Beautiful Lies (Ridley Jones)

Very enjoyable thriller/romance with a unique storyline. You will enjoy the main character Ridley with all her flaws as she searches for answers to her past. Fast paced with bits of wisdom and that make you reflect on your own life.

Story: Ridley Jones is a freelance journalist, starting to build a good reputation in her field, and she had a generally happy childhood, growing up in a well-admired family. One day, as she is walking in downtown New York, she spots a momentarily unattended toddler stepping toward oncoming traffic. Ridley jumps in, saves the little boys, and a passer-by catches the entire thing on tape. Ridley gets her "fifteen minutes of fame" on all the local news broadcasts, and then returns to her quietly successful life. That is, until she receives a note and an old newspaper clipping in the mail, from someone who recognized her on television, and Ridley's entire identity is thrown into question. Ridley cannot ignore the possibility that everything she has always thought to be true, might just be a web of "beautiful lies." She digs and digs, to the dismay of her family and her one-time fiancee (and still best friend), Zack. Concurrent to this unfolding mystery, Ridley meets Jake, the handsome (in a "bad boy" way) new neighbor upstairs in her apartment building and, as they fall quickly in love, Jake helps her investigate her past. The more they look, the more they find, and most of it is not pretty. Who are Ridley's parents, really? Is her brother, Ace, really her brother? Who is Christian Luna, and why does he encounter a disastrous event, just as the truth might be revealed? What role did Ridley's "Uncle" Max play in her past? Just as Ridley is about to figure something out, new facts put everything back into question. And, is Jake the knight in shining armor he seems to be? Ridley also has to wrestle with the question of whether she wants to know the truth, and possible turn her world upside-down (and maybe get herself or loved ones incarcerated or killed), or listen to her family and to Jake, who want her to dismiss the whole "bizarre" possibility and return to her comfortable, successful life. I am reluctant to write more on the plot, as it would be difficult to do so, without ruining the mystery. My take: This is a complex, convoluted mystery, with credible, three-dimensional characters, and amazing, but still credible, twists and turns. Blind alleys suddenly develop doorways, and newfound promising doors lead nowhere. On several occasions, I thought that I had figured out at least part of the puzzle, but I was right only about one-quarter of the time (which seems to me to be just about the right percentage to turn a mystery into a hard-to-put-down mystery). This is a well-written page-turner of a mystery, that has more credibility, complexity, and literary quality than most mystery-thrillers on the market. A prime example of the writing quality is Ms. Unger's ability to use similes and metaphors to create mental images and establish the atmosphere of a scene. Some examples are: "A black man the size of a refrigerator sat sentry by the door, his tremendous girth completely enveloping the chair beneath him, making it look as though he were le

If there's anything better than discoving a really great first-time author, I don't know what it is. I LOVED Beautiful Lies. Basically, once I'd picked up the book, I just couldn't put it down until I'd finished it. The protagonist, Ridley, was so real. She told her story in the first person and addressed the reader directly. I swear, I could be friends with her. And the story she had to tell... It started so plausably and got so convoluted. But I was with her every step of the way. Unger made me buy a fairly far-fetched plot. But mostly, I just wanted to know what was going to happen. What HAD already happened to this girl. Here's how it begins: Ridley Jones is a successful freelance journalist in NY. She's a happy person with a loving family and a good life. One day a random act of heroism gets her photo splashed across the news for a week. In the wake of her brief celebrity, she receives a photograph in the mail. It's a photo of man she's never seen, a woman who bares a striking resemblance to her, and a two-year old girl who looks like she did as a baby--though she's never seen a photo of herself that young. The accompanying note says, "I think you're my daughter." Ridley is not adopted. The story aqccelerates at a break-neck pace from there. But aside from great characters, and a strong plot, this is an exceptionally well-written thriller. It's being billed as a "literary thriller," and I don't know that I'd go that far, but this novel is way above average. I can't wait to see what Lisa Unger writes next. I hope she writes fast!

I truly enjoyed this book. It wasn't necessarily about the story, although I was riveted, and compelled to turn pages to learn the outcome. Plain and simple, it was about the writing. Lisa Unger's style is refreshing and original. I felt like she, through the voice of her protagonist, was in the room with me, telling me this story. Beautiful Lies is a first-person account of a young woman named Ridley Jones, who contemplates a single act, and the events leading up to this act, that change her life forever. She became a momentary celebrity after saving a child from being hit by a car. Because her heroic and selfless deed was inadvertently videotaped, the world witnessed it on local and even national television, and her exposure enabled the truth of her identity to be exposed as well. Throughout the tale, Unger/Jones "talks" to her reader. "I know what you're thinking," she often writes. At first I found this a little annoying, but ultimately, I had to admit in each case, she did know what I was thinking. She had me that hooked. Throughout the story, she interjects little gems of wisdom regarding family dynamics where her parents and brother (her biological parents and biological brother???) are concerned, which had me nodding my head and saying "yes!" One of my favorite lines in the book is: "It's strange how memory gets twisted and pulled like taffy in its retelling, how a single event can mean something different to everyone present." Ultimately, the mysteries are revealed and all the characters--particularly the parents, the mysterious uncle, drug-addict brother, sexy man upstairs, ex-boyfriend and his mother, and the mob-linked laywer--are relevant and satisfying. This is a great, fast read and I recommend it for readers who appreciate good story telling and down to earth characters. Michele Cozzens, Author of A Line Between Friends and The Things I Wish I'd Said.

Ridley Jones is content with her life. "I have loved and been loved by my parents...I love my work, my friends, the place I live," she muses at the opening of BEAUTIFUL LIES. Happy with her East Village apartment, surrounded by a loving family, Ridley's only real trouble is her wayward older brother Ace, a drug addict who has been cut off from the rest of the family and who regularly disappears into the underbelly of Manhattan, reappearing only when he needs Ridley to give him money. All of Ridley's assumptions about her comfortable life evaporate in a second, though, when she achieves her 15 minutes of fame after saving the life of a small child. Instantly, her name and photo are plastered all over the city, even throughout the country. Ridley enjoys her brief fame, until she receives an alarming letter from someone claiming she's his daughter. When Ridley later receives a 1970s newspaper clipping featuring a photo of a murdered woman who looks just like Ridley herself, she isn't sure whom to believe. Ridley's questions to her parents are met with secrecy and defensiveness. Is it possible that Ridley's entire existence has been nothing but a series of beautiful lies? Soon enough, she is thrust into a full-blown mystery that may involve her whole family, her ex-fiance, and even the sexy new upstairs neighbor. On the run, unsure of whom she can trust, Ridley must use all her resources to delve into a past she never knew or even imagined. Readers will devour Lisa Unger's terrific debut work of fiction. An emotionally charged suspense novel with a likable heroine, this sexy thriller rockets like a racecar through the streets of Manhattan. New York City is actually a vibrant character in its own right, which uses real neighborhood locales to enhance its air of authenticity. The narrative's tone, with its second-person addresses to the reader and some philosophical musings that occasionally interrupt the action, may seem intrusive to some readers. The combination of truly enthralling plotting and emotional self-discovery, though, will draw in even the most reluctant readers, who certainly will label Unger as a new suspense author to watch. --- Reviewed by Norah Piehl

WOW!!! I predict a wonderful future for Lisa Unger's first novel, "Beautiful Lies." I forecast its presence on the NY Times Bestseller List for many a moon. However, unlike a number of successful bestselling novels, this one is well written. It also has a most original plot and a quirky, three dimensional protagonist, as well as realistic minor characters. And, oddly enough, there are no real villains in a story where bad things certainly happen. In the novel her main character, Ridley Jones, says/thinks "there are no heroes or villains in real life, 'only good and bad choices.' Our gal Ridley is a thirty-something freelance writer who does work for Vanity Fair, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, etc., so she is pretty successful. But rents are high in New York City and even successful freelancers are hard pressed at times to come up with the rent. Ridley does not have this problem. She inherited a healthy sum of money from her uncle, "who wasn't actually an uncle," but her father's best friend. He absolutely adored her. This money cushions her against potential poverty and allows her freedom from financial worries. And "freedom" is a concept of immense importance to her. Ridley's "fairly uneventful life" is turned upside down one morning...the morning she gains a bit more than her share of 15 minutes of fame. She sees a toddler about to be hit by a speeding truck and leaps into the street to save the boy. Fortuitously...or not, a photographer is on the scene and Ridley, in full action, appears on the cover of the local papers. The story is picked up by the morning talk shows where she and her family bask in the glory of her brief but bright spotlight. They have no idea what her moment of fame will bring her...like an envelope in the mail containing a note and an old photograph. The faded photo is of a young woman - who could be Ridley's double, a man and a little girl who resembles Ridley Jones as a little girl. The note includes a phone number and the question, "Are you my daughter?" Unhinged, our heroine seeks reassurance from her doting father, a successful pediatrician, and her mother, a controlling, uptight woman. They slough off the incident and tell her that some wacko is having a joke at her expense, insisting that they are her birth parents. Still uncertain, she looks for her older brother, a drug addict who lives on he streets, and when she finds him he makes some disturbing comments which fuel her confusion. Then she meets her handsome and mysterious new neighbor, Jake, a sculptor and a real hottie. Her life will never be the same. Set in Manhattan's East Village, just a few blocks from where I live, Ms. Unger really brings the neighborhood to life with her wonderful descriptive writing. "Beautiful Lies," a taut psychological thriller is 375 pages long and I read it in 2 sittings. It is truly UNPUTDOWNABLE!!! I can't recommend a book more highly than that! JANA