I've read all of McManus' books and this is my favorite since The Cousins! A compulsive read with twists and turn.

The characters were really great - especially Liam & Augustus. I thought the end of the mystery was a little muddled, but I still enjoyed spending time with the characters.

It took me a few times to get the premise, but once I did I was hooked. This was a super fun, thrilling, and suspenseful adventure that kept me on my toes the entire course of the novel. It was definitely a page turner and I was so excited to see how it all turned out, who was after Kat and Liam and if they made it out alive! Highly recommend. The young YA crowd will eat this up!

The writing is easy to read, and the pacing is solid and snappy. I stopped after chapter 1 (3%). Seems like an easy three to four stars, with five for the right readers.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children’s for the ARC.

Long time fan of Karen McManus. This is definitely new territory for her (the heist genre), and she once again did good. I finally guessed right on who was behind it all (Karen is very good about red herrings).

Overall, good read.

This was such a good book! I absolutely flew through this book. The characters were so interesting and I absolutely loved where the author took this story. I will be recommending this book to all my family and friends.

Okay, I'll say it. This is NOT another of the Liars books, even though it had liars in the title. That was a bit disappointing.

This book focuses on Kat and her mom, Jamie. Jamie is involved with someone who fakes expensive jewelry, then tries to replace the real stuff with look-alike fakes. The person she works with is quite good too, so she is sent on assignment to swap necklaces at the birthday party for a rich family. And of course things go wrong.

I think my students will like this book. I found it hard to get into and didn't find the characters relatable. And then the ending just wasn't for me.

I received a free eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is a fun teenaged heist. After not being able to get through One of Us is Back (no matter how many summaries I read, I just could NOT keep the details from the previous books inside my brain! Nor could I keep any of the characters straight), I’ve realized that I like McMannus’s standalones a lot better. The Cousins was really fun, and this is too.

Kat’s mother is a jewel thief, but she’s ready to go straight. But first…one last job (isn’t there always?). When she was four, they fled Kat’s horribly abusive father, and minus a quickie 48-hour marriage in Vegas when Kat was 5, it’s been just the two of them ever since. That quickie marriage will become important, because the second narrator is none other than Kat’s “Vegas step brother” Liam. He and his father Luke are also headed to the Sutherland compound - Kat’s mother Jamie is going to “work” the event (but really steal a multimillion dollar necklace and replace it with a fake), and Liam’s father Luke is hoping to get closer to his girlfriend’s family. Said girlfriend Annaliese, is of course the owner of that fancy necklace. Kat wasn’t supposed to tag along on the trip, but she cons her way into it (telling her mom she’s staying with a friend, and then when her mom is about to drop her off, admitting that friend is actually out of town). When they arrive, Jamie is immediately violently ill, so Kat ends up having to pretend to be her mother and take the lunch service shift. She has a hard time flying under the radar (there’s a whole comedy of errors where this fancy ring that somehow ended up in her suitcase gets stuck on her finger, so she’s serving with this SUPER expensive piece of jewelry, which of course draws a lot of attention). Jamie still isn’t better by dinner service, which means Kat may have to do the thieving and swapping herself. There’s only one problem - the necklace disappeared during the lunch service.

On Liam’s end, after his parents’ divorce (and his father’s ill-advised quickie Vegas marriage), he lived with his mother until she died several months earlier. Seeing as he’s not yet 18, Liam is forced to move back in with his father. Dad seems to have no real job or source of income other than scamming gullible women he meets online. Liam tries to put a stop to as much of the nonsense as he can, but then Luke lands Annaliese, and Liam is convinced this is yet another con his dad is running. He’s technically invited along for the Sutherland birthday bash, but he’s mostly hoping to keep dad in check, as Annaliese seems like a perfectly nice if gullible rich lady.

The Sutherlands of course come with Roy family levels of drama, and there was definitely a point when (like in Kit Frick’s The Reunion) I wished this story were about the adults instead of the teens. But again, that’s not the story that’s being told here (given all that unfolds, it does ultimately make more sense to have Kat/Liam be the narrators). On the night of the big birthday party, one of the Sutherlands ends up dead. Kat is the only witness (not that anyone knows that), but she didn’t get a good enough look at the guy - it was dark. And it seems like someone is definitely trying to keep her quiet. She’s not sure if she can trust the stepbrother she had for all of 48 hours (and hasn’t seen or spoken to since), but he may be her only hope for getting out of the weekend alive.

I’ve been reading a lot about the state of YA recently, and it’s intriguing to me. Apparently so many adults read YA these days, that a lot of the YA that’s coming out is starting to feel more like it’s geared towards adults than kids. I find that fascinating, as I feel (and I’ve had conversations with friends who feel the same way) like I may have finally “outgrown” my love of YA, as I don’t have the patience I used to for teenage “stuff.” I don’t really have a point here, just that…it’s interesting. These characters were entertaining to read about, and they did mostly feel like teenagers (Liam more so than Kat, given that she’s had to grow up pretty quickly). Kat’s pretty singularly focused on heisty stuff, while Liam does spend a fair amount of time mooning over Augustus, Annaliese’s cute nephew. It’s a fun, quick read, and I can definitely see it being popular when it comes out this summer.

Starting the year with Karen McManus was a stellar plan!
Such Charming Liars follows Kat and Liam as they navigate through an incredibly awkward family gathering filled with secrets, a jewelry heist, and murder. Each of them has their own family secrets to protect which complicate matters even further as they race to find out who the killer is and if he’s after them now.

I always enjoy McManus’s writing- she creates engaging tales that generally keep me guessing who all the key players are.

This is another solid story by Karen McManus that needs to be on my classroom library shelf. Five stars!!

This was okay. My problem with this book comes down to personal preference: I'm not a huge fan of heist stories. I loved McManus' high school murder stuff much more. Oh well! The characters in this one were pretty cool, though. I could recommend this to younger readers.

This is classic McManus, with just the right amount of twists to follow throughout the story. However, I especially appreciated the "found family", friendship, and ways we bond together that adds a more human element, rather than just the dramatic suspense. Excellent read & great addition to any HS library.

I usually tear through Karen McManus's books, but this one really dragged on for me. I think heist-y stories just aren't my favorite, but I found this pretty boring overall.

This is her best yet - a perfect mix of old- fashioned heist novel and YA mystery. Bonus: The characters are, actually, charming.

I really wanted to like this one - I tend to go back and forth with McManus titles, but this one felt new and different from most of her topics (in a good way) with well-written and likable characters. The heist-trope of this one was new and exciting! I couldn't put it down for the first third of the novel or so, but then the plot kind of dragged on from there. The murder was a good twist, but felt predictable once it was revealed who was behind everything. It's possible I'm being overly picky, but I'd still recommend this to my middle schoolers, especially those who love her other work. While this one fell flat for me, it won't stop me from reading more of her works - I've read everything by McManus and can't resist anytime a new work is dropped. Thanks so much for the ARC!

A twisty, dark thriller about con artists and family from Karen M. McManus, author of One of Us is Lying.. When Kat's mother Jamie reluctantly let her accompany her on her last heist, it seems like they will start a new life with their past in the rearview mirror. But when they get to the Sutherland compound to do their last job-nothing goes according to plan. Including her mother's ex-husband and stepbrother Liam being there. After someone dies, Kat and Liam realize that someone may be after them, and trusting anyone else might be a deadly mistake.

Thanks to Netgalley for my ARC. At first, I thought it was going to be heist story (kinda like Ocean's 11) & I was really into it. BUT then I hit the murder and it all just seemed to easy to figure out.

I love a good YA novel, good plot, nothing heavy or too romantic. Unless you have suspended beliefs, this one is a little too far fetched and unbelievable for me.

I don't know what's more unbelievable, a teenager helping her (incapacitated) mom with a jewelry heist, her former step dad showing up bc he's already conning the mark, her incarcerated father showing up, or the lengths someone would go to go cover their own butt.

I know, I know, it's fiction, it's not supposed to be completely believable.. but hear me out.. having all the toppings on your I've cream doesn't make it better, it makes it confusing and hard to digest.

Now, thank goodness that the author has a great writing style, that's easy to get into and easy to enjoy. I have read a few of her books, but this one was just too much for me

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This author never disappoints, and this book is no exception. As fast paced, and as engaging as all of her other books, this book takes us on a jewelry heist, gone so very wrong with so many twists and turns it is impossible to know what is coming next! Kat has a pass that she would rather forget and she and her mother have spent a lot of time trying to outrun the bad things that have happened to them, they both think that they’re finally going to be free after just one more job, but it’s never that easy. All of the characters in this book are likable for different reasons, except, of course, for the ones that you shouldn’t like lol. I loved all of their relationships and spent the majority of the time just wanting them all to win and to have happiness that I thought they deserved. I read this book in a day it was fantastic and I can’t wait to bring it into my classroom..