A new spine-tingling thriller from the author of The New Neighbors that takes place over the course of a therapy session, in which neither patient nor therapist are who they claim to be.Two liars. One room. No way out.Susanna Fenton has a secret. Fourteen years ago she left her identity behind, reinventing herself as a therapist and starting a new life. It was the only way to keep her daughter … was the only way to keep her daughter safe.
But when a young man, Adam Geraghty, walks into her office, claiming he needs Susanna’s help but asking unsettling questions, she begins to fear that her secret has been discovered.
Who is Adam, really? What does he intend to do to Susanna?
And what has he done to her daughter?
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The Liar’s Room by Simon Lelic takes place in really just the course of a few hours, but this book still managed to blow me away!
What it’s about: Susanna Fenton is a counselor, but that’s not what she always was, and she is running from a past she wishes she could forget. Enter Adam, who makes an appointment with her to help himself, but really only wants to talk about Susanna’s past. What exactly does Adam want from her? I guess we are about to find out….
The Liar’s Room ended up being an incredibly fast read that I was able to tackle in just under 4.5 hours. I also ended up reading it in 2 sittings because I just had to know what was going to happen next. My only real complaint with this one was that it did start to drag a bit, but I was still turning pages quickly and it did hold my attention the entire time.
This is my first time reading a Simon Lelic novel, but it will definitely not be my last. I love when a book can pull you in like this one did, and even though there weren’t any *super* shocking surprises, I still really liked it. One thing that I feel is important to note, is that there is animal abuse in this book. I always struggle when author’s use this in their books, but for this novel it helped to show the state of mind of the people committing the abuse so it wasn’t completely all for nothing (which is what I hate the absolute most). Also, rape is another trigger so this novel is not going to be for the faint of heart.
Final Thought: If you are looking for a fast-paced novel that you can knock out in just a few hours, I highly recommend checking out The Liar’s Room. I think the setting is very unique, and I like the style in which this book is written with flashbacks to Susanna’s past and the reason she left her home and changed her identity. I don’t know if I would call this book spine-tingling per say, but it is a very solid read that I recommend!
Susanna is a therapist and she has an appointment with a new client, Adam, on a Friday afternoon. Almost immediately Adam confesses that he’s there because he would very much like to hurt a particular teenage girl. Susanna soon realizes the girl is her daughter but she cannot fathom why this stranger would want to hurt her child.
As the story unfolds, we learn that neither Susanna nor Adam are who they seem to be; both harbor dangerous secrets and the twists and turns unfold deliciously as we learn where and how these two characters intersect.
Simon Lelic’s writing is superb and I thank him, Berkley Publishing and Netgalley for giving me an ARC in exchange for this honest review.
I personally thought this book went on a bit too long. If it had been edited to remove about 50 pages, I think the book would have been more edgy and better.
The premise is that Susanna is a counselor, with a daughter, Emily. Emily meets Adam, and falls for him. Adam then becomes a patient of Susanna, and makes her recount the story of her son, Jake, who is dead.
Many secrets are revealed during this counseling session, and lies are told and revealed.
The premise of the story is good, I just think it dragged on a bit too long.
#TheLiarsRoom #SimonLelic
Susanna Fenton is not who she seems. She seems to be a divorced mother raising a beautiful 14-year-old daughter, Emily. She is also a successful therapist.
But 14 years ago Susanna left behind the life she had known and started all over in order to keep Emily safe, protected. From Susanna’s perspective, she has “died for her daughter once already. If she were to lose her . . . Susanna would die all over again.”
A new client appears in her office, ostensibly seeking counseling. Adam Geraghty is clearly a troubled young man. But it quickly becomes apparent that he is playing some sort of game with Susanna and he wants something else. When Susanna realizes that Adam is not going to permit her to leave her office — and she cannot reach Emily — her suspicions blossom into full-blown panic. At the days wears on, Susanna realizes that Adam knows about her past and she will have to outwit him in order to save Emily, who became smitten with and agreed to skip school to meet and have fun with a nice young man . . .
Simon Lelic, author of The New Neighbors, has proven again that he is adept at crafting a taut, nail-biting, layered thriller that keeps his readers guessing right up until the shocking ending. The story is told through the viewpoints of both Susanna and Emily, as they reveal the events of the fateful day that Adam shows up for his purported therapy session with Susanna. Emily’s narrative and diary entries reveal that in prior weeks she had become enamored with an older guy who appears to be a sincere, compassionate gentleman in order to earn her trust.
Susanna is Lelic’s most intriguing character, and it her story that propels the story forward as Lelic injects hints about the truth at tantalizingly-timed intervals. Susanna sustained an unspeakable loss 14 years ago — one so shocking that she found it necessary to concoct new identities for herself and Emily, move to a new city, and completely start over. But Susanna has never been able to stop second-guessing her own role in what happened and has lived with the guilt every say since. Her entire motivation for carrying on has been her love for Emily, who has no idea about what transpired all those years ago. Susanna has intended to tell Emily the truth “one day. Some day. Just not yet.” However, as her day with Adam drags on and Susanna’s fears for Emily’s safety mount, she realizes that the day has arrived. If only she can continue to protect her long enough. After the past is fully revealed to readers, the story’s focus shifts to an all-out search for Emily and then, the aftermath. Lelic’s pace is unrelenting.
Susanna and Adam are two liars. In one room. There is no way out for either of them. Or Emily. All of their lives change forever on that day. Their story is a fast-paced, compelling, and satisfying thrill ride.
Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader’s Copy of the book.
“She wakes to find herself broken, and it the first question that enters her head. The next: where am I?” Thus begins the story of Susanna Fenton and her daughter Emily.
Fourteen years ago, Susanna Fenton ran away from a previous life with her daughter Emily, now a teenager. She has a comfortable life, a career as a therapist but she is haunted by her past and her daughter knows nothing of what happened.
One day, a new patient comes through the door of her office, Adam Geraghty. While she is trying to get to the reason why he came to her, he starts asking personal questions. He tells her he wants to do something bad and doesn’t know if he can stop himself. The session goes on in this way and Adam brings up Emily. This is when Susanna gets really concerned and scared.
The story is told in different views, Susanna and Emily. We learn that Emily has had a young man befriend her, his name is Adam and she is besotted with him. As Susanna is getting more and more scared and unsure what Adam has done with her daughter, she desperately seeks a way to escape. What happened fourteen years ago? Why is this young man keeping her hostage? Good questions. You will have to read the book to find out!
I love a good psychological thriller and this one was definetly a thriller worth reading. I have not read anything else by Simon Lelic, but I do have The New Neighbors that I intend to read.
Susanna Fenton has secrets that she keeps hidden from her co-workers and her fourteen-year-old daughter. After a tragic event, she re-started her life in a new town and tried to move forward. She currently works as a therapist seeing private clients while raising her teen daughter.
She meets a new teenage patient named Adam who comes to her seeking help. It becomes apparent that the appointment is a ruse and he is there to uncover Susanna’s past. She struggles to keep her composure as he bombards her with questions and threats. Their session quickly takes a turn for the worst when Adam reveals that he knows Susanna’s daughter and her life depends on her answers.
The Liar’s Room is a novel that takes place over a few hours in a therapist’s office. Simon Lilac’s book is a fast-paced thriller about two individuals together in a room who are not honest about their identities. This book will have you biting your nails while you race to the end.
The Liar’s Room is one of my top reads of 2018. I couldn’t stop, I kept guessing, and I was just chilled at some of the things I read. Simon Lelic wrote a book that kept me up at night, had me finding times to read when I really should have been doing something else, and talking about this book to all my friends.
There are so many secrets that Susan was keeping. It was obvious from the beginning that things with Susanna were not as they appeared. With each twist, turn, and reveal I had an ah hah moment. One more piece of the puzzle was put in place, one more thing that was said made sense, and one more reason for Adam’s visit. With each puzzle piece that fit I was more shocked, in awe, and wondering what would happen next.
Simon Lelic wrote a book about family drama, secrets kept, and the lengths that mother would go to to keep her daughter safe. Pick up this book immediately. Again, it is one of my top read of2018.
Simon Lelic’s books are always eminently readable, with fast and consistent pacing, deliciously unlikeable characters, and unusual plots and subplots. I must confess though, each time I finish one of his books I find myself wondering exactly why I enjoyed it and read it so quickly because the unusual plots often require significant stretching of my boundaries of credulity and the characters are often SO odious taken as a whole that they should send me running for the hills…
Still, I always thoroughly enjoy the read while it’s happening, and this one was no exception. Perhaps it’s because there’s always a takeaway lesson about the dangers of secrets – a theme that permeates his books – and the position that they will always come back to haunt you is one I firmly subscribe to. The writing is always engaging too, and that is vastly important when the characters are not very nice people. I don’t find myself cheering for them, per se; it’s more like I’m ineffably curious as to how they’ll get their comeuppance and when they’ll have to pay their pipers.
It is tough to write a review though, because the action was so bizarre and full of twists that it’s hard to talk about them without giving things away – and without making the story sound too beyond the pale to be believed. It WAS a stretch – like I said, for me, his stories usually are – but an enjoyable read for all the stretching. It’s like yoga, in book form – when you’re in the middle of it you just go with it; it’s only after you’re done that you realize what a strain it was at times… 🙂
Thanks to Penguin First to Read for my review copy.