, including the influential psychologist who developed the Psychopath Test, from whom Jon learns the art of psychopath-spotting. A skill which seemingly reveals that madness could indeed be at the heart of everything . . .
Combining Jon Ronson's trademark humour, charm and investigative incision, The Psychopath Test is both entertaining and…
Alex Appleby is a recovering liar. That’s how she thinks of herself as she slowly rebuilds her world after her husband left. Her twins, Edward and Elise, 23, don’t speak to her. Thank goodness for Carrie, the friend she made at a support group…although Alex has lied to her, too…
Then Alex discovers someone is sending anonymous threats to Carrie. And that Carrie has dark secrets of her own. She’d never let Alex down, though. Never put her in danger. Would she? Because when two liars collide, who will be able to tell what the truth is and which dangers are real?
The Festival of Sin is a three-story light sci-fi arc about a young boy rescued in 6000 BCE and taken to the home planet of the Hudra. Parts two and three are exploratory excursions. It's a fish-out-of-water series. More than fish-out-of-water. Fish-on-another-planet.
Return to Hope Creek is a second-chance rural romance set in Australia.
Stella Simpson's career and engagement are over. She returns to the rural community of Hope Creek to heal, unaware her high school and college sweetheart, Mitchell Scott, has also moved back to town to do some healing of…
