The Book of Lies by Mary HorlockMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
The feral nature of adolescent girls and the vagaries of history...set on the Isle of Guernsey.
The lies told by the Rozier family during the Nazi Occupation in WWII resound down the years to impact on fifteen year old Cat Rozier
Cat the brain, the outcast, becomes fast friends with Nicolette, the new girl in town...The lovely and wild Nicolette. they become inseparable.....partying, drinking, hooking up with the local boys. All the while Nicolette alternates her friendship with taunts and bullying. A personal betrayal ends in murder...and Cat lays the blame on her family's history of lies and betrayal
Interspersed within this tale of "teens gone wrong" is Cat's father's account of the Nazi Occupation and the part played by his older brother as a collaborator.....and the disclosure of other family secrets
Hence, this BOOK OF LIES penned by Cat...History does repeat itself..and adolescent girls, by their nature and hormones, are not innocent.
I liked this book. I read it back-to-back with LIGHT FROM A DISTANT STAR by Mary McGarry Morris ...another story of a teenage girl in crisis...although that child didn't resort to murder. In this case, the girls were none of them very likable, but the interweaving of family history, secrets and lies...made the whole ghastly, central Act a little more justified....but just a little
Recommended...but only to those who don't see teenage girls as angels...to those who see the blood still on the lip
4 Stars
***This was a Net Galley***
3 comments:
I love the book's title. I'll read just about anything related to adolescence, especially if there's angst. Your review compels me to seek this title -- and author.
Thanks, Jude!
I'm not one to read stories of adolescence but I did enjoy this story. I chose it because it was set in Guernsey. Until I'd read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (reviewed here: http://freshinkbooks.blogspot.com/2008/08/guernsey-literary-and-potato-peel-pie.html) I knew little or nothing about the occupation of the island by the Germans during WWII. The Book of Lies covered the same period and I really enjoyed learning more about the history and the people's reactions in the circumstance. I rated it the same as you did. I've since found two other novels set in Guernsey, The Soldier's Wife, and The Book of Ebenezer Le Page. I hope to learn more about the island from these too.
'allo, Enrique...I think you'd like this one...since the angst-ridden are girls...in their feral state..
Sandra...duly noting the two titles you mentioned...Thank You
;-}
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