She manages to include a lost plush toy, a Kindy Mothers race, head lice (of course!), a petition, a twisted ankle, a French nanny, little bullies and big bullies, an ex-husband, a gorgeous barista, a profusion of Elvises and Audrey Hepburns and plenty of laugh-out-loud moments. Moriarty touches on some topical themes as well as some age-old topics: domestic violence body image the dangers of a one-night-stand bullying victim mentality erotic asphyxiation infidelity and bizarre internet auctions.

Readers are likely to find themselves hoping none of the narrators is the Trivia Night victim. Several characters will surprise at the climax, and the reader may even feel some sympathy for the abuser. The dialogue is familiar from any café or school playground and the characters are real and flawed none is wholly good or completely evil. The setting is commonplace and easily recognisable and Moriarty captures the feel of the school situation perfectly. Moriarty gives the reader an original plot with a twist that only the most astute reader will predict. Other perspectives are presented in the form of quotes (some quite perceptive, some decidedly frivolous) recorded after the event by a journalist, from parents and teachers present on the night. Moriarty uses three narrators, each of whom has children starting in Kindergarten: Madeline, confident, outgoing and never averse to voicing her outrage at the smallest injustice Jane, a single mum with a dark secret in her past and Celeste, rich and beautiful, and married to a seemingly perfect man.

This one, intriguing fact is presented in the first chapter, after which the narrative jumps back six months to trace the sequence of events that led to the tragedy. But this year, one of those parents ends up dead. The Pirriwee Peninsula on Sydney’s Northern Beaches is home to a diverse range of people, many of whom have children at the Pirriwee Public School and so are present at the Annual Trivia Night Fundraiser. They’re fundamentalist mothers”īig Little Lies is the sixth novel by Australian author, Liane Moriarty. If you want to be on the P&C you have to have a blonde bob….They’re like Mum Prefects, they feel very strongly about their roles as school mums.

Big little lies audio book