Genre: Mystery

I received this book for free from Freeform in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

"I'm not saying this is Sawyer's fault," the prim and proper one said delicately. "But."

Eighteen-year-old auto mechanic Sawyer Taft did not expect her estranged grandmother to show up at her apartment door and offer her a six-figure contract to participate in debutante season. And she definitely never imagined she would accept. But when she realizes that immersing herself in her grandmother's "society" might mean discovering the answer to the biggest mystery of her life-her father's identity-she signs on the dotted line and braces herself for a year of makeovers, big dresses, bigger egos, and a whole lot of bless your heart. The one thing she doesn't expect to find is friendship, but as she's drawn into a group of debutantes with scandalous, dangerous secrets of their own, Sawyer quickly discovers that her family isn't the only mainstay of high society with skeletons in their closet. There are people in her grandmother's glittering world who are not what they appear, and no one wants Sawyer poking her nose into the past. As she navigates the twisted relationships between her new friends and their powerful parents, Sawyer's search for the truth about her own origins is just the beginning.

Set in the world of debutante balls, grand estates and rolling green hills, Little White Lies combines a charming setting, a classic fish-out-of-water story, and the sort of layered mystery only author Jennifer Lynn Barnes can pull off.

Not to be extremely dramatic or anything but I’d kill to read the sequel to Little White Lies (and to The Long Game but that’s a whole other story.) This is probably an odd sentence to start a review with but honestly, that’s just how J Lynn Barnes’s books make me FEEL. Barnes has a knack for writing addicting novels that you cannot stop reading even if they are over 400 pages long. Little White Lies is not only addicting but it reads like a puzzle, clues dispersed everywhere that you need to connect to form the bigger picture.

Sawyer Taft’s life changes when her grandmother shows up on her doorstep and offers her a deal she is unable to resist. Soon she is drawn into the world of high society, debutantes and a LOT of well-hidden secrets.

Sawyer is witty, sarcastic, jaded, and just a little bit hopeful. She enters a world completely alien to her but somehow becomes the leader of a ragtag group of debutantes and falls deep into a mystery that will dig up a lot of things that people would rather remain buried.

There are a lot of things to love about this book but I think my favorite is the rag-tag group of girls. They start off as reluctant allies but as they all get to know one another better, and overcome a LOT Of misunderstandings, their reluctant alliance blooms into a strong friendship.

Of course, where there is a ragtag group of girls, there is also a ragtag group of boys and the best news is that these boys are not all secretly in love with how ‘different’ Sawyer is. In fact, Sawyer doesn’t even have a love interest!!!!!! BUT THERE ARE SOME ADORABLE side-romances to root for.

So. The mystery. If you’ve read The Naturals series by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, I am assuming you’re gonna come in with some high expectations. While Little White Lies takes a much less gruesome approach to mysteries it is still entertaining. Sawyer agreed to her grandmother’s conditions so that she’d have a chance at college as well as the opportunity to figure out who her father is. And while the mystery of figuring out who one’s father is doesn’t seem interesting, we all know things are never as they seem to be and OF COURSE some skeletons come crawling out of some closets. Also, some teens plot a devious scheme in an attempt to get justice and that is always fun.

I don’t know if everyone who reads Little White Lies is gonna love it but I do know that it is very likely you will be entertained if not fall head-over-heels for this delightful novel. SO, while I eagerly anticipate the sequel, maybe you could play catch-up and join me in this awful wait. YAY.

4.5 Hot Espressos