This Is How I Lied

I read this thriller in one day- it holds your attention, and makes you question every thing you thought might be the truth. The author deftly leads you to believe multiple people are guilty of the crime.
Maggie, now a police detective, must investigate the murder of her best friend, Eve, murdered 25 years ago, now that new evidence has come to light. The story goes back and forth from the time of the murder and present day. The tension is high, and some parts of the book will makes your jaw drop, until the conclusion wraps up everything nicely.
#ThisIsHowILied #HeatherGudenkauf

OMG! There are no words to describe how absolutely amazing this book is! This is a brilliantly written story from a brilliant author who never fails to immerse her readers into a spellbinding read. Her plot and her characters will grab you and not let go. This is one of those books that you don’t want to end. Highly, highly recommend this book!!! Enjoy!

In This is How I Lied. Heather Gudenkauf returns to themes she has explored in prior novels, including teen friendship and the power of secrets to shape and destroy lives.

Grotto is home to around ten thousand Iowans, many of whom, like Maggie and her husband, Shaun, operate farms and orchards. Nestled along a river, it boasts a circuitous cave system known as Grotto Caves State Park, and is a popular destination for hikers and spelunkers. Grotto is the backdrop for Gudenkauf’s dark, stylishly atmospheric story. It was in one of those caves that Eve’s body was found by Maggie and Eve’s creepy, frightening, and decidedly unpopular younger sister, Nola, on the cold evening of December 22, 1995. Eve had been brutally beaten, strangled, and left on an icy cave floor. Maggie’s father was never able to keep his promise to Eve’s mother that he would find and bring the killer to justice. Now her father can remember events from years ago, but has lost his short-term memory and is cared for in the family home by Maggie’s brother, Colin, a fledgling artist.

As the story opens, Maggie is summoned to the current police chief’s office and informed that new evidence has been discovered — one of Eve’s boots, caked with mud, was found in a cave by two teenage boys who turned it over to the department. Maggie recognizes it immediately, and in her first-person narrative explains that the news is “a punch to my gut. I haven’t heard my best friend’s name said out loud in a long time.” The chief agrees to led Maggie take the lead on the reopened investigation.

Maggie’s account alternatives with the exposition of Nola’s perspective, presented in the third person. Now a veterinarian, Nola also resides in the family home adjacent to Eve’s. Her mother, still grieving Eve, is in a skilled nursing facility after sustaining a fall. Nola is as unpleasant and obsessed with the anatomy of animals as she was as a girl. Gudenkauf vividly describes how a once tidy home is now filthy and trash-strewn as a result of her mother’s hoarding. However, her mother’s habits enable Nola to maintain unsavory secrets. After all, if a home is cluttered, there are many places to hide things.

Gudenkauf skillfully propels the story forward by including yet a third perspective: Eve’s. At deftly paced intervals, Gudenkauf takes readers back to December 21 and 22, 1995, the last days that Eve was alive. She reveals what happened between Eve and her boyfriend, Nick, the handsome boy from a wealthy local family. Her mother encouraged the pairing, but Nola knew the true character of their relationship. Step-by-step, Gudenkauf details Eve’s final hours, leading up to why and how she ended up in the cave where her life came to a tragic end.

Virtually every character in This is How I Lied is harboring secrets, including Maggie, Nola, and their neighbor, Cam Harper, a handsome married businessman and father. As a teenager, Maggie regularly babysat the Harpers’ children. But Maggie reveals that their interactions went beyond babysitting, and she has spent many years visiting her father in the old neighborhood without ever speaking to or acknowledging Cam. Whatever happened between them remains a secret Maggie has not shared with anyone, including her husband. And as the investigation into Eve’s murder proceeds, Maggie learns that Shaun has not, over the years, been completely forthcoming about his connection to Eve.

Gudenkauf again demonstrates her prowess at constructing engrossing mysteries set in small-town America. Her vivid descriptions of the setting are crucial to the novel’s success — the picturesque little town of Grotto is filled with colorful characters and has been shrouded in mystery for more than two decades. She brings the streets, homes and, most particularly, the caves to life with evocative, descriptive prose that pulls readers into the action. This is How I Lied is replete with plot twists, revelations, and red herrings, as well as one jaw-dropping disclosure that brings into question readers’ every assumption up to that point and sends the balance of the story on a different trajectory. Gudenkauf’s timing is spot-on, as are her characters’ voices and viewpoints, especially that of Nola both as a teenager and a never-married practicing veterinarian still residing with her mother. Her intelligence and rationalizations of her behavior make her a fascinating, compelling, and haunting character.

At the center of the story, Maggie proves to be a less-than-wholly-reliable narrator, and finding her empathetic is, at times, challenging. As her investigation proceeds, she is forced to confront the memories that have pervaded her decision-making for so many years and, once and for all, wrestle and make peace with the demons that have overshadowed her accomplishments and plagued her as she has pursued a happy family life with Shaun. As the pieces of the troubling puzzle fall into place, Gudenkauf expertly ramps up the tension between the characters both in the flashbacks to 1995 and the present, as the dual story lines accelerate and merge into a stunning conclusion that is no less satisfying because readers will most likely have solved the crime before all is revealed and resolved.

Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader’s Copy of the book.

This is one of my favorite authors, and she never disappoints! Detective Maggie has just heard that some kids found a boot shoved in a crevice inside some of the caves. Kid dropped his phone, reached in to get it, and found more than just his phone. But this isn’t just some ordinary boot, this is a boot that Maggie’s best friend Eve was wearing decades ago when she was murdered in this very cave, and her killer was never found.

Maggie, in her third trimester of pregnancy is heading up this case and in charge of sending this evidence to the state lab for hopes that the real killer will be revealed. Is she too close to this investigation, being that she was Eve’s best friend and her father a detective before her ran the original investigation.

Word spreads fast in this sleepy town, that the cold case murder of Eve is being looked into and that new evidence may finally find the killer. Someone is not happy, and Maggie is getting the cold shoulder as well as subtle threats as she starts to question locals about their whereabouts that night, and if they’ve remembered anything new since then. Having remembered that Nora, Eve’s little sister was there when they found her body she knows Nora has always had a target on her back.

Nora was a little odd growing up, and often got picked on for it. She had a fascination with the dead, taxidermy and vet work. Most kids did not understand her curiosity and many harbored the belief that Nora is the one who killed her sister. Maggie, is bringing up a lot from the past and is afraid she may be too close, but what can she do but let the truth be found out, no matter the outcome or consequences of who this DNA will belong to.

Although Nora, has some dark secrets she’s held close to the vest for years and has always believed Eve’s boyfriend is the one who killed her sister. She saw the bruises and sometimes heard the fighting, as well as comments that were made about her sister and him. Nora tries to persuade Maggie to look at him closer, but can Maggie take this bait that Nora is offering?

As the old case is looked at with a fine tooth comb, and locals are once again looked at a suspects everything hinges on this boot and what the state lab will prove. Can Maggie finally put the past to rest? Will her dad be proud of her solving one of his unsolved? Will the town believe the truth of the evidence or will they still believe their own thoughts on who the true killer is and what really happened that night?

Thank you to the author for send me an autographed copy of this novel, from a giveaway! That one will be sitting on my autographed novels shelf!

I liked the book ok, but it was long. I think it could have been told in less time.

Twenty-five years ago, the body of a teenage girl was found in the caves close to a small Iowa town. Today, with the discovery of a new piece of evidence, the case is re-opened and old sins are brought to light.

Told in two timelines and from the point of view of three characters, this is a twisty, fascinating psychological thriller. All the pieces are put there from the beginning for the reader to figure out who the killer is, but the way the story is told, it’s obvious there are actually a lot of different characters with motives, from the victim’s frankly disturbed sister Nola to her abusive boyfriend, her angry mother, a sexual-predator neighbour and more.

About two-thirds of the way through the book, an absolute bomb is dropped when a very unexpected character reveals their guilt, but the story is by no means over at that point and I kept reading right to the end, riveted, because I just couldn’t quite believe what I was told. And indeed, there’s a certain amount of unreliable narration here, just enough to keep you guessing right up to the final, shocking climax.

Genuinely a fascinating read, and I’d say a satisfying one too, because everyone gets their just desserts at the end. Five stars, and I’ll definitely be looking for more works by this author.

Disclaimer: I received a review copy of this title via NetGalley.

This is How I Lied by Heather Gudenkauf

Smash bang killed her in the first chapter BUT who killed her? Then, 25 years later her BFF is called in and told that new evidence has popped up after a boot, boot of the deceased cold case, has popped up. So, Maggie, laden and ready, nearly, to pop out her first born takes on the cold case of, “Who killed Eve?”

At this point I have to admit I promised to do a Book Review and Blog Post so…am taking a break from the riveting reading to post the review (not finished) and tell you why you should read this book.

What I like (so far):
* Maggie, she seems to be on the job, in the marriage, willing to do what it takes to solve the mystery of who killed Eve 25 years before
* Shaun: I think…haven’t seen enough of him yet BUT as a farmer and someone that Maggie is with…he probably is a good guy
* The writing – well done and can’t get back to the story
* That this is a cold case that might be solved with the use of DNA trace evidence on items saved from a previous crime scene
* Plenty of red herrings
* Wanting to get back to the story even though I should probably go to bed

What I did not like
* That Eve had to die to make this book happen, and that she suffered so much
* That the bad guy got away with the murder for almost three decades
* That I have not finished the book yet so have to return so I can find out what happened.

Did/Do I enjoy this book? Yes
Would I read more by this author? Yes
Will I finish the book? Yes…at least I hope to!

Thank you to NetGalley and HQN-Park Row Books for the ARC – This is my honest review.

4 Stars

Proof that it’s been TOOO long since I read a Heather Gudenkauf book, This is how I Lied is a suspense read that kept me up way into the early morning hours. Told primarily through the lens of Maggie, Eve and Nola, we are whisked back to the night that changed everything. When a boot is unearthed from the Ransom street caves, the two decades old unsolved murder of Eve is reopened. With this comes the threat that long buried secrets held by her friend Maggie are at risk of being exposed.

There’s an abundance of characters in this story, every one of them add something of interest and possibilities. But none more so than Eve’s eccentric and frankly creepy sister Nola. It’s clear early on she has an agenda and that aspect of the mystery is driving force in the plot. Every chapter headlined with her name made me anxious. There’s just something so sinister about her. She plays head games with everyone and Maggie has good cause to be nervous about her.

The plot is well developed with twist and turns that left me constantly surprised. Just when you think you know the who behind Eve’s death, there’s more to be wary of and you’ll wonder just how far Maggie will go to vet out the truth. Is she willing to face down her past in order to have the future she’s hard for? Readers of suspense DO NOT miss out. Grab this book and secure a few hours of escape into a world of betrayal and lies.

Favorite Quotes:

Dex Stroope is in his midsixties, big-bellied with a face that always looks like it could use a good nap.

I found Nola standing there looking up at me with those big glasses and green eyes like some kind of click beetle… Right away I was concerned, but by the casual look on Nola Knox’s face, you would have thought she was selling Girl Scout cookies or popcorn for her basketball team or something. But instead of asking me if I want a box of Thin Mints or Do-Si-Dos, she says, My sister is dead. She was so matter-of-fact I thought I heard her wrong.

My Review:

Cunningly penned from multiple POVs, this diabolical tale kept me taut with tension and my shoulders in my ears while it funneled me in so many directions the little pea in my brain was swirling with theories. I was so sure I had it solved and was feeling rather smug, but NO, this sneaky scribe had me bamboozled as I never saw this ending coming.

My cold heart was squeezed for the character of Eve, the murder victim. Poor Eve couldn’t catch a break, even from her best friend and least of all her immature mess of a mother or younger sister, who was brilliant yet also a deeply disturbed young sociopath. Their small Iowa town appeared rife with social issues and devious characters. This was my second time reading the wily and treacherous wordcraft of Heather Gudenkauf and I am hooked. I am greedy and want all her words, ALL of them!

This is How I Lied certainly kept me on my toes. Heather Gudenkauf gives us a tragic loss, an unsolved murder, and more suspects than you can shake a stick at. I think at one point there were seven possible suspects to weed through, but that count could be off considering how things move from past to present and back again between different characters. The story does get rather convoluted, which serves to keep the reader guessing, but it’s not a technique I’m fond of. Nevertheless, this tale of teenage angst, small town gossip, and murder is an interesting way to while away a day or so, and I’ll admit it – I didn’t see the answer to the whodunit until pretty late in the game, but I did guess a few others along the twisted path to the big reveal. The book is well-written, fast-paced, and all in all, an intriguing read.