Review: We Were Liars by E.Lockhart

The Premise: Before I begin, I just wanted to show a small snippet of the book from the beginning which I thought was super intriguing:

"A beautiful and distinguished family. A private island. A brilliant, damaged girl; a passionate political boy. A group of four friends -- the Liars -- whose friendship turns destructive. A revolution. An accident. A secret. Lies upon lies. True love. The truth." 

Just that little bit there explains most of the story really well. It follows Cadence Sinclair of the Sinclair family. Cadence is with her mother, and along with that, her mother has two sisters, and each sister inhabits a house on this private island along with their grandma. From each sister, comes a child, who Cadence begins to hang around with, and also with that, a visitor to the island, Gat. So the four, Cadence, Johnny, Gat and Mirren form the liars. It follows Cadence as she begins to unravel an accident that happen on a particular summer. The narrative moves a bit in and out of time with Cadence attempting to piece all the events together, while dealing with the repercussions of the present time. Coming from a distinguished family and there is a legacy to protect, so to speak, there is a kind of "hushhush" vibe going on throughout the book. It is a mystery novel, so throughout the novel is just attempting to piece together not just events, but also getting to know the liars on a whole.

My overall thoughts and review: I went into this book completely blind, not knowing a thing about it and I think that is what made me enjoy it so much. The mystery of it was all I knew, but it only enhanced the mystery in a way? I really enjoyed reading it. Lockhart's writing is just beautiful. So many passages, I just enjoyed reading so much because her choice of words, were just amazing. Her descriptions for characters were especially my favorite, such as how Cadence described Gat. I found that it captured that certain kind of lifestyle really well, and also the liars rejection of that lifestyle in contrast to that. The ending just blew my mind, let me tell you. I did not see it coming, but I can see how many others could see all the chips stacking to that event at the end. It just blew my mind completely, and I was really impressed with the overall outcome of the story. I really enjoyed this, and I am still reeling from it a bit, so I am kind of off about my rating for it. I think why it does not get a complete perfect rating from me is because I just wanted to read more about the other liars as a whole.. I just wanted more. Also, the weaving in and out of a story about a king and the daughters with many renditions often confused things a little for me, but I really liked the little preface those offered. All in all, I highly recommend this if you are a fan of mystery novels and a fan of contemporaries. It is definitely worth the read!

Rating of the book: 4.5/5 stars

Have you read We Were Liars? What are your thoughts on it? Let me know in the comments below!