A review by tjalexandernyc
None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell

It's difficult to write an honest review of this book because, while it's certainly compelling, there was a "twist" toward the end that kind of ruined the whole experience for me. Despite there being oodles of unreliable characters, and the whole plot being questionable in terms of what is real and what really happened, I got the impression that this Twist was to be treated as just as likely as all the others, which I found completely ridiculous. This is a personal thing, but I think it applies to enough readers that I will give a spoiler:

One of the main characters was a young teen when she met a 40-something man, began sleeping with him, and later, as an older teen, married. Initially this is characterized as grooming; although the character states she felt powerful at the time, now as a middle-aged woman she sees it for what it was. And indeed, her husband tells another character that his first wife was also not of age when he met her in his late 20s, so his behavior is not a lie on the main character's part. Later, the "twist" reveals that she...seduced this man away from her own mother? Because even as a 13-15 year old, she was so cunning, bordering on psychopathic, that she could manipulate him? Yeah, that ain't it for me, fam. Felt like a real reach to try to make the husband more sympathetic and her less when we had PLENTY of twists to make her less already. None of the characters who discover/reveal this "twist" go, hang on, IS it possible for any teenage girl to have all the power over a middle-aged man? Or is this the same old tired child seductress trope that has been around for centuries with a new hat? Sometimes trying to be edgy...is worse.