Reviews with content warning for Addiction - משפחה של שקרנים

Reviews tagging 'Addiction'

משפחה של שקרנים by E. Lockhart, א' לוקהארט

159 reviews

deartaylorwoods's review against another edition

4.75

dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I didn’t know this was coming until I saw it on the shelf one day. What an exciting day that was!

We Were Liars became one of my favorite books from the moment I picked it up & to get this story years later has been a gift.

I loved going back to the island, yet getting to know it in a different form.

I loved diving back into the E.L. writing style that felt unique to WWL.

Content Warnings

jojo_fiction_'s review against another edition

4.25

dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I recommend reading We Were Liars first, as this book has major spoilers for it.

“I have been a liar all my life, you see.

It is not uncommon in my family.”

The life of the rich and privileged, who have nothing to worry about, and can do no wrong (and if they do, no one will ever know).

I was so excited to stumble upon this book in a bookstore, I had no idea it even existed so I kinda lost my mind when I saw it on the shelf. I read We Were Liars years ago and it was one of those books with characters, a setting and plot twists that stay with you. So of course I had to read the prequel.

In Family of Liars, we follow Johnny’s mother, Carrie Sinclair, as she describes: “the worst thing she ever did”. The book shows the way different people handle grief, the complexity of family and what even makes people be considered as family, sisterhood, and how far people are willing to go to protect them.

“We show our love not with honesty or affection, but with loyalty”

I won't explain the details of the plot in case there are any potential readers who don't want to get spoiled, so this will be more like my thoughts about the characters and overarching themes.

I love stories about rich, old money families. Maybe because I like the aesthetic, or more likely because I like examining the inner workings and psychological issues that a lot of these families have. We get insight into all three of the sisters, Carrie more than the others, and despite them not being good people I think they were good characters.The sisters in Family Of Liars, are not supposed to be likeable. They are spoiled, pretty, privileged, and filthy rich. But I think it's easy to forget that despite their privileges they are still just children when this story takes place (17,16 and 14). The events that happen (

like the death of their youngest sister.

) follow them throughout their lives and they are shown to have no healthy grieving processes in order to “protect” the family and their reputation. Instead they bury it inside themselves and the pain leaks out in other ways. Carrie through her drug addiction, Penny through her need for attention, and Bess through her people pleasing nature and need for order and control.

Throughout the story we are introduced to themes that shape the plot and the characters. Grief, and it’s all consuming nature. Family loyalty, no matter what. The dark origins of old money wealth. Appearance vs reality. The book handles these themes not by just telling you they are there, but by having the characters actions governed by them.

I liked how Lockhart used choppy writing and line structure at points throughout the book to show the disordered thought process of Carrie. Both due to grief and the heavy drugs she was on. As well as her back tracking near the end to tell the real story and not what happened in her head. Just like in We Were Liars, we were left wondering how reliable this narrator is, and how much we could actually believe the story we were being told.

“I did say at the start of this story that I am a liar”

One thing I didn't love, or at least don't know how to feel about is, the way ghosts were shown as being real. One thing I loved about We Were Liars was the ambiguity due to the unreliable narrator. Were the other liars ghosts? Or were they a figment of the imagination of a broken and traumatized girl? Family of Liars takes away from that as it seems that ghosts are the answer. Not that it's a bad interpretation, I just liked the open ended idea We Were Liars left us with.

Overall , E.Lockhart did an amazing job handling difficult topics while keeping the same feelings from We Were Liars. Such an outwardly perfect family, perfect island, perfect summer. But something in the back of your mind telling you something is terribly, terribly wrong.

Content Warnings

lacey1020's review against another edition

3.5

dark reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

3.5 stars.

I definitely think I would’ve enjoyed this more if it wasn’t connected to the We Were Liars universe, but I see why it was. I think that I’m just a sucker of anything set in the 80s. This book was way more interesting than We Were Liars in my opinion. I know I didn’t like We Were Liars very much, but two of my biggest issues with it were the plot twist and the writing style, which I figured wouldn’t be an issue in here. I do think this book was a tad pointless. It didn’t really add anything to the universe for We Were Liars fans to be incentivized to pick it up. Again I found the rich, snooty, appearance obsessed family to be awful. I couldn’t stand how they acted like the main character was the problem for having normal feelings to the situations at hand. Reading about cold, unfeeling rich people hiding their feelings and buying their way out of problems to save face is not really my thing, unless it’s portrayed in a negative light. These characters were frustrating to read about/listen to. I did not understand what Carrie every saw in Pfeff, he was awful the entire time. He was such a scumbag and a tool, I didn’t feel bad when he died. I didn’t see the point of the ghost thing, it didn’t add much to the story. I don’t think her addiction was portrayed in a serious way, and added very little. Because of this I don’t think it made her the unreliable narrator that it was trying to. Also the reveal that her father wasn’t really her father contributed very little. The book never went anywhere with it. The dead sister plotline also contributed little. Also I just want to talk about how fucked it is that the father made the main character get a whole ass cosmetic surgery to make her look more like him. I’m not condoning the wife cheating, but the husband could’ve just left her instead of forcing a unnecessary surgery on a young girl who was not at fault.

Content Warnings

dalek_caan's review against another edition

4.75

adventurous mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I loved this book almost as much as I loved We Were Liars. I was really impressed by the author's ability to tell a story just as captivating as the previous book, in a prequel no less. I would definitely recommend this book BUT I recommend reading the other book first because this book will spoil We Were Liars.

Content Warnings

elianahanstater's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

i want to start by saying that i absolutely love how the author writes. her language is absolutely beautiful and you really feel as if you are inside the lines of the story. however personally i found this book underwhelming compared to the first. i was expecting to be hit as hard as the first book but this never came which was disappointing. regardless the story was very nicely written and portrayed.

Content Warnings