By Ava Shaffer
From the bestselling psychological thriller author Lisa Jewell comes a story of two mothers and the secrets that unravel through their true crime podcast. Alix Summers is the typical perfect Instagram mom with a large kitchen, fabulous wardrobe, and seemingly perfect family. Josie Fair cannot be more different from Alix, apart from the fact that they share a birthday. Looking for something new to spice up her podcasting career, Alix interviews Josie about her peculiar life. However, as the podcast unfolds, Josie’s story only becomes darker and more complex. Rife with mediations on motherhood, purpose, secrets, and upbringing, None of This Is True is an addicting tale readers will not be able to put down.
Read This Book If You…
Enjoy true crime podcasts, like My Favorite Murder
Like morally ambiguous main characters
Are searching for a story about both mothers, mystery, and murder
Want to be glued to your seat until you finish a book
First I want to mention that I am a complete novice when it comes to the thriller and true crime genre, on account of me being a scaredy cat. This was the first psychological thriller I’ve read in many years, which could be one of the reasons why I got so sucked into this story.
After I passed the 30ish page park, I was hooked. I sat on my couch for hours binge-reading this, thought about the characters whenever I wasn’t reading, and sacrificed a few hours of sleep to finally finish it. None of This Is True is absolutely addictive, in the way true crime as a genre and its foray into podcast designs it to be so.
Speaking of the podcast format of this book, I think it was incredibly successful at some times, and at others I was less taken with it. Some of the placements of specific audio clips and interviews were perfectly timed to add suspense to the story, while others felt choppy and misplaced. I would’ve liked this book to lean in a bit more to the podcast format, maybe by playing with the format of how the audio appears on the page instead of just sticking it right below the regular narrative.
I also wasn’t the biggest fan of Jewell’s writing style. I love a good run-on sentence, but only when it's purposefully and sparingly used. There were some places in this where that rambly style of one sentence going on for an entire page works very effectively in this story. But, similar to my issue with the podcast clips, it wasn’t used effectively throughout the entire book. In some places, it felt like these dramatic long sentence structures weren’t totally warranted, and added more confusion than emotional payoff.
Despite my criticisms, I am still glad I stepped out of my comfort zone to read this story. It’s been a really long time since I felt so invested in a story that it was impossible for me to stop reading, and None of This Is True was that book for me.
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