Review: Dark and Shallow Lies by Ginny Myers Sain

A teen girl disappears from her small town deep in the bayou, where magic festers beneath the surface of the swamp like water rot, in this chilling debut supernatural thriller for fans of Natasha Preston, Karen McManus, and Rory Power.

La Cachette, Louisiana, is the worst place to be if you have something to hide.

This tiny town, where seventeen-year-old Grey spends her summers, is the self-proclaimed Psychic Capital of the World–and the place where Elora Pellerin, Grey’s best friend, disappeared six months earlier.

Grey can’t believe that Elora vanished into thin air any more than she can believe that nobody in a town full of psychicsknows what happened. But as she digs into the night that Elora went missing, she begins to realize that everybody in town is hiding something –her grandmother Honey; her childhood crush Hart; and even her late mother, whose secrets continue to call to Grey from beyond the grave.

When a mysterious stranger emerges from the bayou –a stormy-eyed boy with links to Elora and the town’s bloody history –Grey realizes that La Cachette’s past is far more present and dangerous than she’d ever understood. Suddenly, she doesn’t know who she can trust. In a town where secrets lurk just below the surface, and where a murderer is on the loose, nobody can be presumed innocent–and La Cachette’s dark and shallow lies may just rip the town apart.

If you’re looking for books to read in the pre-halloween or Halloween season that are equal parts eerie, mysterious, creepy, have magic and the supernatural in them and have a hint of culture too, then add Dark and Shallow Lies to your list.

Seventeen year old Grey always happily spends her summers in La Cachette, a tiny coastal Louisiana swamp town, with her grandmother. However, this time is different because Elora, Grey’s best friend, disappeared without a trace or clue as to where she could be, from the town six months ago. In this town everyone’s supposedly meant to be psychic and yet no one can tell her where Elora is. That added with the fact that it seems like everyone is lying and keeping secrets, the last thing Grey needs is to start getting flashes which only leave her with more questions than before, like Is Elora still even alive? Is Elora trying to reach her and tell her something or is it somebody else?

Dark and Shallow Lies is a wonderfully written mystery with lots of supernatural and fantasy elements. It pulls you in from the very first page and keeps you guessing about the mystery every second since. Every time I thought I’d finally figured out the mystery, I was proven wrong. There were lots of twists and turns in this story, some of which you never see coming, and they always add to the appeal of the story.

For a debut novel, the standards this book met were so incredibly high. The characters were interesting, complex and super fun to follow throughout the story. The world building was absolutely incredible. The mystery was so well executed, the hints for it perfectly dropped. And the writing itself?? Fantastic. Ginny captures the vibe of the story perfectly and she really snags the readers attention.

This book was un-put-down-able. (If that’s not a word, I’m inventing it!)

Ginny Myers Sainis the author of DARK AND SHALLOW LIES, her debut YA novel available 8-31-21 from Razorbill/Penguin. Although she comes from a long line of writers, her first love has always been the theatre. She has a degree in theatre and has spent most of her career teaching acting and directing plays and musicals. Ginny currently live in Tulsa, Oklahoma, with her teenage son and a very cowardly doberman named Shipley. When she is not working in the theatre or writing, you’re likely to find her listening to true crime podcasts, taking pictures of alligators, eating tacos, or planning a trip to Walt Disney World.

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