A read-in-one-night suspense thriller narrated by a compulsive liar whose little white lies allow her to enter into the life and comfort of a wealthy married couple who are harboring much darker secrets themselves. For the millions of us still chasing those gone girls, this is perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell, Lucy Foley, and Laura Dave.

Sloane Caraway is a liar.

Harmless lies, mostly, to make her self-proclaimed sad, little life a bit more interesting.

So when Sloane sees a young girl in tears at a park one afternoon, she can’t help herself—she tells the girl’s (very attractive) dad she’s a nurse and helps him pull a bee stinger from the girl’s foot.

With this lie, and chance encounter, Sloane becomes the nanny for the wealthy, and privileged Jay and Violet Lockhart. The perfect New York couple, with a brownstone, a daughter in private school, and summers on Block Island.

But maybe Sloane isn’t the only one lying, and all that’s picture-perfect harbors a much more dangerous truth. To say anything more is to spoil the most exciting, twisty, and bitingly smart suspense novel to come out in years.

The thing about lies is that they add up, form their own truth and a twisted prison of a world. And in Count My Lies, Sophie Stava spins a breakneck, unputdownable thriller about the secrets we keep, and the terrifying dangers that lurk just under the images we spend so much time trying to maintain.

Careful what you lie for.

I have found that I have become unapologetically critical of thrillers as of late – especially the ones that boast “shocking, unbelievable twists”. It seems that most thrillers these days are written with the sole purpose of a “shocking” (typically implausible) twist, and then several more are thrown in for the hell of it. And I hate it. I want smart thrillers. I want twists that make sense. I want characters I love (or love to hate) and can root for. In my opinion, this book was none of those things. The book starts with a promising setup (and honestly, the book’s first part is what saved it from a single-star rating), but then it all went downhill for me.

At the heart of the story is Sloane Caraway, a woman with a habit of embellishing the truth. When she encounters a distressed little girl at a park, she impulsively tells the girl’s father, Jay Lockhart, that she’s a nurse before assisting in removing a bee stinger. Sloane is not a nurse – she’s a nail tech, and she got the nail tech job because she lied and faked her credentials after being fired as a preschool teacher and nanny. She crushes on Jay and seeks out Violet (Jay’s wife) at the park, befriends her, and eventually lands a job as the Lockhart’s nanny. At first glance, Jay and Violet seem to have a picture-perfect life of wealth and privilege that Sloane wants in on. But as Sloane becomes more entangled in their world, it becomes evident that she’s not the only one with something to hide.

This setup had the potential to be an entertaining, twisty domestic thriller, but the book leans too heavily on genre clichés and predictable plot points. From the start, Sloane is a difficult protagonist to root for. I hated her and never grew to like her. Unreliable narrators can be intriguing when done well, but her lack of depth makes her more frustrating than fascinating. Rather than feeling like a complex anti-hero, she comes across as irritatingly dense and desperate, making it difficult to care about her or the circumstances she gets wrapped up in.

The rest of the cast doesn’t fare much better. Violet Lockhart is immediately suspicious, her character so blatantly positioned as the wife with something to hide that any sense of mystery is lost. Jay, meanwhile, is a walking cliché – the rich, charming, philandering husband who serves no real purpose beyond being a plot device for Sloane and Violet’s story. His interactions with both of them feel hollow, and his characterization is so underdeveloped that he’s a bore.

The novel is told from varying points of view. We start with Sloane and then flip to Violet and then, Jay (briefly), and then back to Sloane. I understood what the author was attempting to do, but it didn’t work for me. I felt that when we flipped to Violet’s point-of-view, a lot of the first part was rehashed to show us what Violet had been thinking, and then the plot started falling apart. When we get to Jay’s point of view, it goes by very quickly, and the author spends more time telling than showing, which created even more distance between the characters and me.

When all was said and done, I had to wonder why the characters did what they did. It felt like way too much trouble for the end result. Moments that should have been chilling or suspenseful instead come across as melodramatic, giving the book the feel of a Lifetime movie knockoff rather than a sophisticated thriller. Honestly, it reminded me of one of those bad domestic thrillers from the 90s that came on the heels of (and never lived up to) “Basic Instinct”.

Perhaps the biggest letdown is that every so-called twist feels recycled – I was never shocked or even a little surprised. Anyone who has read a few domestic suspense novels will see where the story is headed long before the big reveals happen. The twists were weak, and the finale was way too far-fetched for me to get behind. Again – one of the characters went to an unnecessary extreme with lackluster results just to get what they wanted, and I couldn’t believe it.

Aside from a decent first part, the only other thing I liked about this book was a few of the side characters. Sloane’s co-workers at the nail salon seemed real, and her relationship with her mother offered a little humanity and some much-needed grounding to the story. Unfortunately, these moments are fleeting and not enough to redeem the novel as a whole.

This one had a promising premise and a first act that was okay, but then it totally went down the drain for me. For anyone well-versed in thrillers, this one will likely feel like a forgettable, eye-rolling attempt that doesn’t bring anything new to the table. On the other hand, if an implausible plot doesn’t bother you and you want a thriller that will throw an abundance of bad decisions and questionable twists your way, this one might be exactly what you are looking for.

Book Club/Book Box: