“Though it was the end of summer, the heat still waited outside front doors along with morning newspaper, both boding ill.”

From Ayelet Gundar-Goshen’s The Liar.

Seventeen-year-old Nofar is getting ready to start her last year of school after another disappointing summer in her overall disappointing life.  Her summer job at an ice cream parlor in the city was supposed to be her chance for something amazing to happen, for boys to notice her, and for something to help her match her perfect, beautiful younger sister, Maya.  Lavi is a young, scrawny boy that lives above the ice cream parlor where Nofar works, and he spends his time waiting until the fighting at the border quiets down enough for his suicide to make the front page of the papers.  When Avishai Milner, a washed-up singing competition winner rudely yells at Nofar and then grabs her wrist after she runs out into the alley crying, Nofar screams and changes her whole life.  As people make assumptions about why she screamed, Nofar goes along with them, first without realizing it and then intentionally adding to the lie that Avishai did more to her than just yell.  While Nofar and Avishai know the truth because they were there, Lavi also figures out that the young girl is lying, so he blackmails her into lying in an interview to make him seem like a hero, and then ultimately into dating him.  What started out as a lie from a shocked misunderstanding soon pushes Nofar into the nation’s spotlight, which leaves her caught between her lie’s countless unforeseen consequences.

Gundar-Goshen uses an interesting type of imagery throughout the book, which manages to be both amazingly captivating at times while also confusing to the story at many other times.  Parts of the book seem clunky because of the cultural differences of the author and settings to the reader.  The Liar is an interesting story that highlights the struggle between telling the truth or living the lie.