Bald-Faced Liar: A Novel <— I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS AUTHOR so I was all in, for another one of her clever psych-thrillers. And while it was not my most favorite (let’s just say the reveal didn’t blow me away but there was a tiny twist in the reveal that did – like holy moly that part was clever!!) it was still an overall fun read that kept me guessing.

P.S. For those of you that are captivated by the whole “Satanic Panic” from the 80s/90s, this one’s for you (I’m looking at you, R.! 😉 ) It’s actually kind of an “aftermath”/fallout from all of that, at least, for this main character. I’m not huge on the “satanic panic” stories for some reason (though I sort of remember them from back in the day in real life, but I was just a kid – so maybe that’s why I’m not as affected).

Okay so… what’s it about?

Elizabeth’s life was HIGHLY affected by the Satanic Panic of the 80’s/90s and now as an adult, she just wants to live her life in anonymity. A traveling nurse/clinical specialist, she moves around from city to city, gives variations of her name to the people around her that are temporarily part of her life while she lives in  but never her real name.

Some people only live one life. I have no idea how they do it. I can live as many as I want, remaking myself and pulling from others. People are like books for me, and I wander the world like it’s a library, plucking out whatever catches my interest.

And boy is she a snooper. In fact, I thought I’d be in the eyes of a stalker and that thrilled me… I loved that side of her because you just knew there’d be trouble brewing. But then, it surprised me, because THAT was not where this was going…

…last year I walked away from nursing to become a clinical documentation specialist. Nursing is always there waiting if I want it, but I’m lazy as a cat now in my little place near the beach.

And hey, new files arrive every day. I crack open a fresh one and rub my hands together, ready to lose myself in every detail of this stranger’s life.

I’m not really a stalker. I’m not! It’s not like that.

Then again, isn’t that just what a stalker would tell herself? I’m not bad, I’m just misunderstood. No one thinks they’re the villain of their own story.

“Not true,” I mutter to myself. I’ve been the villain since I was five years old, an enfant terrible who helped destroy an entire family and ruin several careers. No one back home ever let me forget, and it sticks with me no matter how far I run.

Because once upon a time, as a small child, she was forcefully mixed up in a huge hulking lie that destroyed lives and made the news… BIG TIME. The lies became confusing and started to feel like real memories, and well… let’s just say that if you look her real name up, the whole scandal comes to light and she wants to be as far away from her old life as she can. She carries guilt, shame and a whole slew of pain that seems like it will never go away.

The next Satanic Panic is always right around the corner.

It comes in waves like that, like the devil can only be chased away for so long. In the sixties it was roving gangs of devil-worshipping hippies out for blood. Then came movies like Rosemary’s Baby and The Exorcist, ginning up a terror of demons in the seventies. There was the moral panic over D&D and metal rock in the early eighties. And then my time to shine arrived with a bang in 1991. Yeehaw.

Logically I know it wasn’t really my fault. I ruined several lives, but I was just a little girl. Granted, even when young, someone with more confidence and conviction might have resisted the draw of telling a story everyone demanded to hear, but still . . . I was a baby. It’s not that I think I did something unforgivable. It’s that everyone else did.

Choosing to live her adult life with lies and fake names to anyone and everyone she meets, allows her to live openly amongst the people around her (and not reclusively), while keeping her anonymity and when things start getting to close for comfort, she moves again.

Once I became a traveling nurse, I moved every few months, hopping from state to state, creating vignettes of life in each one. I got to meet new people, be part of a workplace, enjoy an unknown neighborhood, all while in a protective bubble of impermanence. That worked perfectly for me for almost fifteen years before I hopped into another supposedly short-term gig here in Santa Cruz.

It’s strange that I’ve been here for two years now. Scary, even. But so many people move through this town that I can create a hundred vignettes without ever leaving. Plus my shady Romanian landlord gives me a nice discount for the work I’ve done for him since I arrived.

It’s comforting to hold this place while everyone moves around me, a strange anchoring I’ve never felt before, a sense of belonging.

But now… she’s found the perfect town, near the perfect beach, in the sweetest apartment setup, and a strange but accommodating landlord, and well… she’s happy. she’s made friends amongst the happy routine of her day, nobody is too close to anyone else in her entourage and for the first time ever, she wants to stay.

Then she meets “Mike” , pretty much the perfect guy, and things start getting too close for comfort again. She wants to run.

His words cool my wariness into regret. It’s not his fault I hoard secrets like treasure. Mike seems like a decent guy, and he’s asking straightforward questions like a mature adult. He’d be a perfect catch for a woman who’s throwing out lines, but I’m very much not.

Especially when she realizes someone is after her. Stalking her. Scaring her. Pretending to BE her. Ruining her comfortable life while her lies and life become a jumbled mess that she’s now forced to unravel and reconsider.

I’m feeling violated. I purposefully don’t let people into my life, and now two people have invaded my carefully controlled world. I’ve relaxed too much in this place, let myself feel at home. Was staying here so long a mistake?

I fled Iowa seventeen years ago, and I’ve carried my life with me ever since like a turtle. A super-cool turtle, though. But I must have dropped too many hints on Reddit, breadcrumbs for someone to follow.

All while trying to stay alive and figure out who’s after her. She has her suspicions…

…for once, I have no intention of running away without a fight. Because who the hell could guess that was my username in the first place? And what other secrets do they know?

And that’s where I’ll leave you to experience the rest. WHO IS IT? AND WHY? I’ll never tell. 😉

It kept me guessing, but it’s not so jaw-droppingly clever that I’ll never forget it, ya know? But there is one part of the reveal that touched me deeply and helped me enjoy the reveal that much more.

So… I’m giving it 4 stars. <— It’s good. I loved the writing, enjoyed how I connected to her, and lived life through her eyes, I loved how I thought shows sort of a stalker in her own right (so good about her anonymity but loving to eavesdrop). But… I COULD put it down, it became repetitive at times, and I did NOT like the anti-cop rhetoric, but there it is. I’m married to one, so go figure, 😉

➔➔➔  Looking for more of my must-read recommendations? Browse my 5 star and 4.5 star and 4 star reviews. 😀

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