Genre: YA thriller
Overall rating: 4.5/5 stars
Synopsis: For all of Kat’s life, it’s just been her and her mother, Jamie—except for the forty-eight hours when Jamie was married and Kat had a stepbrother, Liam. That all ended in an epic divorce, and Kat and Liam haven’t spoken since.
Now Jamie is a jewel thief trying to go straight, but she has one last job—at billionaire Ross Sutherland’s birthday party. And Kat has figured out a way to tag along. What Kat doesn’t know, though, is that there are two surprise guests at the dazzling Sutherland compound that weekend. The last two people she wants to run into. Liam and his father—a serial scammer who has his sights set on Ross Sutherland’s youngest daughter.
Kat and Liam are on a collision course to disaster, and when a Sutherland dies, they realize they might actually be in the killer’s crosshairs themselves. Somehow Kat and Liam are the new targets, and they can’t trust anyone—except each other.
Or can they? Because if there’s one thing both Kat and Liam know, it’s how to lie. They learned from the best.
Review: Such Charming Liars is another stunning murder mystery by YA thriller queen Karen! I genuinely have no idea how she manages to continually write the same kind of story eight times and still not have them feel repetitive or boring. Each book is a fresh and exciting adventure where I still have no clue as to who the culprit is, and Such Charming Liars is no exception.
One of my favorite things about this book was how instead of going the obvious route of romantically pairing Kat and Liam, Karen really focuses on developing their "stepsibling" bond instead. It was a refreshing take on a classic McManus tale, and their respective love lives were still fun to follow as B-plots (or in Kat's case, the lack thereof – she don't need no man).
Kat's relationship with Jamie was a very well written element as well, and reminded me a lot of Rory and Lorelai from Gilmore Girls, but if Lorelai was even less responsible. The theme of setting boundaries between the friend/friend and parent/child dynamic was really interesting, and I enjoyed reading about it.
If there's one complaint I have, it would be the second hand embarrassment I got from Kat's incredibly idiotic behavior and choices at the beginning. She's a 16-year-old girl that didn't have any good role models growing up, so they're entirely plausible with how her character was set up, but that didn't make me want to bang my head against a wall any less sometimes. They definitely were a bit far-fetched and required some extra suspension of disbelief,
All-around, this was a fast-paced, well-developed story with some excellent twists and a unique cast of characters that had me glued to my Kindle for basically 48 hours straight.
READ IF YOU LIKE: Karen M. McManus's other books, every single character is morally gray, dual POV narration (but they're not in love with each other), shiny things, Holly Jackson, Gilmore Girls, found family, and LOTS of rich family drama.
Favorite quotes:
"𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒓𝒆𝒍𝒚 𝒎𝒐𝒓𝒆 𝒆𝒙𝒆𝒓𝒄𝒊𝒔𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒏 𝒂𝒏𝒚𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒔𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝒂 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒆 𝒅𝒂𝒚. 𝑪𝒂𝒏'𝒕 𝒊𝒎𝒂𝒈𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒚 𝒚𝒐𝒖'𝒅 𝒅𝒐 𝒊𝒕 𝒃𝒚 𝒄𝒉𝒐𝒊𝒄𝒆."
"𝑴𝒐𝒔𝒕 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒍𝒅'𝒔 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒃𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒅 𝒃𝒆 𝒔𝒐𝒍𝒗𝒆𝒅 𝒊𝒇 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒂𝒔 𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒍𝒚 𝒂𝒔 𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒅 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒔𝒖𝒑𝒑𝒐𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆 𝒕𝒐 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝒂𝒔 𝒈𝒊𝒓𝒍𝒔 𝒂𝒓𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒍𝒂𝒅𝒊𝒆𝒔' 𝒓𝒐𝒐𝒎."
"𝑰 𝒄𝒂𝒏 𝒌𝒆𝒆𝒑 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒉𝒐𝒍𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖'𝒗𝒆 𝒅𝒖𝒈 𝒇𝒓𝒐𝒎 𝒈𝒆𝒕𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒂𝒏𝒚 𝒅𝒆𝒆𝒑𝒆𝒓. 𝑶𝒓 𝑰 𝒄𝒂𝒏 𝒃𝒖𝒓𝒚 𝒚𝒐𝒖."
Finally, thank you so much to TBR and Beyond Tours for providing me with a digital ARC of this book! This did not affect my review/rating in any way. You can click here to see the tour schedule and check out everyone else's amazing posts, and you can preorder Such Charming Liars from Amazon, B&N, Indiebound, or any other retailer of your choice. Publishing date is July 30th, 2024, which is tomorrow, so you don't have long to wait before you can read it! And if you happen to be on a book buying ban, I have good news: you can also add it on Goodreads and request it at your local library!
About the Author: Karen M. McManus is a #1 New York Times and international bestselling author of young adult thrillers. Her work includes the One of Us Is Lying series, which was turned into a television show on Peacock and Netflix, as well as the standalone novels Two Can Keep a Secret, The Cousins, You’ll Be the Death of Me, and Nothing More to Tell. Karen’s critically acclaimed, award-winning books have been translated into forty-two languages. You can find Karen at @writerkmc on Instagram and at her website www.karenmcmanus.com.
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