Beautiful Lies

A Novel

By: Lisa Unger

Narrated by: Ann Marie Lee

Length: 12 hrs and 51 mins

Publisher's summary

If Ridley Jones had slept 10 minutes later or had taken the subway instead of waiting for a cab, she would still be living the beautiful lie she used to call her life. She would still be the privileged daughter of a doting father and a loving mother. Her life would still be perfect - with only the tiny cracks of an angry junkie for a brother and a charming drunk with shady underworld connections for an uncle to mar the otherwise flawless whole.

But that's not what happened. Instead, those inconsequential decisions lead her to perform a good deed that puts her in the right place at the right time to unleash a chain of events that brings a mysterious package to her door - a package which informs her that her entire world is a lie.

Suddenly forced to question everything she knows about herself and her family, Ridley wanders into dark territory she never knew existed, where everyone in her life seems like a stranger. She has no idea who's on her side and who has something to hide - even, and maybe especially, her new lover, Jake, who appears to have secrets of his own.

Sexy and fast-paced, Beautiful Lies is a true literary thriller with one of the freshest voices and heroines to arrive in years. Lisa Unger takes us on a breathtaking ride in which every choice Ridley makes creates a whirlwind of consequences that are impossible to imagine....

©2006 Lisa Unger (P)2006 Books on Tape

Critic reviews

"Unger takes readers on a pulse-pounding ride through the Big Apple in this outstanding debut that will please both pace-obsessed thriller fans and those who want to savor the more subtle aspects of character development." (Booklist)
"With breathless speed, Unger is off on an action-packed journey of treachery and intrigue....The premise, that there is a dark side to the safe haven law, is deep as well as clever, and Unger plays it out thrillingly." (Publishers Weekly)

Great Story - Well Narrated

To be honest, I don't remember how I came to purchase this book. It may have been a sale item, or a suggestion based on what I have previously purchased. Whatever the reason, I am really glad I had the opportunity to listen to this story.

My past listens include one of the Harry Potter books, DaVinci Code, Angels & Demons, Secret Life of Bees, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, and others.

I wanted something to break up the first two books of the Larsson triology (dragon tattoo and The Girl Who Played With Fire).

When I first started to listen, I thought the same thing that a previous reviewer wrote - the writing is very descriptive and quite flowery. There are a lot of similies and imaginative description. At first I wondered if it was too much, but I found that it all painted a very nice picture of the scenes and characters while I listened and tried to imagine how everything looked.

The story quickly grabbed my interest and I was held in the palm of her hand all the way through. This unabridged version ran about 13 hours and took me about two weeks to complete. I listen during my commute to the city.

As a side note, I found myself driving more slowly to increase the amount of the story I could hear on a given drive and my gas milage improved by almost enough to cover the cost of the book!

I definitely recommend the book and I now have the follow up in my queue I am really looking forward to it :-)

Nice 1st read.

I'll have to try another Lisa Unger book to read, kept me interested until the end.

Is She a Dumb Twit That Needs to Be Saved

The author doesn't know if the main character is supposed to be a dumb twit that needs to be saved or is a smart competent woman that can save herself and others.

Example, at one point Ridley asks, "Is there something like a reverse phone directory?", then later in the book she uses her computer to go to her Lexis-Nexis account to skip trace someone. D'oh. If you've got the intelligence and acumen to have a L-N account you certainly are going to know that there is a reverse phone directory.

Seems like the author tries very hard to make a damsel-in-distress just so she can have a perfectly buff, gorgeous guy save her while she turns around and saves him. Hum. Why does that story line sound familiar?

Sloowwwwwww

This book is slow - slow as a two legged dog with a thick curly black coat of medium length that is starting to grey a bit and whose perfectly round hazel eyes suggest somehow that he is wiser than he lets on. A dog that in his youth could chase a rabbit for nearly a mile with unyielding strength and determination like a hungry prize fighter . . .

Get the idea? The writer's over-use of descriptives and simile bog this book down to the point of being unlistenable. Detail is good when it paints a scene that is relevant to moving the story line or understanding the characters. Hers don't do either, they just drone on without pupose. Skip it.

Could have been much better!

It started out kind of interesting then went down hill fast. No surprise ending, too long because it didn't have any suspense.

Boring Books.

Beautiful Lies is a dreary attempt to set an old style gothic romance into a gritty New York setting. It doesn’t work. The first-person narrator, a woman improbably named Ridley, gets caught up in the mystery of finding out her real identity after she rescues a young boy from a busy street and her story is plastered across the news. Complete with the obligatory mysterious handsome man who the heroine falls in love with and then begins to fear, the novel leans heavily on the 18th century writer’s technique of directly addressing the reader to the point that the listener simply wants to pull out the earphones so she will stop talking at you. The narrator is so self-absorbed, righteous and lacking in any perspective save her interest in herself that it is difficult to believe that she could be the successful freelance writer she is supposed to be. The other characters are as flat as paper dolls and the predictable plot dead ends with our heroine simply having the mystery explained to her by one of the bad guys and her parents. Alas, this thriller wanna be is not worth a listen.

Very Disappointing

The author is attempting to tell a 30 minute story in 10 hours. She will give you one sentence of plot and then 15 minutes of 'color'. After the 1st hour I was bored to the point that I just kept the book on as background noise. I found I could keep up with the plot and not be bored with the unending unrelated prattle.

boring

I've never listened to a story so deperately in need of abridgement - I think this collection of whiney, self-absorbed tripe could be whittled down to 10, maybe 15 pages max. Call me paranoid, but I can't allay my suspicions that the 5-Star reviewers either (a) listened to another book than I did, (b) are the author's friends or (c) all work for the publisher.

Too long

This is one of those few books that you should buy abridged. Endless reflection and review, very little action.

So Irritating

The main character in this book is so childish and self-absorbed, after a while it just became too irritating. And the way she talked to the listener was just strange. Blah, blah blah. Could have been hours shorter, which would have been a relief.