Where the Truth Lies by Rupert Holmes

Where the Truth Lies Reviews

• 
  Lea Ann

  Okay, I fully admit the main reason I sprang this book from its nice, warm home on the library shelf was because the author's name caught my eye. Rupert Holmes? Surely not the same Rupert Holmes who wrote one of most iconic soft rock hits of the '70's, and, incidentally, one of my favorite songs from my childhood, even though it surely must have pained my mother to hear her nine year old sing about "making love at midnight in the dunes of a cape?" Yes, the same Rupert Holmes, and, yes, based on his name (and song) alone I checked out this book.

  
  

  Well, this is a great story! I was hooked from the first page. Well, maybe the second. O'Conner, a young, female journalist, is the narrator of this tale, and her voice is so strong that she jumps off the page, and I can envision her as my pal chatting with me over cocktails. Set in the '70's, hers is the story of a smart woman who gets a little overly involved with two "rat-pack"-esque stars past their prime, one of whom she is interviewing for a biography that she's hoping will include details about a shady episode in his past. I was more than pleasantly surprised by this novel's complexity of plot and the fullness of its characters. The word duplicitious can be applied to both, and I found myself at once both loving and loathing O'Conner and the men she investigates.

  
  

  A page turner until the very end, this book is very fun to read has twists and turns to make one giddy, and amazingly Holmes is able to wrap them all up tightly at the end. Wonderful read!

  
  
  
• 
  Beth Shorten

  Read this quite a while ago, but was thinking about it today and wanted to put a review out there because this is an absolutely gripping book. (PLEASE skip the movie. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't the book and changing one of the main characters from a suave Dean Martin to a suave Brit just didn't do it. No offense to Colin Firth who is a great actor, but it just didn't work.) The fact that I can remember reading it at lunch over 10 years ago and not being able to put it down speaks volumes. (This was in pre-e reader days.) I had work to do, but I just couldn't stop reading. I had it in my lap and was sneak reading it. I stayed at the office LATE on a Friday because I couldn't put it down. It had so many twists and turns and I couldn't help but get caught up with it.
  
  I've re-read it, even knowing how it ends (and who the killer is and how it happened...which is pretty amazing) and it STILL grips me every time.
  
  Put simply: I LOVE this book and it takes suspense and mystery to a new (and sometimes kinky level). Plus if you love the 1970s and Disneyland, you'll want to check this out too.
• 
  Dawn F

  It’s been a long time since I read it but I remember being highly entertained by it. I should perhaps say that my feelings towards it are prejudiced by the subject matter. Taking place in the 70s, it’s based loosely, though not terribly subtly, on the partnership between comedy act Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin, though they are obviously renamed here. In a fictionalized version of events Rupert Holmes explores through the eyes of a young investigative journalist what transpired between the two that ultimately broke them up. Having read
  Dean and Me: A Love Story by
  Jerry Lewis, I don’t think Holmes is far off the mark, either.
• 
  Amanda

  I picked this up on whim while I was mourning the fact that I had finished "Rebecca." I thought it might be in somewhat of the same drama, mystery, suspense, love, etc... 22-pages in, it referenced "Rebecca," and I knew I was in for a good time.
  
  Full of wonderfull, albeit dark, comedy, thrilling suspense, and a shocking-reveal at the end, this book more than met my expectations. Scenes and questions are still realing within my head, as I can't seem to let go of the characters.
  
  O'Connor tells her story and pulls you in. My emotions traced right along with hers as she got tangled in her own lies, uncovered dark secrets, was wooed by two very differnet men, and watched her world crash down around her.
  
  This novel was satisfying on every level... an indulgence that was suspenseful, funny, and sexy.
• 
  Megan

  This was actually a good mystery. I loved the depictions of Disneyworld and old Hollywood. I gave it 3 stars because I thought it was a little too raunchy, but otherwise, it was enjoyable.
• 
  Jenna

  This was NUTS. Starts off kinda slow and easy and ramps up to crazytown, especially for the last 50 pages which just keep whipping out twists until the last sentence. As somebody who's been in her own personal crazytown this year, reading and watching Martin and Lewis media like a fiend, I enjoyed a lot of this, and seeing just how much these guys matched up to the real thing. That said, it was also had a hard time imagining these characters as separate entities. Lanny truly felt like middle-age Jerry, down to the nastiness and manipulative generosity, but Vince was definitely a bit further from Dean in multiple ways... I mean, it was kinda lame to give him such a mean manipulative streak at the end, even if he was backed into a corner. It felt uncharacteristic even for Vince... Though in general, the whole bisexual angle was interesting (something I definitely believe real Jerry Lewis dipped into, probably not Dean). Also thought it was a bit much to have Vince kill himself over grief and guilt like that... besides being sad it also felt a bit like a punishment, where all of the heteros go off living their lives happily ever after.
  
  I also had mixed emotions about the narrator, though I largely thought she felt pretty real and not too Mary-Sue. Her 'dates' with the two of them are wonderful and get your heart fluttering in the right spots – shoutout to Doyers Street and Disneyland – but also she's too indulgent and it's a bummer about how she undercuts her own professional working relationships. But I know I'm not meant to be thinking about furthering the cause of working women when I'm reading a noir-esque love triangle novel so. All in all, there's a lot dopey here but it gets so far into it it's fun as heck to read. I didn't even try to piece anything together, I just enjoyed the ride.
• 
  Zac Stojcevski

  After reading the first 138 pages of this 538 work, something novel occurred in my juice experiences whereby a gust of wind send my bright red copy to the bottom of a pool. I retrieved it, and dried it over many days. Thereafter there were sections that made me question why the effort - mine at retrieval and the authors for engagement. However, read a few more and useful plot twists made up for the plot dips where the read ebbed and flowed like the waters from whence the book was retrieved.
  
  But this is a story told by the multi talented lyricist that asked the world if we liked pina coladas and getting caught in the rain. Just as in that Escape song where there is a climax, so too in this story where we have the moment of “oh, it’s you”. The heroine explored by the author in varying depth is at times part Jessica Jones part Bridgette Jones with many laugh out loud moments in the solving of a long forgotten murder and cover up. A definite cover to cover read.
• 
  Jill

  4.5 stars
  A crackerjack of a read!
  Story rocked along like a pressed vinyl 78 record, taking us to and from the late 1950s to the mid 1970s with ease and good pace. Our main gal was believably flawed, she was likeable and did enough intelligent things to forgive her the stupidities that had you groaning and saying silently "Watch out - trouble ahead!"
  Excellent writing. Just like the other Rupert Holmes novel
  The Musician's Daughter, I thoroughly enjoyed this style of writing, so smart with enough sass and wit added in to keep it really interesting, but not too much that it lost itself in its own cleverness.
  Great stuff!
• 
  Lori

  Funny, my copy came from friends of the library sale and its cover is pretty boring blue & white, no picture. :) Murder mystery undertaken by a young female journalist. What a time she had! There is just enough sex to keep that side of the brain interested, there are several fun twists and the ending was a huge right turn from what I could ever imagine. For this author's first novel I thought it was a pretty good read.
• 
  Ron Holmes

  This is the first book I have read by Rupert Holmes but I do like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain. The story line is very interesting and really has some unexpected twists that could have been predicted if I were really paying attention. However, there are some explicit sex scenes that are worth reading. And, the book was surprising.
• 
  Andy

  Some really clever/amusing phrasing and descriptions made this a guilty pleasure for me. Some of it seemed a bit dated/sexist/problematic, but I found the book consistently entertaining...
• 
  A

  I am boo boo the fool... I really did think I was going to rediscover this for gays who like Golden Age Hollywood but it was hot garbage
• 
  Mary Ahlgren

  None of the characters are particularly likable. Maybe I should say "remotely likeable"......
• 
  Lucy Busker

  Generally speaking, this is solid work. I liked the narrator, despite what seemed at time almost an effort to put the audience off. The narrative was snappy and inviting in a way that helped me not want to shake her for some of the decisions she made. I did have the added benefit of having seen the movie, and thus being able to "see" Kevin Bacon and Colin Firth as Lanny and Vince, which helped a lot. (I could not reconcile Alison Lohman to the book narrator, but I found her oddly cast in the movie as well.) Even knowing the "twist," I enjoyed the unfolding layers of secrets. Like I said, solid work.
• 
  Joe Slavinsky

  Author Rupert Holmes is a real renaissance man. A musician early on, famous for "Escape(The Pina Colada Song)", he's written 2 novels(this book was his first), and plays, including the Tony winning "The Mystery of Edwin Drood", which was based on Dickens last, incomplete, novel. So, he's won a Grammy, a couple of Edgars, and several Tonys. I read his second novel, "Swing", aka "The Musician's Daughter", a couple years ago, and really enjoyed it. When I spotted this one, at the library, I grabbed it immediately. The story is set in the '70's, told in first person, by a female writer, who wants to write a book about the break up, under unusual circumstances, of one of the great comedy acts of the '50's(who are very much like Martin & Lewis). The prime circumstance seems to be the finding of a dead woman, in the bathtub of their hotel room, upon their arrival, in New Jersey, from Miami. There's much more to this than meets the eye, and the writer gets in over her head very quickly. There's a lot of suspense, and a twisted plot, which makes for some serious page-turning. I would recommend this book, to any serious mystery fan.
• 
  Shauna

  This book is not of the sort that I usually read, in that it was far more graphic in language and sexual content than my tolerance level usually permits. That said, I am otherwise a fan of Rupert Holmes, and there was so much else in the book that was fascinating-- character, story and well written descriptions-- that I kept coming back to it for more. My favorite parts were the notable 1970s descriptions, both of Hollywood and New York, styles and mannerisms, but especially the descriptions of Disneyland. It was also a curious way to write a mystery because you don't even find out what the crime is until well into the novel, although our protagonist starts sorting out the "truth" from the beginning.
  
• 
  Shirley

  I read this book because I saw Atom Egoyan's adaption of it a couple of years ago. It's quite a bit different from the movie. Still a nice read. Moves at a good pace. It's a thriller/murder mystery.
  
  A young female writer is hired to write book about one-half of a popular comedy team from the 1950s. The team broke up suddenly after doing a 39 hour charity telethon on TV. She wants to find out about The Girl In New Jersey, the girl who showed up dead in the comedy team's hotel suite after the telethon 15 years ago.
  
  Who killed her? Was it Lanny Morris, the womanizing and crazy one of the duo or what it Vince Collins, the straight man of the team?
  
  
  
  
  
• 
  Chris

  The heroine was a little too slutty for my taste but she made up for that by being plucky and ever the optimist. Just when I thought I had the plot figured out the author would throw in a twist that I never expected so the last few pages were real page-turners. My favorite thing about the book was the nostalgia of hearing the names of all those old TV and radio announcers, memories of LA in the 50's and 60's, and especially Disneyland in the old days. His descriptions of The Magic Kingdom really brought back a lot of memories for me. A few of his details of the times made me wonder "How could he possibly know about that?"
• 
  Deodand

  I'd seen the movie some time ago but couldn't quite remember the plot. I did remember the twists though, which I won't reveal.
  
  The first few pages were awkward and that kept me from enjoying it more. There's also a long and very specific paean to Disneyland in the middle that I found out of place and weird - I think the author meant it as a commentary on the game of cat-and-mouse taking place at the same time. The main character alternates between stupidity and good sense in a head-scratching, confusing manner.
  
  The plot was good though, and that counts for a lot with me.
• 
  Ezgi

  positives: images of 70s were quite vivid. very absorbing plot and enjoyable to read.
  negatives: ending was forced. a very agatha christie like scene where all is solved. though the book is handled in no way reminiscent of christie, the consecutive deaths and the unravelling of plot is like those not unlike many before. the scene where she cuffes herself to the faucet is almost done for the movie, which i haven't yet watched but think might use some of the almost cinematographic scenes in the book.
  
  
• 
  Mary

  Kind of a crazy embellished story of Jerry Lewis and Dean martin and why they split, murder, mafiosi and the Hollywood life. Of course it is written as 2 other names, to protect the innocent and to make you wonder if any of it is true. Who knows, who cares. It was and interesting read, slow at times and way to graphic, but I did finish it. You read it and determine your own thoughts on it.
  Sure do love to hear Dean sing, still to this very day and as they say he was funny in his bones.
• 
  J. Ewbank

  For some reason this book did not meet my expectations. The book turned out much different than I thought. This probably is not the best book by this author, at least for me.
  
  Undoubtedly others have liked it much more than I did.
  
  Might try another by this author to see if it is just this book or me.
  
  J. Robert Ewbank author "John Wesley, Natural Man, and the 'Isms'"
• 
  Clare

  Far superior to its film adaptation, Where The Truth Lies gives us a bold, brassy, messed up, and funny protagonist in K. O’Connor, as well as a tightly plotted and deliciously tense mystery. The novel’s sexual content sometimes seems to be going on autopilot, however, disconnecting the reader from O’Connor. Still worth a shot, though.
• 
  Denise

  This is an abridged version of the story. I enjoyed the writing and found the characters interesting. The narrators Ana Gasteyer (especially!) and Michael McKean were also great. My only criticism has to do with the abrupt ending which may have been a choice in the abridging. An extra bit of trivia: Rupert Holmes had the hit Pina Colada back in 1979.
• 
  Indah Threez Lestari

  245 - 2015
  
  Aku tahu kalau duo comic di novel ini, Vince Collins dan Lanny Morris, diciptakan berdasarkan duo Dean Martin-Jerry Lewis.
  
  Tapi saat membaca bukunya yang terbayang malah Colin Firth dan Kevin Bacon. Mau bagaimana lagi, aku menonton versi filmnya lebih dulu soalnya...
  
  Ripyu rada panjangnya kupajang di blog ya:
  
  http://threezstacks.blogspot.com/2015...
  
  
• 
  Chrissie

  I LOVED this book--twists and turns--gangsters, drugs and murder. However, the movie made me want to turn in my membership card for the Colin Firth Fan Club. STAY AWAY from the movie.
• 
  Cat

  set in the 70's in hollywood, a journalist delves into the dark secrets of a comedy duo. All a bit surreal and depraved. too weak for a good detective novel.
• 
  Tracey

  Adult fiction; mystery/suspense. There are lots of twists in this one for people who enjoy mysteries, and lots of other stuff for people who don't.