Review: Lies

Title:  Lies
Author:  T.M. Logan
Genre:  Mystery/Thriller
Publisher:  St. Martins Press
Format:   Kindle ARC
No. of Pages: 432
Date of Publication:  September 11, 2018
My Rating:  5 Stars


BLURB:

WHAT IF YOUR WHOLE LIFE WAS BASED ON LIES?

When Joe Lynch stumbles across his wife driving into a hotel car park while she's supposed to be at work, he's intrigued enough to follow her in.

And when he witnesses her in an angry altercation with family friend Ben, he knows he ought to intervene.

But just as the confrontation between the two men turns violent, and Ben is knocked unconscious, Joe's young son has an asthma attack - and Joe must flee in order to help him.

When he returns, desperate to make sure Ben is OK, Joe is horrified to find that Ben has disappeared.

And that's when Joe receives the first message . . .

Link to buy the book

MY THOUGHTS:

Grab a coffee. Delay dinner. Shut the TV off, kick your feet up and settle in for a nonstop read. Here is a story filled with contempt, jealousy and hate. One afternoon while driving four-year-old William home from school, Joe Lynch spots his wife's car at a parking garage. He is thoroughly confused, because she was supposed to be at tennis. He hurries over, and sees her having an argument with a man, Ben Delaney. He is unable to grab her attention, but does approach Ben afterwards. Joe and Ben get into an altercation and Ben gets hurt. However, William suddenly has an asthma attack, so Joe rushes off to attend to him.

Concerned for the hurt Ben, Joe does go back to the hotel. However, not only does he not find Ben, but he cannot find his cell phone. Almost immediately he begins to discover messages via his Facebook account where someone is apparently posting as him. This is no doubt in preparation to implicate him in something nefarious. That is evident from the very start. From this moment on in the story, we are hit with chapter endings that are intended to grab the reader from the throat. The very end of chapter one states that Joe made a spur-of-the-moment decision that would change his life. Read: “The hijacking of my life on social media.”  “Everything you know is a lie.”

Social media key in this story, which is entirely told from Joe's first person point of view.  Not only has Ben disappeared from the hotel, he has disappeared altogether. Where is he? What does he really want from Joe? Meanwhile, things begin looking very bad for Joe. He is forced to take matters into his own hands and is forced to act quickly, because his life is turned upside down.

I could not put Lies down! I devoured this book from cover to cover in just a couple of hours! While speeding through the pages, I was hit with so many twists and turns and incredible red herrings, well, simply put, that I did not see coming! The suspense is absolutely thrilling. The conclusion of this book is one that will remain with me for a very long time. It was done with excellent precision. Another great facet in this novel is the heavy use of social media and cell phones. So apropos to the times that we are living in. Lies is T.M. Logan's stunning first novel, which was followed by 29 Seconds. I most certainly will be reading this fantastic debut author again.

Many thanks to St. Martins Press and to NetGalley for this ARC to review in exchange for my honest opinion.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Tim was born in Berkshire and studied at Queen Mary and Cardiff universities before becoming a national newspaper journalist. He currently writes full-time and lives in Nottinghamshire with his wife and two children. LIES is his first novel - published by Bonnier Zaffre in January 2017. His next thriller, 29 SECONDS, comes out in January 2018 and is currently available to pre-order. For exclusive writing and new releases from TM Logan, sign up to the Readers’ Club: www.bit.ly/TMLogan.

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