None of This is True
Lisa Jewell
4.5 stars
Format: Hardcover
Edited on July 23, 2024
If nothing else, trust your instincts. Alix dismissed hers. And look where it got her.
Lisa Jewell has delivered an un-put-downable and scintillating page-turner in her latest thriller None of This is True. To celebrate her forty-fifth birthday, Josie Fair goes to a pub with her husband and observes another woman dining, also celebrating her forty-fifth birthday. Josie introduces herself to Alix Summer, her birthday twin, and they share a laugh over the coincidence. Alix is a popular podcaster with an Instagram-worthy life and Josie is a denim-clad seamstress with a husband twenty-six years her senior. A few days later they encounter one another again, and this time Josie proposes a most intriguing idea.
“Hi! I’m Your Birthday Twin!” is a new podcast by Alix Summer where she unfolds Josie’s life story layer by shocking layer as Josie embarks on a new beginning. However, as Josie’s secrets become darker and Josie begins consuming Alix’s own life, Alix finds herself a part of her own true-crime story.
The novel is punctuated by excerpts from a Netflix docuseries detailing the ashes Josie left in her destruction. The reader is able to sneak a peek into bits of the future, then catch up in the story. With how often Netflix actually makes true crime docuseries based on sensational stories, including one here felt modern and original. I do wonder how this story will be read in twenty or thirty years? Will it seem dated because of the docuseries angle? For today’s reader, it was a fun plot driver that compels you to keep reading.
I inhaled None of This is True. It reads quickly, the pace never lags, and I did not know in which direction the story would go. The only other Lisa Jewell book I have read is Then She Was Gone, which was so twisted I was prepared for anything. I know what Jewell is capable of!
None of This is True would be a five-star review if only the ending were different. It was deranged, but felt unfinished. A handful of earlier statements and questions went unanswered but Jewell had my attention, she could have put me through another fifty pages and I’d happily oblige. Without giving away spoilers, some ending scenes could have been elaborated and secondary characters could have been given more background. The story is told from both Alix and Josie’s points of view but everyone else felt just out of reach from understanding. I updated this review from four stars to four-and-a-half stars after Lisa Jewell responded to my Instagram DM with closure. It was the context I needed!
A perfect choice for book club, None of This is True will beg the reader to ask, what actually is the real story? Who are the victims? Do some characters get what’s coming to them? Seeds of doubt are planted throughout the novel and at the end, you’re left questioning the facts.
