The Lying Game

Title: The Lying Game

Author: Ruth Ware

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Published: 2017

Obtained: Barnes and Noble

When three women receive a mysterious message from their friend, Kate, they all rush to her side as they promised to do as girls. However, as told from the point of view of Isa, the women soon realize that not only did their childhood game have terrible consequences, but they are also missing pieces pertinent to a situation that occured years ago…a situation that they all agreed to keep secret. Now, it’s time for the friends to face their past head on—but will they all adhere to the old rules of the game when it comes to being truthful with one another?

Ruth Ware’s novels, that I have read, are full of beautiful prose and suspenseful plots. The Lying Game starts out strong; however, it loses its luster pretty early into the story. I love the premise of the novel focusing on four girlfriends and their mysterious history, but the plot unravels like molasses. While the narrator, Isa, is fairly well-developed, the other three girls are lacking in depth. Ware starts with such a sturdy premise—her opening chapter hooked me into the mysterious text message from Kate and had my mind reeling about what kind of trouble in which these four, seemingly normal, girlfriends could be involved. That enticed feeling was short lived.

Ware writes with such lovely phrasing and poetic justice. I felt this writing was perfectly suited for her novel The Death of Mrs. Westaway with it’s old-school, gothic feel; I did not, however, feel that it worked in the Lying Game. This book is one of four friends who attended a boarding school together in their youth, where they spent their time breaking rules and drinking. The lengthy, flowery writing (while very appreciated as a reader and writer) is distracting from the story itself. So many times I grew frustrated and just wanted the narrator to get to the point! Furthermore, I think what was so frustrating, as a reader, was that the elaborate prose was often in regards to details that either didn’t matter or had no real connection to the actual story.

Isa is a frustrating narrator. She is slow to expose the reader to important details about her past and her relationship with the three other girls. Isa’s character build wasn’t particularly interesting to me—while reading, I found her dull and, at times, obnoxious. Kate is slightly more developed, but still falls short. Fatima and Thea are incredibly weak characters, which is a shame because I was so curious about them at the start of the novel. A majority of the scenes with the women focus on them drinking and reminiscing, pieced together with flashbacks and memories from the narrator; however, it comes off choppy to me, as a reader, with very little meat and details that could help build up the mystery of the story. While a rule of their game is to never lie to each other, they are constantly lying to each other! Moreover, it still bothers me that they seem to lie to each other for no substantial reason. Again, the idea is there, but the story just doesn’t build or come together very well.

As beautiful as Ware’s writing is, the story unravels in a very tedious manner. The pace is slow and the story is full of subplots and scenes that just don’t really have much to do with crux of the novel. I was excited by the premise of the book and by the introduction, but the rest of the novel was underwhelming. There are scenes and phrases from The Woman in Cabin 10 and The Death of Mrs. Westaway that still stick out in my mind, but I don’t feel that same way about The Lying Game. It was a fun and easy read with, I reiterate again, beautiful writing; but, I think readers who are familiar with Ware will find that it falls short of her other novels. I gave The Lying Game a 2 out of 5 stars. I have one more of Ruth Ware’s books to read and I still have high hopes for it! As far as the wine pairing with The Lying Game, I recommend The Stag by St. Huberts, which is a Cabernet Sauvignon. It’s a full bodied, smooth, dark red that has hints of berries, oak and spice. I picked this up due to liking a dark, flavorful red to go with a good mystery full of perplexing characters; admittedly, I will say that the flavors in this wine are more complex than the characters in The Lying Game (which was disappointing as a reader, but fantastic as a wine-drinker).