Liars

A searing novel about being a wife, a mother, and an artist, and how marriage makes liars of us all—from the author of Very Cold People and 300 Arguments

A nuclear family can destroy a woman artist. I’d always known that. But I’d never suspected how easily I’d fall into one anyway.

When Jane, an aspiring writer, meets filmmaker John Bridges, they both want the same things: to be in love, to live a successful, creative life, and to be happy. When they marry, Jane believes she has found everything she was looking for, including—a few years later—all the attendant joys and labors of motherhood. But it’s not long until Jane finds herself subsumed by John’s ambitions, whims, and ego; in short, she becomes a wife.

As Jane’s career flourishes, their marriage starts to falter. Throughout the upheavals of family life, Jane tries to hold it all together. That is, until John leaves her.

Liars is a tour de force of wit and rage, telling the blistering story of a marriage as it burns to the ground, and of a woman rising inexorably from its ashes.

272 pages. Hardcover.

About the Author

Sarah Manguso is the author of nine books, most recently the novel Very Cold People. Her next novel, Liars, is forthcoming in 2024. Her other books include a story collection, two poetry collections, and four acclaimed works of nonfiction: 300 Arguments, Ongoingness, The Guardians, and The Two Kinds of Decay. Her work has been recognized by an American Academy of Arts and Letters Literature Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Hodder Fellowship, and the Rome Prize. Her writing has been translated into a dozen languages.