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Romance. Young Adult Fiction. Young Adult Literature. HTML: When Alix's charismatic girlfriend, Swanee, dies from sudden cardiac arrest, Alix is overcome with despair. As she searches Swanee's room for mementos of their relationship, she finds Swanee's cell phone, pinging with dozens of texts sent from a mysterious contact, L.T. The most recent text reads: "Please tell me what I did. Please, Swan. Te amo. I love you." Shocked and betrayed, Alix learns that Swanee has been leading a double life�??secretly dating a girl named Liana the entire time she's been with Alix. Alix texts Liana from Swanee's phone, pretending to be Swanee in order to gather information before finally meeting face-to-face to break the news. Brought together by Swanee's lies, Alix and Liana become closer than they'd thought possible. But Alix is still hiding the truth from Liana. Alix knows what it feels like to be lied to�??but will coming clean to Liana mean losing her, too… (more)
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Even though Swan dies early on, I was hoping this book would be more about her (as she is the most interesting character) and her double-life than about the two girls she left behind. The title suggests something a bit more scandalous.
Still, for a teenage audience it's probably just risque and intriguing enough to keep their attention.
I won this book in LibraryThing's Early
Unfortunately, I feel pretty disappointed with what I discovered. I should have known from the beginning - the entire premise of the book was just too strange for me. I completely understand that people grieve in different ways and I always appreciate it when books show that in realistic ways. Though much of Alix's behavior made me uncomfortable, it wasn't difficult for me to understand where she was coming from. Stealing Swanee's phone, her overwhelming desire to meet Liana, her difficulty relating to Joss' grief - these are all pretty normal grief reactions.
Maybe my problem is just that I didn't believe the relationship between Alix and Swanee. The book starts after Swanee's death, so readers never really get a first-hand look at the relationship between the two. However, Alix does describe it frequently, and it never sounds like a good relationship. Swanee comes off manipulative and deceitful, selfish and uncaring. Really, she sounds like a terrible person. So, that makes it difficult for me to believe that either of these girls - who seem relatively normal and self-confident - would have put up with her shenanigans. I suppose it is a realistic portrayal of a teenage relationship - quite often, you find yourself changing in small ways, ways that might make you unrecognizable when looked at as a whole. With hindsight, you might realize how unhealthy and destructive those relationships were. It is so easy to get caught up in young love - any love, really - that you might forget yourself.
So perhaps I shouldn't fault this book too much. What it sets out to do I think it does pretty realistically (though I find the relationship between Alix and Liana to be terribly rushed). I just never found myself invested in the story and I very much looked forward to the time when I would be finished with it. Just not for me, I suppose, though I will try to check out one of Peters other titles in the future.
Thanks to the publisher for an advance reader's copy.
Overall though I may not have been able to connect with the characters very much, in truth I really did not like Alix at all (hard to explain, she just bugged me), I still really enjoyed reading this book.
In LIES, Alix’s life revolved around the magnetic Swanee. She’s devastated to find clues to a secret romance on Swanee’s cell phone. Should she A) Use Swanee’s phone and pretend to be Swanee to fess out the situation with this other girl or B) Stay out of it and let Swanee rest in peace. I think you can guess which door Alix chooses in this scenario.
Swanee was one of those girls that could charm her way out of anything. Her little sister worshiped her, her parents spoiled her, and she was the center of the universe at school. She was the star of the track team and it was a total shock when she collapsed on the field of sudden cardiac arrest. Alix gave up everything to be with her because Swanee commanded her full attention. Finding out that Alix left behind this double life was devastating to her.
The cell phone trail leads to Liana, who is just as big a victim as Alix. They soon become unlikely friends, even though their new alliance is built on a lie. Is this budding romance a rebound as Alix’s dad suspects, or the real thing?
Swanee is painted as the villain in this book, and I wished we could have had her side of the story. Because as it stands it’s hard to see how Liana and Alix were so blindly in love with her. There are many examples in the book where she is portrayed as cold and calculating, though she obviously had both girls under her spell.
One of the side stories is about Swanee’s little sister Joss, who acts out after Swanee’s death. This story is kind of left hanging and I wanted a little more resolution there. And there’s also a look at two very different parenting styles – Alix’s helicopter parents and Swanee & Joss’s parents’ live and let live motto.
The romance between Liana and Alix is sweet and the pair has chemistry. Though considering the traumatic experience they’ve had I would rather see them keep things casual for a while. But their need for monogamy probably has a lot to do with Swanee’s deception.
This is my first experience with Julie Anne Peters’ writing, and I think she has a good pulse on YA’s- the dialogue and behavior read as authentic to me. This story had a lot going on for a shorter book and it kept my earbuds glued to my ears.
I listened to the LIES audiobook, read by Christine Lakin (The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Parasite.) The production is crisp and clear, and Lakin’s voice is natural and effective. Her style reminds me of narrator Emma Galvin (Divergent), and she’s a good storyteller who doesn’t overdo it with her performance- she lets the story shine. Her voice for Alix is matter of fact and suits the character, while her voice for Liana is sweet and bubbly, just how I’d imagine her. I’d select more audiobooks solely based on Lakin as the narrator. Her voice is pleasant to listen to.
Author Julie Anne Peters announced that this is her last book – she’s retiring to focus on children’s literacy and tutoring kids to read at their grade level. Luckily I still have her back catalog to catch up on. Check out this book if you like romance, contemporary YA, and LGBT books that are not coming out stories.
Once Alix and Liana (finally) meet, things really start moving and this becomes just another cutesy romance novel. With serious complications of course, seeing as Alix and Liana were both dating Swanee at the same time. But the fact that they are two (three if you count Swanee) girls is never the complication that causes problems. As Alix gets to know Liana and their mutual crushes grow, each of them sees how their relationships with Swanee were flawed and not just because she was cheating on them. The contrast between how each of them was treated by Swanee and how they treat each other is stark, but Peters does not beat the reader over the head with the abusive relationship stick. We are left to make those conclusions ourselves.
Swanee's family and parents' issues are a kind of sensational side story throughout the book. I'm a little disappointed with how they are portrayed and how their lifestyle choices are shown to affect their children. At the same time, they're pretty icky people. Still, I wish Peters hadn't painted them and Swanee with the same brush and/or hadn't made Swanee's siblings so incredibly damaged.
Another note about Alix's parents. They never liked Swanee. Alix assumes that is because they aren't comfortable with her being queer. When they meet Liana and she starts spending time with both Alix and her parents, it becomes clear that her parents are FINE with Alix's sexuality. They just weren't fine with Swanee. It's really sweet.
Overall I loved this book. Alix is a very likeable and relatable character. Liana is swoon-worthy and adds much needed humor to some dark parts of the plot. Alix's family is like icing on the cake. And it's not a coming out story! Progress!
Book Source: LibraryThing Early Reviewers
I felt that Peters gave Alix a very authentic voice, which added greatly to the story. Alix felt a like a teen who is beginning to understand what it means to be an adult. She hovers between recklessness and accepting responsibility. Through the story we see her begin to mature. The great thing about it is that, Alix never loses that teen voice that makes her seem real.
As with any great story, I found myself wanting to see the story told from some of the other characters' viewpoint, especially Liana's. Don't get me wrong, the story is complete on to itself. It would just be really awesome to hear her side of the story. I highly recommend reading it.
One last thing, for some reason I just loved the line about a certain law of physics and butt-checking the ground.
It's a sweet love story with a lot of fun moments, but I admit I was hoping for some of the titular lies to be a bit less... pedestrian.
The parts at the beginning of the book in which Alix is still trying to figure out what happened to her girlfriend are interesting To read, after finding a new fling things get old. Thirty pages on it just gets cheesy and after that I just stopped caring, though I did finish it.
The preachy parts about coming out and The Gay Experience I could have done without, but I suppose in a different mindset I might have appreciated them.
I feel like with my first two reviews on here, they aren’t so positive. They both also have some of the same reasons as to why I did not particularly enjoy the books. In Lies My Girlfriend Told Me there was a lack of growth in the characters. Alix was very whiny and annoying throughout the book. I know you may think that is harsh and you’re thinking, ‘well of course she was, she just lost her girlfriend.’ But, it wasn’t just the fact she lost someone…she just always felt sorry for herself (in more ways than one). Throughout the book we don’t hear much about Swanee. Yes, she passed away and she had a lot of skeletons in her closet, but to me that’s all we go out of her. Now, moving on to Liana… She is someone that I did enjoy in the book. Someone going through (Swanee’s passing and her deceit) is also going through the lies of Alix.
I never wanted the book to end. Not because I was engaged throughout the whole thing, but because I felt like nothing was truly fulfilled. I felt like I didn’t receive closure. To me it seemed like the focus was just on couple relations and no other relationships. Family was a factor in this book and there was no closure in that sense of relationship, which really upset me. Each page I turned kept upsetting me more because I knew that I wasn’t getting the information I wanted back.
To wrap everything up and to put it simply…I just wish there was more.
The book really takes off as Alix struggles with the decision of whether to notify her rival, Liana, about Swanee’s death and how to do the right thing while dealing with her own loss and pain. Alix and Liana become closer as they discover disturbing things their relationships with Swanee had in common. It becomes obvious that Swanee was a troubled girl. Anyone who was ever a teen will remember this inexperienced stage of life when it’s all too easy to miss these signs and to let “love” carry you away … from common sense, your old friends and any sense of who you are – if you even know. The revelations and the loss in common bring Alix and Liana together in a way that is ultimately more positive than either of their experiences with Swanee.
In a real sign of progress, there is little conflict in the story over the girls’ sexuality. The story is simply one of two teens learning to cope with romance in all its tragedy, glory and all the things in between. The book is a fast, absorbing read for both teens and adults.
Alix's mother wakes her up with really bad news. Her girlfriend, Swanee, died
While in Swanee's room, after her death, Alix hears Swanee's phone ping with a text message. It's from L.T., whoever that is. There are dozens of texts: where are you, why didn't you meet me, i love you..... Alix forces Swanee's sister, Joss, to tell her who L.T. is. And it turns out, she'd rather not know, because Swanee was dating her at the same time she was dating Alix.
Alix steals the phone and, for two weeks, texts L.T. back, as if she was Swanee. But then she realizes that L.T. would want to know what happened and they meet.
That's enough of the story to get you going. Lies My Girlfriend Told Me is tender. It's realistic. It's romantic. So, if you're a Julie Anne Peters fan, if you're a romantic, if you like a good story, then read Lies My Girlfriend Told Me. I couldn't put it down.KeepingYouASecret
And let's not forget my all time favorite Julie Anne Peters book, Keeping You a Secret. So, pack them both in your bag as you leave for vacation or the beach.
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Pedestrian romance. Disappointingly one-dimensional characters.