Nine Liars
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4.6 • 10 Ratings
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
Stevie Bell solved the case of Truly Devious, and now she’s taking her detecting skills abroad when she becomes embroiled in a mystery from 1990s England. Another pulse-pounding and laugh-out-loud stand-alone mystery from New York Times bestselling author Maureen Johnson.
Senior year at Ellingham Academy for Stevie Bell isn’t going well. Her boyfriend, David, is studying in London. Her friends are obsessed with college applications. With the cold case of the century solved, Stevie is adrift. There is nothing to distract her from the questions pinging around her brain—questions about college, love, and life in general.
Relief comes when David invites Stevie and her friends to join him for study abroad, and his new friend Izzy introduces her to a double-murder cold case. In 1995, nine friends from Cambridge University went to a country house and played a drunken game of hide-and-seek. Two were found in the woodshed the next day, murdered with an ax.
The case was assumed to be a burglary gone wrong, but one of the remaining seven saw something she can’t explain. This was no break-in. Someone’s lying about what happened in the woodshed.
Seven suspects. Two murders. One killer still playing a deadly game.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in the Truly Devious universe, this scintillating mystery by Johnson (The Box in the Woods) follows Ellingham Academy senior and renowned amateur sleuth Stevie Bell, who feels rudderless with no college plans or cases to solve. She misses her boyfriend, David, who is in London, so when he suggests a visit, she and her friends hop on a plane. Upon arriving, David's classmate Izzy solicits Stevie's help. In 1995, Izzy's aunt, Angela, and her eight housemates celebrated their Cambridge University graduation at a country estate. During a drunken game of hide-and-seek, someone murdered two of the attendees with an ax. The police assumed the killer was a burglar, who remains uncaught, but Angela once told Izzy she believes one of her friends is guilty. When Stevie confronts Angela, she denies the suspicion, but her obvious fright strengthens Stevie's investigative resolve. Johnson delivers a meticulously crafted fair-play mystery that gratifies as a standalone while also forwarding the richly textured characters' arcs, a treat for fans of the series. Distinctly written flashbacks to 1995 pepper the present-day narrative, creating resonance and investing readers in Stevie's case. Stevie cues as white; the supporting cast is intersectionally diverse. Ages 14–up.
Customer Reviews
Pacy and witty
I have read all of Johnson’s books and I love her voice, it’s pacy, sardonic and witty without being arch.
I hugely enjoyed this book.
Stevie is back and her over-thinking anxious panicking self has to try to solve a mystery against the clock and against her own jet lag.
As a person who graduated from the Irish equivalent of Cambridge, the flashbacks to 1995, the year I left Trinity Colllege Dublin, were very evocative for me. Especially remembering the Battle of the Bands between Blur and Oasis.
I always knew which character was narrating/speaking, the red herrings were satisfyingly confusing.