The Liars' Club

A Memoir

by Mary Karr

352 pages

English language

Published May 31, 2005 by Penguin (Non-Classics).

ISBN:: 978-0-14-303574-9
OCLC Number:: 61332250

(10 reviews)

The Texas refinery town of Leechfield, perched on the swampy rim of the Gulf, is famous for mosquitoes and the manufacture of Agent Orange - a place where the only bookstores are religious ones and the restaurants serve only fried food. A handful of the Leechfield oil workers gather regularly at the American Legion Bar to drink salted beer and spin long, improbable tales. They're the Liars' Club. And to the girl whose father is the club's undisputed champion mythmaker, they exude a fatal glamour - one that lifts her from ordinary life.

But there are other lies. Darker, more hidden. Her mother's unimaginable past threatens the family's very sanity. Mary Karr looks back through younger eyes to exorcise those demons: a mad, puritanical grandmother; a vast inheritance squandered in one year flat; endless emptied bottles; and the darknesses inflicted on an eight-year-old girl. This voice explodes with antic, wit, …

9 editions

Kathrin Passig reviewed The Liars' Club by Mary Karr

Review of "The Liars' Club" on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Das Buch wird immer wieder mal als wichtiges Ereignis im Memoirenwesen genannt. Es war auch interessant, meine Unzufriedenheit liegt zum Teil sicher an zu hohen Erwartungen. Die Rezensionsversprechung, dass es "hilarious", "funny" oder "darkly comic" sein soll, kann ich mir nur so erklären, dass 1994 eine andere Zeit war. Ich glaube nicht, dass das noch jemand behaupten würde, wenn das Buch jetzt herauskäme, es handelt nur von Trauma, Trauma und dann zur Abwechslung noch anderen Sorten Trauma. Einige Parallelen zu "The Glass Castle" von Jeannette Walls, das ich interessanter fand, ich kann aber nicht mehr genau sagen, woran das lag, zu lange her.

Annette C. Boehm reviewed The Liars' Club by Mary Karr

Review of "The Liars' Club" on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

The book takes us into the world of seven year-old Mary, growing up in Texas oil country. When the grandmother is diagnosed with cancer and moves in with the family, many things change, not necessarily for the better.
This is the first of three memoirs by poet Mary Karr. Also see my book blog for more about this book: outsideofacat.wordpress.com/2020/07/07/the-liars-club-mary-karr/

The book takes us into the world of seven year-old Mary, growing up in Texas oil country. When the grandmother is diagnosed with cancer and moves in with the family, many things change, not necessarily for the better.
This is the first of three memoirs by poet Mary Karr. Also see my book blog for more about this book: https://outsideofacat.wordpress.com/2020/07/07/the-liars-club-mary-karr/