We were liars

THE AUTHOR

E. Lockhart is the pseudonym for Emily Jenkins, an American writer and literature professor. Lockhart is her grandmother's maiden name that Jenkins uses when she writes for a Young Adult audience. She has also published children's books and two novels for adults under her own name.

As E. Lockhart, she has been nominated for several awards for her books We were liars and The disreputable history of Frankie Landau-Banks.

CONTEXT

The book centers around a wealthy family on the American east coast.

The main characters are the three cousins Cady,

Johnny and Mirren,

and their friend and foster cousin Gat.

PlOT

Two years ago, Cady was in an accident on the family's private Island off the American east coast. She was badly hurt and is since the accident suffering from severe headaches and memory loss. No one in Cady's family wants to talk about what happened that summer two years ago, but she is determined to go back to the island to remember.

The story takes place both in present time, when seventeen-year-old Cady returns to the family's summer home on Beechwood Island, as well as two years ago when Cady was fifteen years old.

Slowly the terrible truth about what happened to Cady starts to unfold.

THEMES

Class is a big theme in the book. The Sinclair family is a very wealthy and privileged family. Cady wrestles questions about ownership/possession, responsibility and guilt.

Family relationships is another big theme in the book. In the Sinclair family, the surface is everything. However, underneath, power struggles, bitterness and grief are boiling.

Setting

For the most part of the year, the Sinclair family lives in Boston, Burlington, Cambridge and New York.

However, the story is set mainly on Beechwood Island, which is a small private island off the coast of Massachusetts, near Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard.