Review: The Liar Society, by Lisa & Laura Roecker

The Liar Society
Lisa & Laura Roecker
Paperback, 358 pages
Sourcebooks Fire (3/1/11)
Rating: (Avg 4.5)

Kate Lowry didn’t think dead best friends could send e-mails. But when she gets an e-mail from Grace, who died mysteriously a year before, she’s not so sure. When the emails continue, Kate is forced to confront her school’s resident druggie, a sketchy administrator, and even her own demons.

As Kate moves closer and closer to the truth, she teams up with a couple of knights-in-(not so)shining armor–the dangerously attractive, bad boy, Liam and her love-struck neighbor, Seth. The three uncover an ancient secret lurking in the halls of their elite private school with the power to destroy them all.

But the truth doesn’t always set you free. Sometimes it’s only the beginning.

You know what I miss? I miss those fun little high school mystery books that I used to read when I was a teen. The ones where you're just as clueless as the MC, so you're having to figure out and guess right along with the main character. You know what I'm talking about, right? Well, fortunately for us, Lisa and Laura Roecker have brought that back with their debut novel, The Liar Society.

Set in a boarding school, this book has all of the potential to be a run-of-the-mill boarding school book where the main girl is popular with all the hot guys, but the mean girls don't like her and all she wants is a true friend... yadda yadda yadda. Yet again, the authors surprise us by taking the boarding school premise and making it so much more than that. We have a main character who's distraught by her best friend's death and, when receiving e-mails from said dead best friend, she does everything in her power to try and find out what the friend is trying to telling her. What ensues is a story full of adventure and mystery, with a hint of romance and wit added right along with it.

Kate is a wonderfully written MC and I love that they make her such a powerful female in this book - she's got the looks, the attitude and the wit. Plus, there's this sense of undying loyalty for her best friend in the book that just makes me all warm and fuzzy on the inside. I think Kate and her two sidekicks, Liam and Seth, are an amazing trio that work well together. Seth is that guy next door that you can always depend on and Liam is that bad boy that makes your little heart go pitter-patter. Their dynamic together is nothing short of amazingly perfect. I also liked that some of the characters weren't as shallow as they seemed as first and were developed extremely well through the story where it wasn't necessarily told that they weren't as horrible as you thought, you actually saw through their actions how they truly were. Of course, there were some jerks.. but it might surprise you who those jerks really are. Or not.

This is definitely more of a character-driven book, but the plot was not lacking in any way. I loved the use of the flashbacks to show Kate's relationship with her best friend Grace before she died. I also loved the boarding school with all of its rich history and detail. Kate's quest to find out about her friend is endearing and the ending is unexpectedly bittersweet. However, there is closure and a definite hint at another book to follow - one that I will definitely be picking up as soon as it becomes available.


Find Lisa & Laura Roecker Online
Website | Blog | Twitter | Facebook

Buy The Liar Society
Website | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

{Happy Release Day!!}