Friends, I’m going to be completely honest with you. I have fallen behind on my reading in the last couple of months. Those darn holidays really got in the way! I do a brunt of my reading while waiting in the school pickup line and with no school that cut two and a half hours of reading out of my week!
I am returning to a book that I started in November, but nowhere near finished and I don’t want to make you wait for a book review blog so I am going to write a quick review on a book that I read a while ago that I never wrote about.
“Big Little Lies” by Liane Moriarty
Published: 2014 by Penguin Publishing
Genres: Novel, Mystery, Psychological Fiction, Domestic Fiction
Jane is a young mother sending her son Ziggy off to kindergarten when she meets Madeline and Celeste. The three moms become friends and they learn that they all have problems. Madeline’s struggling with the fact that her daughter from a previous marriage is developing a close relationship with her new step mom, the young and beautiful Bonnie. Celeste is abused by her rich banker husband. Jane was raped at the age of 19 and left to raise Ziggy on her own.
Jane is called into the school because Ziggy has been accused of bullying a classmate. Ziggy denies hurting her, but won’t name the real bully.
They are all trying to do their best for their kids while dealing with the bad things in their lives and it all comes crashing down the night of the school fundraiser trivia night.
Liane Moriarty manages to touch on dark subjects, jealousy, rape, bullying and abuse while keeping the story entertaining. The story keeps you engaged and even though it jumped between past and present it is easy to follow.
I read the book when I found out it was going to be a TV mini-series. I read it first then watched the HBO series starring Nicole Kidman as Celeste, Reese Witherspoon as Madeline, Shailene Woodley as Jane, and Zoe Kravitz as Bonnie. I felt the casting was pretty good except for Shailene Woodley. I just don’t find her to be a good actor. I didn’t feel as if she was believable as Jane. Jane in the book has a lot of darkness in her and a lot of innocence at the same time. I didn’t feel any depth in the on screen Jane.
I thought both the book and the mini-series were good, but the book was better. I would give the book a 4 out of 5 stars.
