One of Us Is Lying

One of us is lying, #1

by Karen M. McManus

audio cd

English language

Published by Listening Library (Audio).

ISBN:: 978-1-5247-5688-8

View on OpenLibrary

(14 reviews)

All the secrets of the Bayview Four will be revealed in the TV series soon to be streaming on NBC's Peacock!

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY - BUZZFEED - POPCRUSH

"Pretty Little Liars meets The Breakfast Club" (Entertainment Weekly) in this addictive mystery about what happens when five strangers walk into detention and only four walk out alive.

Pay close attention and you might solve this. On Monday afternoon, five students at Bayview High walk into detention. Bronwyn, the brain, is Yale-bound and never breaks a rule. Addy, the beauty, is the picture-perfect homecoming princess. Nate, the criminal, is already on probation for dealing. Cooper, the athlete, is the all-star baseball pitcher. And Simon, the outcast, is the creator of Bayview High's notorious gossip app.

Only, Simon never makes it out of that classroom. Before …

All the secrets of the Bayview Four will be revealed in the TV series soon to be streaming on NBC's Peacock!

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY - BUZZFEED - POPCRUSH

"Pretty Little Liars meets The Breakfast Club" (Entertainment Weekly) in this addictive mystery about what happens when five strangers walk into detention and only four walk out alive.

Only, Simon never makes it out of that classroom. Before the end of detention Simon's dead. And according to investigators, his death wasn't an accident. On Monday, he died. But on Tuesday, he'd planned to post juicy reveals about all four of his high-profile classmates, which makes all four of them suspects in his murder. Or are they the perfect patsies for a killer who's still on the loose?

Everyone has secrets, right? What really matters is how far you would go to protect them.

3 editions

Enum & Valerie reviewed One of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus (One of us is lying, #1)

One of Us is Lying

4 stars

I liked it, but I already liked the TV series, so I knew what to expect. Now I can compare!

Things I liked better in the book: There is no omnipotent, omniscient being as in the series. Everyone just knows what they see and hear about, and works with mundane methods. Also, Luis, Ashton and Eli are amazing extra characters! Also, yes, Simon is definitely a channer.

Things I liked better in the TV series: How the entire situation came to happen. Jake's role, Simon's, and most of all, Janae's! Also, the entire ending. That version is just way more satisfying.

Esther S. reviewed One of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus (One of us is lying, #1)

Sólido

4 stars

3'5/5 Mentiría si dijera que algo me ha sorprendido o que me ha enganchado muchísimo, pero sí que es una historia muy sólida donde todo lo que pasa tenía que pasar así y tiene sentido. Trata muchas cosas y en general los mensajes que deja están bien.

patchworkbunny reviewed One Of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus

Review of 'One Of Us Is Lying' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

One of Us is Lying is loosely based on The Breakfast Club, but with a more sinister edge. There's the geek, the jock, the criminal, the prom queen and the outsider. Five enter detention but only four leave alive. I read this during readathon and it kept me turning the pages, eager to know who did it. I am not super familiar with the film it's based on.

Simon is the creator of a gossip app that reports on the secrets of Bayview High. There are few people who don't have a reason to kill him, but what are his fellow detentionees hiding? They might all start out as stereotypes but of course, people are so often different from how they present themselves to the world.

Cooper is the jock and his secret is nothing to be ashamed of, it's society that is the problem, especially the attitudes in the sporting community. I think for him, although he lost the choice of telling friends and family, it wasn't altogether a bad thing.

Addy is the prom queen character and seems a bit air-headed at the start but you soon learn her relationship with her boyfriend is controlling. She has relied on him too much and she must earn not to be co-dependent. What she did wasn't right, but maybe it was good for her.

I liked Nate who is the least advantaged of the bunch. He lives with his alcoholic father and makes ends meet by dealing drugs. He is not a bad person but driven by shitty circumstances. He's on probation when the death happens and obviously, everyone thinks he is the prime suspect.

Bronwyn's a straight A student with aspirations of Yale. Her secret will put that at risk. She felt like the main character in this, but maybe the hardest to feel sympathy for. I don't think what she did was dealt with properly either. The media are overly intrusive in all cases though, it's a real problem that people are tried through the media before things even get to court.

Each character has chapters in first person narrative but the voices aren't that distinct so I did rely on the headings to tell me who was talking at times. These four teenagers who didn't have reasons to mix normally, start to forge friendships, despite lingering suspicion. By the conclusion, it's a sad reminder of the brutal social environment that high school can be. It's so hard to come out of it unscathed.