The Book:
The Good Liar by Catherine McKenzie
Published April 3, 2018 by Lake Union Publishing
Date read: March 28, 2021
The Characters:
Cecily and her deceased husband Tom
Cecily’s best friend Kate
Franny, Kate’s long-lost daughter
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The Plot (from Goodreads):
When an explosion rips apart a Chicago building, the lives of three women are forever altered.
A year later, Cecily is in mourning. She was supposed to be in the building that day. Instead, she stood on the street and witnessed it going down, with her husband and best friend inside. Kate, now living thousands of miles away, fled the disaster and is hoping that her past won’t catch up with her. And Franny, a young woman in search of her birth mother, watched the horror unfold on the morning news, knowing that the woman she was so desperate to reconnect with was in the building.
Now, despite the marks left by the tragedy, they all seem safe. But as its anniversary dominates the media, the memories of that terrifying morning become dangerous triggers. All these women are guarding important secrets. Just how far will they go to keep them?
The Twist:
Cecily and Tom were getting divorced when Tom died. She knew he was cheating on her, and found out later that it was with Kate.
Everyone thought Kate died in the explosion, but she used it as an excuse to run away. She was guilty about her affair with Tom and overwhelmed as a wife and mother.
Kate saw Franny’s interview and returned to expose her as a fraud. She also recorded Franny confessing to causing the explosion. Franny said she was Kate’s daughter, Kate denied to everyone including Franny that it was true, but at the very end of the book we learn that she actually was her daughter. She had gotten pregnant while studying abroad and put the baby up for adoption without anyone knowing.
The Review:
I have never been disappointed by a Catherine McKenzie book. I’ve been reading them all out of order–I started with You Can’t Catch Me, then Six Weeks to Live, and now The Good Liar. I think The Good Liar has been my favorite so far.
The premise of this book was refreshingly unique. The Good Liar was full of secrets and twists that kept me guessing right up to the end. Every character is lying to someone–some characters to protect their family, and some characters to protect themselves. It’s a great example of a perfectly executed unreliable narrator story.
I love finding a great author with a long backlog of books for me to read. I have I’ll Never Tell on audiobook, and can’t wait to get to the rest of them! Keep an eye out for Six Weeks to Live, coming this May!
If you’ve read this book, who do you think the title refers to?
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