What readers think of The Lies I Tell, plus links to write your own review.

I must have enjoyed this book as I read it in two days. It is about two women; Meg, a con artist and Kat, a journalist trying to expose her. Meg is unapologetic and tough yet empathetic. Kat is determined and strong. Both are on a mission and will do anything they can to accomplish it. Lying starts out as a necessary evil and then becomes all encompassing. It is a game of cat and mouse, but who is the cat and who is the mouse?

This is a taut, suspenseful cat-and-mouse chase where the roles of 'cat' and 'mouse' are constantly shifting. It will have you guessing - and second-guessing! - all the way through. Another winner by Julie Clark!

Meg Williams, grifter, living by the girl code. ("We have to look out for each other because no one else will.")

Kat Roberts, journalist, obsessed with exposing her.

Lies pepper the lives of these two complicated women who forge a bond, despite painful pasts and desires that draw a fine line between justice and revenge.

This is an interesting exploration of their psyches and the forces that molded them.

This is a difficult book to review without spoilers. The format of the book tells a web of lies through the characters of Meg and Kat. The alternate voices for each chapter and the time shifts can be confusing if read in small doses. The gambling addiction element of one of the characters is important to the story line but not very convincing. Overall, I did like the book. I enjoyed Julie Clark's first novel and this second novel did not disappoint.

Suspense novels require tension, anticipation and uncertainty. The Lies I Tell by Julie Clark supplies all of those. But if you look under the covers just a little, you find that like Lewis Carroll's Alice, you have to believe six impossible things, if not before breakfast, at least before you finish the book. The female protagonists are lying about who they are and what they are doing, consistently fooling people. The plot clicks along, with some intriguing cons. But when you unpack each falsehood, you start to wonder how so many men (and all the targets are men) could fall for so many ridiculous tricks. A good plot outline but with no there, there.

Wanted to love this book. Revenge! Justice for the unjustified male bullies and opportunists! Well, while some of Meg's grifter shenanigans were well plotted, amusing, and quite interesting, the overall story seemed to lack the needed suspense. Her desired endgame was known from the very beginning. The format of switching chapters between Meg and Kat should have worked better but sometimes foreshadowing or sequencing seemed off between the two. Hard not to give examples without spoilers so I'll just say this book definitely has good points - sections of good writing - and is not a bad read by any means, but for me it just needed tightening up to be the suspenseful page turner I was expecting.