Everyone Here Is Lying: A Novel

Everyone Here Is Lying by Shari Lapena is a 2023 domestic thriller. Lapena is an author who focuses on the psychological undertones surrounding domesticity and familiarity. The novel follows the disappearance of nine-year-old Avery Wooler as her family struggles to come to terms with her abduction. Lapena explores themes of deception and guilt, along with the emotional effects surrounding criminal investigations.

This study guide refers to the 2023 Pamela Dorman print edition.

Content Warning: This guide describes and discusses the source text’s treatment of child abuse, child abduction, and child molestation. This guide also references the source text’s stereotypical and potentially stigmatizing portrayal of neurodivergent people.

Plot Summary

William Wooler arrives home after his mistress, Nora Blanchard, breaks up with him. At home, his nine-year-old daughter, Avery, talks back to William, and he loses his temper and hits her. William apologizes to Avery, begging her not to tell her mother. William leaves because he feels guilty.

Michael Wooler, William’s son, cannot find Avery when he gets home. His mother, Erin, calls the police. William comes home after Erin calls to tell him Avery is missing. Detective Bledsoe and Detective Gully ask the family if they have any trouble at home, and they all reply that they do not. At her home, Nora hears about Avery’s abduction on the news. Nora’s husband, Al, and her son, Ryan, join the search team to look for Avery. The next day, Michael tells the police that his father hits Avery regularly because she has behavioral issues. The police suspect William of killing Avery.

The police find William’s burner phone. William confesses that he was having an affair, but he does not tell them Nora’s name. He tells them that he saw Avery at home after he was with Nora and that he slapped Avery. Gully interviews Avery’s friend Jenna with her mother, Alice; Jenna tells her that Avery had an older “boyfriend” who touched Avery. The police receive an anonymous tip that someone saw Avery get into Ryan Blanchard’s car the day she disappeared.

Michael tells Gully that he saw Alice’s son, Derek, at a tree house in the woods with Avery one day. The detectives interview Al, Nora’s husband, who tells them that he knows Nora was having an affair with William. Gully asks Derek if he touched Avery, but he denies it. The police discover that the anonymous caller is a woman named Marion Cooke who lives on the Woolers’ street. Marion tells the police that she did not give her name because she fears that her abusive ex-husband will find her.

Marion goes back home and talks to Avery, who is staying in her basement. Avery asked Marion to hide her and pretend that Avery disappeared to punish William. However, Avery does not know that Marion is obsessed with William and wants to kill Avery and frame Ryan for the murder. Marion hates that William chose Nora over her, and she wants them to suffer. Avery watches television in the basement and finds out that the police arrested Ryan. Erin wants to know the identity of the witness who saw Ryan, so she goes around the neighborhood asking people. When she gets to Marion’s house, she suspects that Marion is lying and confronts her. Marion admits that she was the witness, and Erin leaves. Avery overhears Marion’s confession and tells Marion that she must recant her statement because she does not want Ryan to get in trouble. Marion decides that she will kill Avery the next day.

Gully realizes that Marion is lying about hiding from her ex-husband because she still lives in her hometown and she never changed her name. Marion puts sleeping pills in Avery’s milk, but before Avery finishes the glass, she realizes that Marion means to kill her. When Marion comes out on the landing in the basement later, Avery pushes her down the stairs and kills her. Avery runs out of the house, pretending to be scared, and sees Gully coming up to the house. Gully calls for EMTs, and Avery reunites with her family. The police discover Marion’s body inside the house. Avery tells the police that William hit her so hard she fell and that Marion kidnapped her. Erin and William fight because he suggests that Avery may be lying about some of the events. Over the next few weeks, Erin feels surprised that Avery seems happy and does not act like someone who has suffered a trauma. Instead, Avery wants to talk to the media and tell her story. Eventually, Erin allows Avery to go on national television. On the television show, Avery misspeaks and tells the interviewer that she was mad at Marion for double-crossing her. The interviewer asks her to start her story from the beginning and tell everyone what really happened.