Tell Me Lies

A Novel

By: Carola Lovering

Narrated by: Corey Brill, Rebekkah Ross

Length: 13 hrs and 6 mins

Publisher's summary

A thrilling, sexy coming-of-age story exploring toxic love, ruthless ambition, and shocking betrayal, Tell Me Lies is about that one person who still haunts you - the other one. The wrong one. The one you couldn't let go of. The one you'll never forget.

Lucy Albright is far from her Long Island upbringing when she arrives on the campus of her small California college and happy to be hundreds of miles from her mother, whom she's never forgiven for an act of betrayal in her early teen years. Quickly grasping at her fresh start, Lucy embraces college life and all it has to offer - new friends, wild parties, stimulating classes. And then she meets Stephen DeMarco. Charming. Attractive. Complicated. Devastating.

Confident and cocksure, Stephen sees something in Lucy that no one else has, and she's quickly seduced by this vision of herself and the sense of possibility that his attention brings her. Meanwhile, Stephen is determined to forget an incident buried in his past that, if exposed, could ruin him, and his single-minded drive for success extends to winning, and keeping, Lucy's heart.

Alternating between Lucy's and Stephen's voices, Tell Me Lies follows their connection through college and postcollege life in New York City. Deep down, Lucy knows she has to acknowledge the truth about Stephen. But before she can free herself from this addicting entanglement, she must confront and heal her relationship with her mother - or risk losing herself in a delusion about what it truly means to love.

With the psychological insight and biting wit of Luckiest Girl Alive and the yearning ambitions and desires of Sweetbitter, this keenly intelligent and staggeringly resonant novel chronicles the exhilaration and dilemmas of young adulthood and the difficulty of letting go, even when you know you should.

©2018 Carola Lovering (P)2018 Simon & Schuster

An okay story

I thought the story was semi relatable once I got to the end but my god was it hard to get through with the monotone narrator that put inflections in odd places and pronounced ugh as ugg.

Couldn’t stop listening!

This book will keep you on the edge of your seats. I just want to know what happens next and am crossing my fingers for a sequel!

Cute Story

The story was credible. The performance was good. I enjoyed the book in its entirety

Meh

This book had great potential but unfortunately it fell flat at the end. There was so much hype about Macy's death and the Unforgivable thing and when we get to it in the book it just evaporates into nothing. The author had so much potential to run with these storylines but just drops the ball in the end.
On the good side the narrator was great.

Good story, rushed ending

This books overall is a great read. The storyline is wonderful, but it builds as all books do to a big moment, and the big moment with such an incredible build up wraps up in 2 chapters when it should have been 6. There is so much more that could have and should have happened at the end.

Pretty Good

Like other reviewers, I felt like it was a little "going nowhere" and hoped something interesting would happen (like she would kill him). It was an interesting read though. But lots of millenium angst.

Great read but could have been a bit better

I thought overall the story was written well. Unfortunately I watched the TV series first which was very different from the book. I didn’t form a bond with the characters and their voices like I did with the characters in the TV series. Still though it was one where I couldn’t wait to get to the end and was excited to read it.

SO GOOD! Must read

The plot is so thick and it’s over all so good. I listened to the whole thing in a week.

My hate for these character’s brought me joy

The book is not bad at all, but it is definitely not for everyone. If you like toxic romance and fucked up characters, give it a chance.

Lucy is so stupid, very insecure, very weak. BUT the way she rationalized red flags and ran full speed through these red lights definitely intrigued me. Her self destruction and dedication is insane lol. If there was a book about Cassie from euphoria… this would be it. We find out she has several disorders and it makes sense that she is off lol. Stephen, a real sociopath. But he knew it enough to know he had to *pretend*. I liked hearing his thoughts, and then hearing Lucy interpret everything completely different. I think there was some reality to that.

Now the way things ended… the end is the only part I wasn’t happy about. I mean, i hated the characters but I know that this book was made TO hate the characters and the author SUCCEEDED lol. But the ending… I felt like we were building up to something through the story… I thought there would be more of a GOTCHA! maybe an investigation and exposure of Macy’s story. Idk, Something! All the drama that was in that book and the ending, even though good for her ya know, just was not as dramatic as I hoped.

Kept waiting for it to get better

This genre is my jam but this story was not. Lucy was an infuriating main character and so desperately pathetic it was a struggle to follow along at times. There were too many stupid moments that made me roll my eyes. But I recognize it was quality writing by the author to make me feel such strong dislike towards a fictional character so I’m caught at 3 stars