HerKentucky Whiskey Glass Rating: 🥃🥃🥃

Publisher’s synopsis: It’s 2 A.M. on a Saturday night in the spring of 2001, and twenty-eight-year-old Cecily Gardner sits alone in a dive bar in New York’s East Village, questioning her life. Feeling lonesome and homesick for the Midwest, she wonders if she’ll ever make it as a reporter in the big city—and whether she made a terrible mistake in breaking up with her longtime boyfriend, Matthew. 

As Cecily reaches for the phone to call him, she hears a guy on the barstool next to her say, “Don’t do it—you’ll regret it.” Something tells her to listen, and over the next several hours—and shots of tequila—the two forge an unlikely connection. That should be it, they both decide the next morning, as Cecily reminds herself of the perils of a rebound relationship. Moreover, their timing couldn’t be worse—Grant is preparing to quit his job and move overseas. Yet despite all their obstacles, they can’t seem to say goodbye, and for the first time in her carefully constructed life, Cecily follows her heart instead of her head.

 Then Grant disappears in the chaos of 9/11. Fearing the worst, Cecily spots his face on a missing-person poster, and realizes she is not the only one searching for him. Her investigative reporting instincts kick into action as she vows to discover the truth. But the questions pile up fast: How well did she really know Grant? Did he ever really love her? And is it possible to love a man who wasn’t who heseemed to be? 

The Lies That Bind is a mesmerizing and emotionally resonant exploration of the never-ending search for love and truth—in our relationships, our careers, and deep within our own hearts.

HerKentucky Review: Nearly every Emily Giffin novel can be summed up in two sentences: Midwestern girl winds up in big city circumstances that are more lavish than her wildest dreams. She acts from insecurity and hubris, making an impetuous decision that nearly costs her everything. Ms. Giffin’s The Lies that Bind, applies that basic plot to the story of 28 year-old Cecily, a Wisconsin native and would-be journalist, who feels an instant connection to Grant, whom she meets in the spring of 2001. They begin an intense affair, and then he totally vanishes after the 9/11 attacks.

Emily Giffin is known for writing novels about complex moral issues. Her characters make questionable decisions, and you either really root for them, or you don’t. In some (Something Borrowed and Something Blue), that technique really works for me. In others (Love the One You’re With and Baby Proof), the characters are so flawed that I kind of hated them and the decisions they made.

In The Lies that Bind, I found the female protagonist to be somewhat willfully obtuse. Her decisions were knowingly shortsighted and selfish. And, yet, I couldn’t put the book down. I felt the nostalgia pull so strongly in this one. I was 25 on September 11th, working at a job that made me miserable and dealing with dating drama and never having enough money. I hated the stupid decisions Cecily made, but I so strongly recalled my own life at that point. Ms. Giffin really transported me to my own life decisions at the time. Enjoy this one with a Sex-and-the-City era Cosmo and a Christina Aguilera playlist, and remember how you didn’t always make the best dating decisions 20 years ago.

Purchase The Lies that Bind on Amazon or Bookshop.org.

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