Annie Barrows

There is much to recommend this book: The characters are engaging, the historical details appear thorough and accurate, and there are sufficient conflicts and plot twists to render a compelling story. . . a pleasant summer read.

A big, juicy family saga with warm humor and tragic twists, 'Truth' is lively and engaging . . . . the story gets more and more absorbing as it moves briskly along.

[A] heartwarming coming-of-age novel . . . Sparkles with folksy depictions of a tight-knit family and life in a small town. . . In a novel full of richly drawn, memorable characters, bright, feisty Willa is the standout. . . Add The Truth According to Us to the stack of repeat-worthy literary pleasures.

It takes a brave author to make the heroine of a new novel an observant and feisty girl . . . Like Scout Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird . . . Barrows . . . has created a believable and touching character in Willa.

Annie Barrows creates a worthy successor to Lee’s beloved Scout Finch….The Truth According to Us has all the characteristics of a great summer read: A plot that makes you want to keep turning the pages; a setting that makes you feel like you’re inhabiting another time and place; and characters who become people you’re sad to leave behind — and thus who always stay with you. As Jottie tells Willa at the beginning of the book, the ‘Macedonian virtues’ are ferocity and devotion. The Truth According to Us is the sort of book that inspires both.

. . .as delightfully eccentric as Guernsey yet refreshingly different. It’s an epic but intimate family novel with richly imagined characters, an intriguing plot and the social sensibilities you would expect of a story set in the South . . . . Many tragedies haunt the Romeyns, including the dissolution of Felix and Sylvia Romeyn’s marriage. The traumatized girls, Willa and Bird, are exquisitely portrayed and the lasting damage caused by the abandonment is sensitively rendered. Willa’s indomitable spirit, keen sense of adventure and innate intelligence reminded me of two other motherless girls in literature: Scout Finch in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird and Flavia de Luce in Alan Bradley’s big-hearted British mystery series. If Guernsey is a tribute to the power of books, The Truth According To Us is a testament to the toxicity of secrets . . . . Just as we did in Guernsey, we empathize with the characters as if they’re our neighbors. Macedonia is a great place to spend some time this summer. The temperatures are soaring, but it’s nothing compared to the heat generated by this sizzling story.

Barrows . . . hits the mark again with this delightful yet at times heart-wrenching story of life in a Depression-ridden small town. Fans of [The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society] will find parallels in this novel’s blend of narrative and epistolary chapters. A warmhearted Southern charmer that is sure to captivate readers.

Barrows brings a deft, light, yet crisp probing touch to this confluence of tender people confronting tough circumstances.

Irresistible … a sly charmer of a story about a small town in Depression-era West Virginia whose history is rewritten by a debutante on the run. Family histories, too, are unraveled, but mended by the fierce, strong women who dominate this delightful page turner, a tribute to the power of love and forgiveness to heal even the most heartbreaking betrayals

[Guernsey] affirms the power of books to nourish people during hard times.

A book-lover's delight, an implicit and sometimes explicit paean to all things literary.

I can't remember the last time I discovered a novel as smart and delightful as this one, a world so vivid that I kept forgetting this was a work of fiction populated with characters so utterly wonderful that I kept forgetting they weren't my actual friends and neighbors. Treat yourself to this book please.

Traditional without seeming stale, and romantic without being naïve.