Not my usual reading fare, but my daughter is a massive fan, so getting an ARC for her, and seeing what she liked for me, made sense.

None of This is True begins (framing device apart) with two women, previously unknown to each other, celebrating their 45th birthday on the same day in a Queen's Park gastropub:

- Alix, a semi-successful podcaster, well-off and married to a city businessman, there with a large group of friends

- Josie, unassuming and there with her much older (he's over 70) husband, both rather fishes-out-of-water in the environment (in a nice detail, Josie looks up the menu beforehand and googles many of the ingredients)

The two meet in the toilets and realise they are "birthday twins", even born on the same hospital ward, and Josie suggests that Alix tells her story on her podcast.

That this will all end very badly indeed (and end in multiple deaths) is foreshadowed early on in one of the novel's key framing devices - that the whole thing has been made into a Netflix true-crime series, with scenes from the story re-enacted over audio from Alix's podcast and interviews with others involved.

Jewell can certainly write, and the first 2/3rds of this kept me racing through the pages as, as the novel's title suggests, Alix, and the reader, wrestle with how much of Josie's surprisingly dramatic life story is true, as well as her gradual intrusion into Alix's own life.

On the -ve side, the revelations / wrapping up in the last third was a little anti-climatic, particularly given the book's opening already sets up the drama. And it also felt the resolution backed away from one of the challenges posed by Josie to Alix, whether her marriage was really any more functional than Josie's and whether Josie was actually doing her a favour.

Jewell makes an interesting narrative choice that, framing device apart, the story is narrated from alternating close third-person perspectives between Alix and Josie. For Alix this makes sense, but given Josie appears to be hiding a lot, it raises the question of what exactly we are reading as the close third-person narrator seems equally fooled at times - although in a neat coda to the novel Jewell does suggest an answer, while leaving the reader with more questions.

Overall - although not my usual style of book, I was relatively impressed.

Thanks to the publisher via Netgalley for the ARC.

Lisa Jewell always with amazing surprises.
I love this book so much, Can't wait Netflix series 🙃
WOW!!!!! Hooked from the first page and read this book in one sitting… Full of tension and suspense. A real page turner, a domestic noir but OMG so much more!!!!!

How does Lisa Jewell do it? Each one of her psych thrillers is more compelling than the last. Once I started reading this I just couldn’t stop - and now I’ve finished it in a day and am bereft. None of This is True is gripping, twisty, heartbreaking and truly terrifying. The podcast format is brilliantly executed and if it hasn’t happened already, I’m sure Netflix will snap up the rights. Bravo!

Oh. My. Word.

Only Lisa Jewell can bring you a book which absolutely terrifies you but you also can’t stop reading.

I read this in two evenings flat, it was unputdownable. But please do not read this with the lights off or when you are alone, it is heart thumpingly good, very disturbing indeed.

When Josie is out celebrating her 45th birthday with her husband, she sees a table next to hers also celebrating the 45th birthday of Alix, a successful podcaster. When Alix starts to work with Josie to document her life through a podcast, it starts a chain of events with far-reaching consequences.

If you loved ‘The Family Upstairs’, you are in for a treat with this, it is very dark and totally unexpected.

Probably my book of the year! Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the arc in exchange for my honest review.

Wow what a psychological thriller this book is. A family with so many problems and how they play out.
A famous pod caster who is drawn in without knowing it and how it affects her family.
The last famous twist to the story to finish it.
A great book from start to finish.

This is bloody brilliant!

It’s so intensely creepy, I love it.

We start to get hints that all may not be as it seems early on but it is so well paced. I especially like the almost dual narrative with the Netflix interjections!

I was approved for this book on Thursday evening and I’ve just finished it this morning (Saturday) - talk about a page turner! Every time I read one of Lisa Jewell’s books I think they can’t possibly get any more gripping … but then they do! The things I found that make this one particularly gripping and unique are the format (if you like true crime documentaries and podcasts like me🙋‍♀️, this is 100% the one for you) - her writing style makes it so easy to visualise exactly what this book would look like were it on screen, I actually want to watch it now! (And I’m sure at one point I actually started believing the characters were real 😂.) Also, the level of doubt that is constantly fed to the reader (as is often the case with the consumer of TC docs) so that you never know what really happened. I’d love to know if Lisa herself really does know the true story here! This was an incredible read, one of my faves of her thrillers (so far!).

Well I genuinely don't know where to start, Lisa jewell has done it again, a gritty story with great characters all brought together to a satisfying conclusion, took me two days to read this and kept me reading well in to the night, I'm actually quite upset it's over

Well. Well! This is a cracker of a book, I have struggled recently to find books that make me want to stay up late at night devouring every word but this one, this one I could not put down! Creepy and intriguing in equal measures. Josie is a strange character and you are desperate to understand her and find out what she’s done right from the start, and you just know she’s not as innocent as she seems. The format of a podcast interspersed with extracts from a documentary alongside first person narrative works so well to keep the pace going. They’re a lovely little twist at the end as well! Read it, Lisa Jewell at her best!

After binge-reading The Family Upstairs and The Family Remains at Christmas and having throughly enjoyed every minute, as well as reading several books previously by this author, it was safe to say that I was very excited to receive an advanced copy of her latest title.

‘None Of This Is True’ sees two women, Alix and Josie, celebrating their 45th birthdays on the same day in the same restaurant. They are birthday twins. Their chance meeting is just that until a few days later, after Josie has listened to all of the famous podcasts that Alix has produced, another meeting outside Alix’s children school, sees the two women discuss a new podcast topic. Although wary of this mysterious stranger, Alix can’t resist the thrill of a good story and welcomes Josie into her life, an action that will cost her dearly…

Lisa Jewell has done it again, her writing style draws you in from the very first sentence, you know from that point in that you should just wave goodbye to your life until you have finished the book! It’s another masterpiece, setting the scene with the detailed descriptions of both characters lives, little elements drip fed through the chapters giving you clues as to the truth but never quite giving it away, which is succeeds in doing right up to the ending, one I wasn’t expecting to be honest but I should’ve known better with Lisa’s twists! It’s going to be one of those books that stays with me and that I keep thinking about, highly recommend and well done Lisa on another blockbuster read!

I’m normally impressed by Lisa Jewell and I was again.

Told as story that has become a Netflix show and a podcast, Josie meets Alix at her birthday dinner, Alix is also celebrating her birthday, it turns out they are both 45, and both born in the same hospital. Birthday twins.

Josie is confusing and needy and complex, Alix isn’t sure but thinks Josie would make a great interview subject for her podcast.

This book is packed, it has carefully written relationship troubles, shocking pasts, lies and death. It is a quick read probably due to my inability to put it down.

It’s a clever book and it is well crafted.

A Sea Of Red Herrings..
A forty-fifth birthday celebration in a local gastro pub brings together ‘birthday twins’ Alex and Josie - from there things begin to go rapidly downhill. Amidst a sea of red herrings, much misdirection and an unravelling of lives the game begins and continues in earnest. The insertion of the Netflix documentary adds another dimension to an already immersive storyline and a plot where characters are deftly drawn and often complex. A stunning psychological suspense where absolutely nothing is as it seems and nobody is as they seem - so, perhaps, none of this is true.

Absolutely brilliant. Lisa Jewell always is, and I've read every single one of her books, but I do feel this one is another step up. 5 big stars.

An absolute page-turner that had me reading late into the night (and early hours of the morning).
Lisa Jewell takes a deliciously dark turn down a twisty, narrow rabbit-hole with this one!
Alix and Josie are 'birthday twins' - born on the same day, in the same year, even at the same hospital. But their lives are very different and Josie is drawn like a magnet to Alix's life that seems to be the polar opposite to her own.
She finds a way to inveigle her way into Alix's world, believing that this will be her ticket to happiness and a way out of her humdrum, dull, sometimes problematic life. Alix welcomes Josie tentatively at first, but quickly becomes the welcoming, sympathetic friend who she believes Josie is so desperately seeking.
But thinks aren't what they seem.
I think Lisa Jewell has upped her own ante with this one!!!

OH 👏 MY 👏 GOSH 👏 Seriously! This book was literally EVERYTHING 😍

Thank you so much @netgalley for this arc, you have no idea how excited I was to get access to this book!

It's been a while since I've had the courage to read @lisajewelluk's books again, and this was the perfect novel to start with.

My love of mystery is always fed when I prop open one of her books, and this one was the best by far! The plot was super different from what she normally writes about, and I didn't hate it. It was super creepy, gave me chills to the point I had to stop reading for a while even though I never wanted to stop reading.

I tried to hold off from finishing as long as I could, but I just couldn't take the suspense anymore 😭 Part 4 was a real brain f***k for me because I was literally thrown off from what I originally thought was happening.

I'm still so impressed by this story, and will be recommending this book 1000% to anyone who is looking for a serious rollercoaster thriller read.

The queen of suspense has done it again! It is undisputed that Lisa Jewell is one of the best writers in the psychological thriller genre. None of this True had me completely hooked through and through. Dark, delicious and devious.
This opens with a prologue. We follow a drunk man stumbling out of a hotel. Then we get a snippet from an article about an upcoming Netflix true crime documentary based on the deaths of three people. Their identities are unknown and forms intrigue immediately. Then we go back in time and meet Joise and Alix. This is a dual narrative book written in first person. The story opens with two women meeting in an upscale Gastropub to celebrate their birthday in Queen’s Park. Josie finds herself drawn to Alix and following a short conversation in the bathroom discovers her podcast and decided to become her boyfriend subject in a new series. Slowly, slowly we start to learn that Josie is not quite as normal as it seemed…
With excerpts from the Netflix documentary this was fast paced, gripping read. The characters were intriguing and I loved the setting of Salusbury road, incidentally where I grew up. Josie is such a complicated and a dark character. I wasn’t sure what to make of her. I devoured this in one day. I do wish however that the ending had been wrapped more neatly as I felt I had some questions and not enough answers. Regardless I did inhale this one and found is creepy and compelling.

None of this is true by Lisa Jewell

Pub Date:
Publisher:Random House UK, Cornerstone,
Genre :

Thanks to Random House UK, Cornerstone, and NetGalley for my copy.

Josie and Alix Summer are birthday twins. Alix has no idea what a devastating impact the seemingly harmless Josie will have on her life.

The portrayal of Josie is excellent. On the surface, she appears unassuming, always dressed in denim and carrying her small dog. The truth is that she is extremely devious and manipulative, and she has a lot of problems.
The other characters are well-developed as well, and there aren't too many of them. The focus is on Josie and Alix's relationship.

The book's format is interesting and provides snippets of information, allowing you to piece together what's going on. There are sections set in 2019, when Josie and Alix first meet, as well as podcast transcripts and the subsequent Netflix documentary.Trying to figure out what the truth is is a real page turner. You will not be let down.

Firstly, I need to collect my jaw from the floor because WHAT have I just read ??!?

The book follows Alix who runs a popular podcast when she runs into Josie a woman claiming she’s on the brink of ‘changing her life’. Throughout the book we learn more about Josie’s life and events leading up to the present time when Alix soon finds herself immersed in her own true crime podcast.

I couldn’t get enough of this book - it is a gripping, page turner that had me immersed from beginning to end. I was so caught up in the characters and the story that will leave me thinking about this book for months after I’ve read it.

Excellent story from Lisa Jewell. Very engaging and the twists and turns keep you guessing.

Highly recommended

This is one of the best books by Lisa Jewell I've read. I literally could not put it down and used every spare moment to indulge in the psychological drama playing out in front of my eyes. It felt like I was binging a Netflix series instead of reading a book.

In short, the book is about a journalist who finds herself the subject of her own popular true crime podcast. Popular podcaster Alix Summers crosses paths with an unassuming woman called Josie Fair while celebrating her 45th birthday. Josie, it turns out, is also celebrating her forty-fifth birthday. They come across several similarities and joke they are birthday twins.

A few days later, Alix and Josie bump into each other again, this time outside Alix’s children’s school. Josie has been listening to Alix’s podcasts and thinks she might be an interesting subject for her series. She is, she tells Alix, on the cusp of great changes in her life.

Josie’s life appears to be strange and complicated, and although Alix finds her unsettling, she can’t quite resist the temptation to keep making the podcast. Slowly she starts to realise that Josie has been hiding some very dark secrets, and before she knows it, Josie has tangled her way into Alix’s life—and into her home.

But, as quickly as she arrived, Josie disappears. Only then does Alix discover that Josie has left a terrible and terrifying legacy in her wake, and that Alix has become the subject of her own true crime podcast, with her life and her family’s lives under mortal threat.

Who is Josie Fair? And what has she done?

To get to the answers you find you cannot turn the pages fast enough. I was captivated by the main characters and weirdly enough identified with both of them. Expect lots of twists and turns, even to the very last pages when you think nothing can surprise you anymore. Absolutely loved this book. Highly recommended to fans of mystery fiction.