We Were Liars

Encourage readers to connect the book’s themes and characters with their personal experiences.

1. Do you believe in ghosts or anything similar? How might this have influenced your reading of We Were Liars?

2. How responsible do you think Cady is for what happened to her friends? How does your answer relate to your beliefs about personal responsibility versus external circumstances that are beyond a person’s control?

3. One of the sources of tension in the Sinclair family comes from generational differences. Have you found this to be a source of tension in your own life or the lives of people you know?

4. The Sinclair family is portrayed as corrupted by wealth and power. In real life, do you think these things are inevitably corrupting? What factors might contribute to a person being more or less influenced by the acquisition of wealth and power?

5. Cady is very angry at her family and believes they are corrupt. In your opinion, is she honest with herself about how she benefits from their privilege? Does she make honest attempts to live without this privilege?

Examine the book’s relevance to societal issues, historical events, or cultural themes.

1. What is dissociative amnesia? How realistic is the book’s depiction of this condition? Do you think there are moral considerations when using a condition like amnesia as a plot device?

2. Cady’s friends die when she and they are in the process of committing a felony. Legally, this is felony murder. Why isn’t Cady prosecuted? What factors (e.g., her age, gender, race, etc.) might shield her from liability, and what factors make it more likely for a person to be prosecuted for such a crime in the real world?

3. In the real world, who gets to define what “normal” is? How do different kinds of social norms impact people from marginalized ethnic or cultural backgrounds, those with disabilities, and so on? Does this mean that norms are inherently wrong?

Dive into the book’s structure, characters, themes, and symbolism.

1. What do the houses on Beechwood Island represent? How does Cady’s relationship to these houses change over the course of the story? What changes in Cady do these changes represent?

2. How would you describe Cady’s narrative voice? How do techniques and devices like irony, metaphor, and so on help create her distinctive voice? What role does this voice play in characterizing her?

3. To what degree are the ghosts in the novel “real”? What evidence supports the idea that they are actually there, and what evidence supports the idea that they are figments of Cady’s imagination? What larger thematic ideas do these ghosts help to develop?

4. What is the significance of the novel’s title? What are the various kinds of lies being told in this story? What messages about lying does the story convey?

5. In many novels, amnesia is not just a plot device—it is a way to represent the loss of identity or the inability to fully accept oneself. Does Cady’s amnesia function in either of these ways? Does it represent something else entirely? Or is it just a plot device?