I have been intrigued by books with the format of podcast ever since I’ve read the first one like that! Especially on audio. Also, they’re usually thriller/mystery so this girl is going to read it more so. This book was the classic murder mystery, with a very powerful start in my opinion (the first sentence!) and I couldn’t stop reading. The voice in Lucy’s head plot twist was a shock and from there it was a fast ride.

“Listen for the Lie” by Amy Tintera follows Lucy, a young woman accused of murdering her best friend. Now years later, a podcast has picked up the cold case and wants to discover what really happened. Lucy, unable to recall the night herself, teams up with podcaster Ben to discover what actually happened that night.

I thought I was over the podcast theme in books, but somehow this one hit different. Lucy is such a good character and her half-in, half-out vibe makes for interesting reading.

Overall, this book was a solid 5 star read for me. I knew from the first few pages this book would be good, but honestly the pages just flew. I HAD to know what happened!

Thanks to NetGalley and Celadon Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review! This book is out now!

This book hooked me from the beginning and was completely bingeworthy!!!

One of my favorite genres is thrillers/mysteries, which can sometimes make me picky. I am always trying to see whether I have figured out the twists and 'who did it.' This book made me happy that while I might have figured out a few things, the author still delivered some surprises. This was such a twisty and fun ride with some great sarcastic humor thrown in. Also, I loved the characters and podcast episodes throughout.

In terms of the characters, Lucy Chase was a fantastic female lead. Even when you wonder what is going on with her inner-thoughts and what happened that night, you root for her. She is strong, doesn't appear to give much of a damn of what others think, and sarcastic in the best way. Reading this book, I laughed way more than I likely have before for this genre. Amy Tintera also outdid herself with Lucy's grandma. What another amazing character! The banter between her and Lucy, along with her mischievousness was icing on the cake!!!

Highly recommend this one!!! I'm not going to lie....I could use more books with these characters and this podcast!! Regardless, I will keep an eye out for future books from Amy Tintera.

Thank you NetGalley, Celadon Books, and the author for a copy of the e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was a quick, fast paced mystery/thriller that kept my attention the entire time- I couldn’t put it down!
Everyone assumes Lucy Chase murdered her best friend and got away with it but when a new podcaster comes to town, more details and secrets come to light about the murder.
It was a dark comedy and fast paced whodunnit that I’d highly recommend

Despite being the prime suspect in her best friend's murder, Lucy has no memory of the night five years ago. No one was ever officially arrested/convicted of the crime, but the town no longer made Lucy welcome so she left and never looked back.... that is until a true crime podcast began looking into Savvy's death.

I loved this one. I am a fan of the podcast trope and it was executed well here. The audio was entertaining and I'd recommend checking it out.

This by far is one of my top reads so far this year! Lucy returns home after her best friend was killed a few years earlier and she's the prime suspect. When Podcaster, Ben Owens wants to interview her, her grandmother Beverly, steps in and helps coordinate the interview. As he digs in to the people, places, and things that are Plumpton, TX secrets abound and nothing and no one is quite what they appear to be.

Lucy & Grandma are my absolute favorites. The sparky, sarcastic dialogue had me laughing out loud multiple times. I honestly couldn't put this down and would love a Ben Owens Listen for the Lie book series.

Way back, like many folks at the time, I got sucked into true crime podcasts like Serial. Digging into a case and trying to find the truth is exhilarating and it’s exactly what I loved about this book. Alternating between our protagonist and podcast episodes, this book was a wild ride! I had a lot of fun with it, though I did figure out the true killer early on. I really enjoyed this one!

Five years ago, Lucy wakes up to find that her best friend, Savvy, has been murdered. With Savvy's blood on her clothes, their entire small town of Plumpton, Texas thinks Lucy is the murderer. Lucy can't remember anything about that night, including what happened to Savvy. Now, a popular true crime podcaster, Ben, has returned to Plumpton to solve the mystery and finally uncover who is responsible for Savvy's death.

Listen for the Lie blew me away (apparently 2024 is the year for 5-star mystery/thriller releases and I'm here for it)! As her adult debut, Amy Tintera absolutely knocked this one out of the park. It was so unique, sarcastically funny, and the fast-pace kept me wanting to keep reading. It definitely had that element of not wanting to put it down. As a lover of podcasts like Morbid, Up and Vanished, and Serial, I also loved the true crime aspect. I was disappointed that I couldn't immediately go and read one of Amy's backlist books to fight the reading slump that this will undoubtedly put me in because this is the first of its kind. I will definitely be reading anything and everything she writes in the future. I think that this book will be loved by readers in all genres and that while it is a mystery, the humor and writing style makes it a book for absolutely everyone!

5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Celadon Books for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!

I really enjoyed the plot and the format of this book but I only rated it 3 stars because it was so unbelievable that Lucy just kept kissing every guy she interacted with. It made no sense and took me out of the story. Without the unnecessary kissing I would have given it 4 or maybe even 5 stars.

Five stars!

"Listen for the Lie" is Amy Tintera's first adult book and my first introduction to her work and it does not disappoint. The premise is pretty simple: Five years ago everyone in Lucy's home town thinks she killed her best friend Savvy. Unfortunately, Lucy suffers from a convenient case of amnesia and doesn't remember anything about that night. And then we have Ben Owens, the host of a super popular podcast in town, "Listen for the Lie" He is trying to get to the bottom of Savvy's murder and Lucy helps...... Even though she may very well be the killer and she just forgot.

Where this book shines is the characters. Both Ben and Lucy are very well written. Some authors struggle with writing snarky characters but this one triumphs in the best way with Lucy. She is snarky, quick witted, and genuinely hilarious. I laughed so many times with some of her comments and interactions. Plus the thriller part was very "thrilling" Very well executed with great twists.

Highly recommended!

I really appreciate Celadon Books for giving me the opportunity to read this book for free for my honest review and it is out right now.

It's rare that I genuinely enjoy reading a thriller, but I can honestly say that about "Listen for the Lie." Often, I'm too focused on trying to figure out the twist or keep track of the players and timelines that I fly right through them in a matter of days, retaining little to none of the actual story and walking away disappointed. Listen wasn't like that. Listen made me want to slow down and spend as much time as I could with Lucy. She was likeable, interesting, the opposite of an unreliable narrator. Despite just about every other character in this book not believing her, she was just about the only person I believed as the story unfolded. She was written in such a way that she didn't have anything to hide and was very honest about that. She was clear on what she knew and what she didn't know, and didn't bother to cloudy anything with miscommunications or lies. I really enjoyed having her as the main character and I wish more thrillers had characters like her.

I also enjoyed how the podcast was used in the story. I personally don't listen to true crime podcasts. I don't enjoy them, and I have an issue with what they do to the people involved with the crime. That was actually mentioned and handled in this story. I also enjoyed that Ben had a bit of slime to him, in my opinion. He wasn't written as this "trying to help the world through podcasting" character. He, just like Lucy, was very human, very real. By the end, I ended up liking him as a character but it took the entirety of the book and him proving himself to be him in it for than just the angle.

My only critique is that this thriller has very similar themes that I see in just about every thriller these days: spousal abuse, assault, cheating. It's so apparent in thrillers that it's tiring. I would love to read a twisty thriller with great characters that aren't cheating on their spouses, aren't abused, and aren't victims of assault. I want it unhinged with hidden family members, cult secrets, out of this world weirdness. Thrillers are meant to be strange; get weird with it!

This was a really good book. It follows the story of Lucy who comes back to her hometown 5 years after her best friend died. The whole town believes Lucy killed Savvy and that she is faking amnesia. Ben comes to town to do a podcast on the death of Savvy to finally find out what happened. I loved the podcasts sections where you get the POV of people from the town.

Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera is one of the most entertaining thrillers I’ve read. Highly recommend!

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, of all the genres I read, thrillers are the most hit or miss. But I never really love them—I either think they’re good enough or I downright do not like them. However, Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera might make me a lover of thrillers. This one is super good.

There’s an unreliable protagonist at play, but she 100% knows this. Did she murder her best friend? She doesn’t know because of memory loss.

Yes, this all sounds so familiar. But how this aspect is written is so unique and interesting. And bonus, for once, the thriller woman protagonist is not an alcoholic, in fact, she’s a lightweight. So all the overused thrillers tropes are given a fresh spin and it’s works so well.

This novel is fantastic. It takes you on such a wild ride, and will make you laugh. But it also does cover serious issues too. I thought it was a great balance all around.

Lucy, a twenty-something who left her hometown after her best friend, Savvy, was murdered, must return home for the first time since the murder happened five years ago. Why was she away from home for so long? Everyone thought Lucy did it. And now a popular true crime podcast is dissecting the murder to try to figure out who actually did kill Savvy, so Lucy steps in to help clear her name and get justice for her best friend.

Such a fast paced, page-turning thriller! This book kept me guessing until the very end. I had so many theories of who I thought did it, and I was wrong every time!

I loved the unique storytelling in this! The narrative cleverly weaves between Lucy's perspective and excerpts from the podcast itself, making you feel like you're right in the investigation. Which was so well done on audio!! This book also totally gave off unreliable narrator vibes: Can you trust Lucy? and it kept me guessing who's friend or foe. Just when I thought I knew where this was headed the author threw in some twists that kept me hooked until the end!

This was a fun and easy book to read. It had lots of twists and turn and threw in some red herrings to make you want to keep reading. I thought the addition of the podcast was done well and added to the story. I found the main character, Lucy, to be annoying at times but it didn't turn me off from the book. She was meant to be an unreliable narrator. The side characters made the book more interesting especially the grandmother who is arguably the best character in the novel.

Overall, if you want an easy book to sit down and read in a few hours this is a good option.

This one was so so good. One of the best thrillers I have read in a while. First of all - characters top notch. It delivered on the snarky, not give a damn, not wanting to please MC and I was here for it. Also GRANDMA! Who knew one could have a role model for their olden times? I do now!

This book was tense, and fast moving. It kept delivering on red herrings and twists at the same speed of light. Which I really appreciated. The podcast theme/inclusion was very helpful. I bet listening to this on audiobook would be even better experience than just plowing through it on paper. The whole concept - is the narrator reliable or not, was such a refreshing take on that trope. The ending - OMG! That's all I have to say. And IYKYK - I hoped she would do it!

This one will definitely be a favorite for a while. Thank you to the publisher for my review copy.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Fans of thrillers featuring podcasts will LOVE this one. It is fast paced, lots of twists and turns, and I had no idea how it was going to end. Definitely a must read and I could not put it down.

Highly recommended!

At times compelling and intriguing. Yet often annoying. Purposely the author has made the FMC an unreliable narrator. Granted that she can't remember what happened the night her best friend was murdered and everyone thinks that she did it, but I found her to be an annoying character. Possibly intentionally by the author. A crime podcast decided to look into her case five years later, so the story is focused on solving murder. Perhaps, the fact that I figured it out by one third into it kept me from enjoying it more.

I received a free copy of Listen for the Lie in exchange for an honest review.

Many thrillers revolve around the tropes of memory loss and an unreliable narrator, but few do this as successfully as Amy Tintera in this astonishing debut.

The format of the book, alternating between podcast episodes and chapters from the accused murderer protagonist’s point of view, cleverly hid all the novel’s secrets until the final chapters.

Tintera has an authentic Southern voice which made her Texan characters live off the page.

I hope Tintera writes many more thrillers as superb as this. Highly recommended.