This book poses the question "What would you do and how far would you go to protect your child?".
The secondary plot centres around the past lives of the parents and their respective attempts to come to terms with their mistakes and try to make a fresh start.

I enjoyed this book although I did find some aspects of the characters slightly irritating at times..
I recommend this book if you enjoy a family saga covering how different generations can end up repeating mistakes but it's never too late to start again and do the right thing.

Jane Corry never disappoints. I loved this book.
I believe anyone with a teenage child would be able to relate to this story.
After the shocking confession by their son at the beginning the story then takes you back to provide the background information of how his parents Tom and Sarah met etc.
The book has a good pace and I loved every page right to the end.

I liked this book. It was well written. Great characters and really easy to picture I enjoyed the story too.
Thank you to netgalley and the publishers and the author for the opportunity to read this book for my honest opinion

A gripping thriller, one where I never guesses the ending outcome. However it felt about 150 pages too long, and concentrated too heavily on one plot aspect I felt it didn't really need to.

A book about family, marriage and children. How far would you go to protect a child? What if you and your husband were very different people? A slow read but worth the effort, unusual storyline that comes together to explain the results. 3* rating

I am a big Jane Corry fan and have read all her other books. So I was excited to get a copy of this to read and review.

The Lies We Tell is a domestic thriller, based on a huge moral dilemma, What would you do if your child came home one day and said he'd killed someone?

The book begins with the story of the above happening , then swiftly goes back in time to the relationship between the parents and the dark secrets both hold. Both have their own reasons for how they feel about their child's announcement and how they deal with it.

The story of their relationship is interspersed with scenes in a courtroom, and goes back and forth a bit in time. Things are revealed slowly but surely before it all pieces together dramatically.

The characters are excellently put together, their stories fully thought out and work perfectly for the overall story. Though not all of them are likeable, (namely Tom) but that is the sign of a good author! Some people have found the relationship side of it too slow but I really enjoyed it and was thoroughly gripped. I was however, even more engaged with the 2nd half of the book and how the consequences of the killing played out, it was fast moving and not at all predictable.

A thoroughly enjoyable book. Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin UK for a copy of this ebook in return for an open and honest view.

What a gripping thriller.

This was a very disturbing but good read.

Thoroughly enjoyed from start to finish and could not get enough of.

This is a must read for anyone who enjoys a good thriller!!
Absolutely loved the characters, the plot, the tension -  impossible to put it down.
Certainly recommended!

Excellent, really enjoyed this, it was the perfect holiday read. It gripped me from the first chapter and didn't disappoint.

I was fortunate to receive a copy of this ARC from Penguin and NetGalley.

There is a real moral dilemma at the heart of this book - how far would you go to protect your child? Do you allow it to destroy your marriage? Even to the detriment of someone else's? And how much does your past experience feed into this?

The first part, detailing how Freddie's parents met, did feel like it went on a bit. But I do understand it was necessary to explain their backgrounds to demonstrate how they react later on.

My favourite quote:
"My pottery keeps me sane. Round and round goes the clay. Round and round goes my mind. Coil pots with each stage of my life, stacked one on top of the other."

I look forward to reading more of the author's work.

I'm sorry to give a negative review, but The Lies We Tell was so tedious, I was on the verge of actual pain whilst reading it. The characters are all hypocritical neurotic drama queens, the plot is paper-thin and stretched to within an inch of its life, the logic just isn't there and the pacing is a lesson in how to cure insomnia. Even skimming the last 20% seemed to take an age.

A book needs to contain suspense if it's going to be marketed as such. I'm disappointed.

Just WOW!
I couldn't put this book down
It is told in two halves after the initial thread of the story is told. In the first half we learn more Sarah and Tom and their history and relationship. Although you can tell early on they are polar opposites they still have the same yearning for stability. The comes along Freddie and through the years he can sense his closeness to one parent more. In the second half we learn more about Freddies disclosure and who the family deal with it.
It takes some time for the plot to come to an end but the characters are well versed and It was good read.

The book begins with a mother lying awake waiting for her teenage son Freddie to come home. When he finally does he blurts out that he has done something truly terrible. His mother Sarah, is determined to protect him, Tom, his father has a different opinion and wants to involve the authorities; the book then continues in two parts. Part A describes how young, free-spirited Sarah and older straightlaced and rigid Tom became a couple and the testing journey their relationship has had to withstand. Part B deals with the ramifications of Freddie’s long-awaited confession with twisting and turning final chapters. As well as being an enthralling page turner this book is written in such a manner that the characters are totally believable, foibles, warts, and all! Another triumph for Jane Corry, I thoroughly recommend!

The Lies We Tell by Jane Corry is a slow burn domestic thriller. The story starts off with Freddie being a teenager and he has come home after curfew one night having made a terrible mistake. Sarah wants to save her son but Tom wants to immediately call the police. The story goes back in time at that moment to when Tom and Sarah met and how they ended up being in a relationship, getting married and having Freddie. We learn about what happened in each characters past life.

I found that I truly couldn't get 100% invested in this book. This book is over 500 pages long and I found the story dragged on especially getting the full story of Tom and Sarah and how they became the family of three they are today. It definitely could have been cut down in parts.

Thank you Netgalley and Penguin General UK for a copy of this book for an honest review.

I was really gripped by the premise. A son comes home to say he's killed someone, and we see how the mother reacts, what she will do to protect her son. It's what I wanted We Need To Talk About Kevin to be about all those years ago (WNTTAK is a fab book anyway).

I did find it a little hard to get into as we're almost immediately taken away from Freddy and the murder and into a long flashback. On that note, this novel felt very long overall. Reading on Kindle it's hard to gauge how long, but I feel like a good quarter of it could have been cut.

But once it reached the good old 65% mark it was fast-paced and everything I wanted in a domestic thriller.

This was a thought provoking book that had me thinking what would I do in this situation. There was a problem in that some of the book concentrated on one topic for far too long . This is why I lowered my rating.

This book has layers - layers and layers of lies. The premise of the book was just the tip of the iceberg. After Sarah and Tom's son Freddie comes home in the early hours of the morning, he tells his parents that he has killed someone. This story is almost completely forgotten about for the first half of the book as the reader is then transported back in time to see how and when Tom and Sarah met. They are very different people and obviously not right for each other. Lies from both sides are covered up as they carry on as a couple. They try relentlessly for a baby and finally manage to have Freddie. Some lies are discovered which fractures Sarah and Tom's relationship even more.

Years later, when Freddie makes his confession to his parents, Sarah whisks him away without even bothering to ask him what had exactly happened. The past eventually catches up with them all with the author still relying on time jumps.

This book was long. It really dragged in some parts, so much so that I lost interest in what I was reading several times. There were parts of the story that were completely unnecessary and could have been left out. Had the book been more concise, the story would have been more gripping.

A great novel which explores the relationships we have with our family, friends and most importantly with ourselves. Loved the way that the past was discovered through the eyes of the main characters

I found this book an addictive read, once started I couldn’t put it down. Sarah and Tom are parents to fifteen year old Freddie. The book opens with Sarah laying awake, wondering where Freddie is as he has not come home. On waking Tom we realise that there is friction between them regarding Freddie and when he does come home and confesses to a murder we realise their differences as to How they will cope. The first section of the book covers how Sarah and Tom met, how they were complete opposites then and how they struggled to have the baby Sarah was desperate for. We realise the differences escalated as Freddie turned into a teenager as they had totally different ideas of how to handle him. Tom wants to turn him into the police but Sarah just wants to cover it up to protect Freddie. A moral dilemma for both parents. The second section of the book tells how Sarah coped with Freddie’s admission and why she did what she did. Sarah and Tom both have secrets from their pasts which they have never revealed and this adds to the absorbing story. This is a book full of lies, secrets and betrayal which makes it a riveting read.
Thanks to Netgalley and Penguin for giving me the opportunity to read and review this book.

A real slow burner. I liked that though because it’s so well written. It’s a story that starts with a son who is going off the rails but it also looks at his parent’s relationship and his separate relationships with them. A definite must-read this winter!

I have to admit I felt disappointed after finishing The Lies We Tell. I was drawn in by the premise, initially; it promised to examine themes of familial loyalty and motherhood in a gripping mystery. In some ways, it delivered but it’s definitely more of a character study as the focus quickly switched to exploring Sarah and Tom’s early relationship and strained marriage. Unfortunately, I did not warm to either of these characters so I found I lost interest in the novel quite quickly.

With that being said, it is a fast read and I did continue to the end to find out the resolution with respect to Freddy’s confession. I found the second half much stronger and gripping than the first, which seemed to be a continuous merry-go-round ride of Tom and Sarah’s incompatibility. My main compliant is, I think, that the characters never felt real to me so I was never truly invested in their journey. Primarily, we only know Freddy from the differing perspectives of each of his parents (an interesting choice to be fair) so the reader never really sees who he is as a person. As the main thrust of the novel (for me, at least) was the parent’s central moral dilemma on how far do you go to protect the one you love, it seemed a confusing approach.

If you are looking for a tense domestic thriller on the above themes, I would suggest this might not satisfy you; on the other hand, if exploring a strained, incompatible relationship through marriage and parenthood with a difficult child appeals to you then I think you might really enjoy this novel.