*This guest review was written by the amazing Maria with RelentlessReading*
“For eighteen years I’ve believed what other people told me about what was right and what was wrong. From now. I’m deciding”
It’s 1959. The battle for civil rights is raging. And it’s Sarah Dunbar’s first day of school, as one of the first black students at the previously all-white Jefferson High. No one wants Sarah there. Not the Governor. Not the teachers. And certainly not the students – especially Linda Hairston, daughter of the town’s most ardent segregationist. Sarah and Linda have every reason to despise each other. But as a school project forces them to spend time together, the less their differences seem to matter. And Sarah and Linda start to feel something they’ve never felt before. Something they’re both determined ignore. Because it’s one thing to be frightened by the world around you – and another thing altogether when you’re terrified of what you feel inside.
Y’know the type of books that are, in simple terms, more than books? The books you never really put down, even though the physical copy mightn’t be in your hands anymore; the characters who don’t feel like characters but real people, real friends of yours, telling you the story of their life. The characters whom you love equally as much as you could love any real person, and whom you miss and worry about constantly whenever you’re not with them. The books you don’t just read, but live in; the books that entirely take over your life, whilst you’re reading it and for long afterwards.
“Lies We Tell Ourselves” is one of those books.
“Lies We Tell Ourselves” can teach you more about the past than any history book ever could – not because it tells you the facts, but because it tells you much more than that. It teaches us about not only what happened, but, more importantly, how it felt to those involved – and, for once, not the white people involved, but the black people. Those who were truly victimized, not those who have the habit of playing the victim. The terror and pain experienced by Sarah beams from the pages. At times it felt not as though I were reading about her, but as though I were her; I could feel every ounce of shame, every once of anger, all the humiliation she experienced. Books like “Lies We Tell Ourselves” are of huge value in today’s society, because they allow people like me – white, privileged people to gain a better understanding of both institutionalized and societal racism, not only in the past but also nowadays.
Which leads me onto the topic of representation. There’s no doubt about the fact that, although recently a greater emphasis is being placed on diversity in YA books, authors and publishers still have a long way to go. “Lies We Tell Ourselves” is a perfect example of what we mean when we say we want better representation in novels. First of all, it doesn’t treat minorities like individual blocks; it shows that, more often than not, minorities intertwine. Many authors seem to not realize that a person can belong to more than just one minority. LGBT+ or POC protagonists are a rare occurrence in YA books, but what’s even rarer than that is an LGBT+ and POC protagonist; I was really excited to finally find a book that contains such a main character.
Another problem I have with many “LGBT+ books” is that they focus mostly on the fact that the character is LGBT+. We don’t want books about LGBT+ characters; we want books with LGBT+ characters, and “Lies We Tell Ourselves” is exactly that. Of course, coming to terms with one’s sexuality is a major aspect of the novel, but it is not the only aspect. There’s more to the plot and to Linda and Sarah than solely how they feel towards one another.
I could talk for long about all the things about “Lies We Tell Ourselves” that I adored, but in summary it can all be brought down to one sentence: I couldn’t find a fault in the book if I tried. It’s gripping, unique, and impossible to put down. The characters are original and intriguing; the character development is perfect. The book is educative, but not the text-book type of educative; it teaches facts through fiction, it tells us about the past (and present) without bringing it down to solely names, dates, and places. In simple terms, it has all the ingredients of the perfect novel.
Without a doubt, “Lies We Tell Ourselves” is among the top five books I’ve read this year, and a new addition to my list of all-time favourites. It’s definitely a novel I will be recommending to all.
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THANKS to Maria for sharing this review! Go check out her blog!
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