So, I’m gonna be honest here and say the main reason I read this prequel to We Were Liars is because of the TV show….  I wanted to know who Rosemary was and what the sisters had been hiding from the fateful summer they mentioned in passing at the tail end of the show. Not to mention, I obviously need to see where next season is headed. If it wasn’t for the TV show, though, I probably never would have read Family of Liars because, in all honesty, I really wasn’t interested in the lives of the bratty mothers. 

Throughout Family of Liars, though, you really don’t get to learn anything extra about Bess and Penny except that they are as bratty, shallow, and rude as they seem in the show. Carrie was my favorite sister in the show and she’s the only one who you even remotely feel bad for in Family of Liars since it’s from her point of view anyway. I absolutely hated Penny in this novel (much like the TV show), and couldn’t have cared less for Bess. Rosemary, unfortunately, wasn’t given much depth either and just seemed like her whole character (ghost or otherwise) was meant as a bad omen. It really disappointed me because I wanted a more in depth look at this family and didn’t really get that in this novel. 

As far as the plot goes, after Rosemary’s death and Carrie’s jaw surgery is where things get into the real plot. Carrie is now addicted to painkillers after her surgery and barely functions without them. She’s seeing Rosemary’s ghost on the island every summer and talks with her frequently. The summer that is the majority of the plot sees four of Carrie’s cousin’s guy friends come to the island to stay for the summer (much to Tipper’s dismay). Carrie eventually starts getting feelings for one of them and it all goes downhill from there. If you want to know just how downhill it goes, check out the spoilers below. 

Spoilers ahead. 

So, Carrie ends up killing Pfef while he seemingly is trying to rape Penny. Did anyone else think Penny was just trying to make an excuse for going after him again?? Because I found it so hard to believe that Penny wasn’t just feeling shocked and a little scared that Carrie had killed him and worried that she might go for her next if Penny really had been getting with Pfef AGAIN. That’s just my opinion, though. 

Well, they hide his body, Harris finds out, and the whole ordeal is swept under the rug. Carrie isn’t actually Harris’ biological child (which spurs the murder as well), and Rosemary moves on very anticlimactically. That was it. 

Overall, this book was very… just… I don’t know mediocre? I really hope the next season in the TV show amps it up more than this novel did because it honestly just got 2.5 out of 5 for me rounded to 3 for social platforms. Meh at best and not the deeper look I wanted into the Sinclair family. 

Source: Personal Copy

(P.S. You can read tons of books—including ones written by me—by trying a free trial of Kindle Unlimited!)