Broken Things

Lauren Oliver

Oct 2018 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this ebook

With all the intensity and whiplash turns of Sharp Objects and One of Us Is Lying, this engrossing psychological thriller by New York Times bestselling author Lauren Oliver is an unforgettable, mesmerizing tale of exquisite obsession, spoiled innocence, and impossible friendships.

It’s been five years since Summer Marks was brutally murdered in the woods.

Everyone thinks Mia and Brynn killed their best friend. That driven by their obsession with a novel called The Way into Lovelorn the three girls had imagined themselves into the magical world where their fantasies became twisted, even deadly.

The only thing is: they didn’t do it.

On the anniversary of Summer’s death, a seemingly insignificant discovery resurrects the mystery and pulls Mia and Brynn back together once again. But as the lines begin to blur between past and present and fiction and reality, the girls must confront what really happened in the woods all those years ago—no matter how monstrous.

Ratings and reviews

Broken Things, while a good murder mystery, struggles to maintain the atmosphere that you would expect. It is not a thriller by any means, and more like the resolution of a mystery so that the main characters can move on with their lives. The story opens five years in the aftermath of Summer’s murder, which her best friends Mia and Brynn were blamed for, but nobody had evidence so the people at large just settle for harassing the girls and bullying them. The murder and everything that came after altered their lives immensely – Brynn pretends to be an addict so that she can stay in rehab centers and not move about in society, while Mia withdraws further into herself at home, ignoring even the fact that her mother is obsessively hoarding things. When Mia finds a clue while cleaning out her house, that suggests that someone other than the three of them knew the details of the fanfic they were writing (which was also how the murder was committed – word for word as in their story), she seeks out Brynn and later on, Owen (Summer’s ex and her crush/best friend) to finally figure out the murderer of the now cold case. Tagging along is Abby, Mia’s new best friend, and Brynn’s cousin Wade, the latter well-versed with the details of the case. The group thus, chases down leads, even going so far as on a short road trip to recover the original fanfic, and asking questions of townspeople who knew Summer. There are obviously red herrings, but the reveal was unpredictable – and a little sickening, if I may add. The focus of the book is the broken relationships between the characters and them mending it now, 5 years later. Intermittent ‘THEN’ chapters give us glimpses into the dynamic between the three girls, how Summer dominated them, how Brynn was in love with summer, how Mia felt like a third wheel, and how they found a home together in something they shared. Their friendship is as complicated as the girls who had them, and it mirrors the girls of the original book. As for Lovelorn, there are some ‘excerpts’ from the original story and their fanfic, to give an idea of what drew their love for it, as well as how they interpreted things. The mystery is, however, mostly felt as a background thing – like it is moving their story along but not really the main plot. It failed to engage me into it, or get me really invested in the characters and it maybe because I expected something else from the cover and synopsis. Nevertheless, it is an interesting mystery, beautifully written and with brilliant characterization. Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review from Harper Collins, via Edelweiss.

Good

About the author

Lauren Oliver is the cofounder of media and content development company Glasstown Entertainment, where she serves as the President of Production. She is also the New York Times bestselling author of the YA novels Replica, Vanishing Girls, Panic, and the Delirium trilogy: Delirium, Pandemonium, and Requiem, which have been translated into more than thirty languages. The film rights to both Replica and Lauren's bestselling first novel, Before I Fall, were acquired by Awesomeness Films. Before I Fall was adapted into a major motion picture starring Zoey Deutch. It debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2017, garnering a wide release from Open Road Films that year.Oliver is a 2012 E. B. White Read-Aloud Award nominee for her middle-grade novel Liesl & Po, as well as author of the middle-grade fantasy novel The Spindlers and The Curiosity House series, co-written with H.C. Chester. She has written one novel for adults, Rooms.Oliver co-founded Glasstown Entertainment with poet and author Lexa Hillyer. Since 2010, the company has developed and sold more than fifty-five novels for adults, young adults, and middle-grade readers. Some of its recent titles include the New York Times bestseller Everless, by Sara Holland; the critically acclaimed Bonfire, authored by the actress Krysten Ritter; and The Hunger by Alma Katsu, which received multiple starred reviews and was praised by Stephen King as “disturbing, hard to put down” and “not recommended…after dark.” Oliver is a narrative consultant for Illumination Entertainment and is writing features and TV shows for a number of production companies and studios.Oliver received an academic scholarship to the University of Chicago, where she was elected Phi Beta Kappa. She received a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from New York University.www.laurenoliverbooks.com.