Lie With Me
"I couldn’t put this stunning book down until the final page had been consumed. "
Synopsis:
Paul Morris is down on his luck. He’s a middle-aged writer who has never been able to recreate the success of his first novel. A chance encounter with an old friend, Andrew, presents an opportunity Paul can’t resist in the form of wealthy widow Alice. With her big home in London and her holiday house on a Greek island, Alice leads the sort of life Paul’s always dreamed of.
Desperate to impress, Paul lies about himself, embellishing his life story for the benefit of Alice and her rich friends. But one lie leads to another and before long Paul is caught up in a web of deceit that – somehow – leads back to the disappearance of a young girl some years earlier...
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Review:
I have read Sabine Durrant’s previous crime novels and I thoroughly enjoyed them so I was really looking forward to ‘Lie With Me’. I certainly wasn’t disappointed. I absolutely loved this book and, for me, it is Durrant’s strongest novel yet. There are many things that make ‘Lie With Me’ such a good novel: it’s very well written, the plot is tight with a shocking and unexpected twist in the tale and the characters are all well-drawn. By far and above the best thing about it, however, is the central character Paul Morris. Paul is a wonderful creation. He is a down-on-his-luck author who has never got over the fact he isn’t the hugely successful, best-selling author he clearly thinks he should be. He is a liar, a thief and a womaniser. He is vain and selfish and self-centred. He is truly appalling and absolutely brilliant at the same time. I loved him! Despite his many flaws, I was rooting for him from the beginning (and I still am). Desperate to impress Alice, Paul lies about himself – little lies that don’t seem that important at first. And the lies work. It’s not long before Paul is joining Alice and her friends on their annual holiday to Pyros, a Greek island where Alice owns a second home. At first, Pyros seems like the Mediterranean idyll Paul imagined it to be. Very soon, however, Durrant makes the holiday take a darker turn. Paul isn’t the only one who was in Pyros the night the girl, Jasmine disappeared all those years ago. Andrew, Alice and all the people he’s on holiday with were there too. As the anniversary of Jasmine’s disappearance draws closer, it starts to feel as if there’s more than just coincidence that’s brought them all back to the same place again. It is these little lies and uncertainties that Durrant tweaks so perfectly which directs her reader in to so many different directions at the same time. ‘Lie With Me’ is an original, intriguing and very clever novel about the lies people tell and the trouble that can lead to. I couldn’t put this stunning book down until the final page had been consumed.