One of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus Review: A Gripping YA Whodunit Debut

One of Us Is Lying is a young adult mystery-suspense novel — Karen M. McManus's debut — originally published by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House, on May 30, 2017. (The edition most widely available now is a Delacorte Press reprint.) The premise is deceptively simple: five students — Bronwyn Rojas, Nate Macauley, Cooper Clay, Addy Prentiss, and Simon Kelleher — are sent to detention together. Simon, the creator of the school's gossip app, dies before the period ends, and the four survivors instantly become suspects. Each of them had something Simon was about to expose, and the novel rotates among their four points of view to unravel who — if anyone — among them is responsible.

LitCharts's study guide identifies the book's central thematic preoccupations as stereotypes and unlikely connections, gossip, secrets and lies, and what it frames as the particular pressures of adolescent life. The four protagonists — the brain, the criminal, the jock, and the beauty — begin the story as high-school archetypes and are pushed by the investigation into something more complicated than their labels suggest.

Few debut YA novels have landed with the breadth of recognition that One of Us Is Lying accumulated. It reached #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and was named one of the ten best books of the year by critical coverage. Among its many additional honors: a Best YA Book of the Year selection from Buzzfeed, a Best Books for Teens selection from the New York Public Library, a YALSA Top Ten Best Fiction Book nomination, a YALSA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers designation, a Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Book of the Century citation, a Goodreads Best Young Adult Book of the Year nomination, and a CBC Teen Choice Book Award nomination. The novel's reach extended beyond the page when it was adapted into a television series. McManus has since become, by Penguin Random House's description, a #1 New York Times, USA Today, and international bestselling author — with this debut as the foundation of that reputation.

One of the novel's most discussed design choices is its use of multiperspectivity. Rather than anchoring the reader with a single narrator, McManus cycles through the points of view of all four student suspects — Bronwyn, Nate, Cooper, and Addy — giving each their own interiority and secrets. This structure serves the mystery mechanics directly: because readers see the investigation from inside each suspect's head, the question of guilt remains genuinely open even as information accumulates. Entertainment Weekly's comparison to Pretty Little Liars and The Breakfast Club — surfaced by Penguin Random House's own marketing — captures the dual appeal: the social-ensemble dynamics of the latter and the sustained suspicion of the former. McManus, who holds an MA in journalism from Northeastern University, brings a reported craft to the book's construction of false headlines and gossip-media texture that grounds the high school setting in recognizable contemporary detail.

The same structural choice that powers the novel's suspense can create unevenness for some readers. With four distinct first-person perspectives cycling across a single plot, the novel must do substantial work to differentiate four voices while keeping each chapter's revelations proportionally weighted. Some readers accustomed to tighter, single-narrator mysteries may find the rotating format diffuses tension at certain junctures rather than building it. Additionally, the book's high-school social architecture — cliques, archetypes, reputation — is very deliberately deployed, and readers who prefer their fiction to move quickly past genre scaffolding into murkier psychological territory may find the setup leaning into familiar YA conventions before complicating them. These are structural trade-offs inherent to the design, not failures of execution, but they are real factors in whether a given reader connects with the book.

One of Us Is Lying is aimed at readers aged 14 and up, with a recommended grade range of 9–12, and it works particularly well for teenagers drawn to social drama, ensemble casts, and mystery plots where every character has something to hide. The designation as a YALSA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers signals that the novel's pacing and premise are accessible enough to engage readers who don't typically seek out fiction — a meaningful credential for a whodunit with 416 pages. For educators, librarians, and parents, the book is the first in a three-part series; it was followed by One of Us Is Next (2020) and One of Us Is Back (2023), meaning readers who connect with Bayview High have more to return to. It stands, however, as a complete mystery in its own right.