ABOUT THE BOOK
The Color of Lies
by C.J. Lyons
Publisher: Blink
Release Date: November 6, 2018
Genre: Young Adult — Contemporary, Mystery, ThrillerSynopsis:
From New York Times and USA Today bestselling author CJ Lyons comes The Color of Lies, a world drenched in color and mystery.
High school senior Ella Cleary has always been good at reading people. Her family has a rare medical condition called synesthesia that scrambles the senses—her Gram Helen sees every sound, and her uncle Joe can literally taste words. Ella’s own synesthesia manifests itself as the ability to see colors that reveal people’s true emotions…until she meets a guy she just can’t read.
Alec is a mystery to Ella, a handsome, enigmatic young journalist who makes her feel normal for the first time in her life. That is, until he reveals the real reason why he sought her out—he wants to learn the truth behind her parents’ deaths, the parents that Ella had always been told died in a fire. Alec turns Ella’s world upside down when he tells her their deaths were definitely not an accident.
After learning her entire life has been a lie, Ella doesn’t know who she can trust or even who she really is. With her adoptive family keeping secrets and the evidence mixing fact and fiction, the only way for Ella to learn the truth about her past is to find a killer.
Perfect for fans of Caroline B. Cooney, Ally Carter, and Jennifer Brown, The Color of Lies blurs the lines between black-and-white facts and the kaleidoscope of reality.
BOOK LINKS
My Review
I’ve always been interested in books where a character has synesthesia, and this book was a thriller that had multiple synesthetes! I just knew I had to pick it up.
Ella is the only one in her family who seems to have a form of synesthesia that allows her to still live a normal life. Her grandmother and several others live their lives as recluses, avoiding sounds and words that might make them physically ill. Ella knows that her parents died in a fire when she was three, but then a boy named Alec comes along and turns her whole life upside down. He claims that her parents did not die in an accidental fire, that they were murdered. He says that he met Ella when she was younger, but Ella says that she was never at the scene of the fire. She must decide whether to trust Alec or to go back to believing her version of her parents’ death.
Alec was trying to work with Ella to figure out the truth. It was definitely awesome to have a diverse group of characters in this story. I found that I didn’t quite connect with him at certain parts of the story, but I was with him by the time that I reached the end.
The way that I would describe this story would be with the letter A. There are a lot of things going up the slope to build to the climax, and it seems a little bit slow climbing up the steep slope. Then, there is the top. The climax is abrupt, and almost out of nowhere. Lastly, there is a huge downward fall, where everything seems to happen all at once. And then we have a time skip at the end, and an almost “where are they now” with the characters, which I really enjoyed.
The story was good and had a lot of suspenseful details leading up to the climax, but because the ending felt so rushed, I still lost track of things. But I really enjoyed the book up until that point!
Ella in particular also went through a lot of character development as she started to remember things that she had forgotten over the years. I really loved her character, and how much she cared about her family. She was never a spoiled teenage brat, even if she didn’t have the best circumstances.
Overall, this was an addictive thriller, and I enjoyed my time reading it! I hope you enjoy this novel as much as I did!
I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a new YA mystery-suspense novel.
I received an advance copy of this book and this is my voluntary review.
Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over forty novels, former pediatric ER doctor CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about in her cutting edge Thrillers with Heart.
Two times winner of the International Thriller Writers coveted Thriller Award, CJ has been called a “master within the genre” (Pittsburgh Magazine) and her work has been praised as “breathtakingly fast-paced” and “riveting” (Publishers Weekly) with “characters with beating hearts and three dimensions” (Newsday).
Learn more about CJ’s Thrillers with Heart at www.CJLyons.net
GIVEAWAY
Prize: 5 Copies of The Color of Lies by CJ Lyons (USA only)
Ends: 11/16/18
Nice review! This book sounds interesting, and I totally had to look up the condition because I had never heard of it before!