Sometimes I Lie – Dark & twisted, with plot twists galore!{Book Review}

April saw me churning out book reviews, because I think I was reading like a demon. I figured lockdown would be over soon, so I wanted to make the most of any free time I had….. Enter May and lockdown was going strong, the books on my bookshelf did not entice me, so it was a slower month. However, once level 4 hit and I could hit up my local Bargain Books, spending more money that I could afford to….on books, seemed to get me excited about reading again. I ordered Sometimes I Lie and received it in record time! A few people raved about this book to me….so….let’s find out.. do they sometimes tell lies? Or was this a solid recommendation?

What is Sometimes I Lie about?

My name is Amber Reynolds. There are three things you should know about me:
1. I’m in a coma.
2. My husband doesn’t love me anymore.
3. Sometimes I lie.

Amber wakes up in a hospital. She can’t move. She can’t speak, she can’t open her eyes and she can hear everyone around her, but they have no idea. Amber doesn’t remember what happened, but she has a suspicion her husband had something to do with it. Alternating between her paralyzed present, the week before her accident, and a series of childhood diaries from twenty years ago, this brilliant psychological thriller asks: Is something really a lie if you believe it’s the truth?

My Review

The opening page starts with Amber waking up in hospital, not wanting to accept where she is, but by the end of the chapter….it’s evident that she is in a coma! The book then alternates between the present, a week ago, before the coma, and then also the diary entries of a 10yr old. I liked the use of the timeline and it only being a week ago, but it made me anxious as to what could have happened in a mere week to get to this place!

I need to tell you that I am EXTREMELY claustrophobic, so reading about Amber being stuck inside her own body is the most chilling thing I’ve ever read. Forget murdered kids, haunted houses and monsters….. this was so hard for me to read. I would stop reading at night, because I was scared I’d dream about being in that position. That’s how bad it was. lol

I felt the book started off really slowly and I was a bit uninterested if I am honest. The addition of the diary entries definitely upped the interest level for me, because I was so curious as to what happened during her childhood, that would be relevant in 2016/2017 (when the story takes place). By the 2nd half of the book, this became a real page turner for me, even though some of the twists were a bit predictable. BUT some of the twists totally were NOT predictable too!

Sometimes I Lie is dark, twisty and let me just say…Miss Amber is one of the most unreliable narrators you’ll ever meet! She completely messes with your head, but that’s what we like though right? To have our minds messed with?

Critique?

When I finished the book, I had to reread the last page again and again. I then needed to google the crap out of the ending and hope that somebody could shed some light for me. Nobody seemingly could. So I felt frustrated that I had ZERO idea what the last page even meant, and that’s why I am docking it with my rating. I felt like an ending that nobody understands, or can make sense of….after already giving us closure, just for the sake of a plot twist, leaves me as the reader wanting.

My rating

Sometimes I Lie is a book that has really polarising reviews. People either loved it or hated it! On Goodreads, this book has a rating of 3.82 stars out of 5. I’ll give it a solid 4 stars. The plot was good, the writing was good and I loved how twisty it was. There are some moments you’ll have to suspend reality with, but that is the point of reading, is it not?

Will you be adding this to your book shelf? I picked up Sometimes I Lie from Bargain Books and it retails somewhere between R170 and R235.