Vanity Fair’s Little Gold Men podcast discusses American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Martin Sherwin and Kai Birdand asks: “ Should You Read the Book First?” Toronto author Shari Lapena is rapidly becoming an international phenomenon with her gripping stories of nice people in pretty neighbourhoods all gone bad. Everyone Here is Lying is the best of her seven works. It begins with a bang and ends with a twist no one will guess. In between, there are clues, lies, intrigue and a lot of well-drawn characters doing nasty things…Lapena doesn’t get a paragraph wrong here and she’s unrelenting in her conflicted characters.” Want to get the latest book news delivered to your inbox each day? Sign up for our daily Book Pulse newsletter. Big Books of the Week The coroner says that it looks like Marion died after hitting her head on the post of the staircase, but she can’t be sure. She’s calling the cause of death “undermined” rather than accidental. There was a whole side plot with Nora’s husband thinking about killing her, but he didn’t do anything. They just hated each other.

A smart, unguessable mystery set among a cast of satisfyingly flawed characters. Shari Lapena is an auto-buy for me - I always know I'll be in for a treat!” Someone We Know is a tour de force of thriller writing. Shari Lapena proves yet again that she is the mistress of the pacy plot, cliff edge tension and menacing suburban claustrophobia. Fans will be delighted and if you haven't read her books yet, then why on earth not?"

You can always rely on Shari Lapena to deliver a suspenseful, tightly woven domestic thriller and Everyone Here Is Lying doesn’t disappoint…” Shari Lapena is the undisputed queen of dysfunctional families, and Everyone Here Is Lying is a triumph.” I inhaled Everyone Here Is Lying. The pace never flags, the twists are fiendishly clever, and the writing is as perfect as can be.' Liz Nugent

William Wooler, a trusted doctor and loving family man, has been having an affair with his neighbor, Nora Blanchard. Every Tuesday, the two of them sneak away from their busy lives and meet up at the local motel for an illicit rendezvous. But this week, Nora abruptly announces that they need to stop. It’s not fair to their families and she just can’t keep carrying on with the relationship. In an act of resistance towards her husband’s exploitation, Rui eats a bowl of seeds that sprout from her body. The Forest Brims Over is a surreal unfolding of a marriage exploring how gender affects our relationships with others and ourselves.”— Andrew King, Secret Garden Bookshop, Seattle, WAAnd what an end it was. It's quite coy, winking at the reader and implying a certain conclusion. Usually I don't mind using my own imagination to fill in the blanks, but in this case, I wanted that certainty. I wish there had been one more chapter to spell it all out so I could get the satisfaction of seeing the villain get what they deserve. But that's a pretty small quibble overall.