Owen Foster has never wanted for anything. Then his mother shows up at his elite New Orleans boarding school cradling a bombshell: his privileged life has been funded by stolen money. After using the family business, the single largest employer in his small Louisiana town, to embezzle millions and drain the employees' retirement accounts, Owen's father vanished without a trace, leaving Owen and his mother to deal with the fallout. Owen returns to Lake Cane to finish his senior year, where people he can barely remember despise him for his father's crimes. It's bad enough dealing with muttered insults and glares, but when Owen and his mother receive increasingly frightening threats from someone out for revenge, he knows he must get to the bottom of what really happened at Louisiana Frac--and the cryptic note his father sent him at his boarding school days before disappearing. Owen's only refuge is the sprawling, isolated pecan orchard he works at after school, owned by a man named Gus who has his own secrets--and in some ways seems to know Owen better than he knows himself. As Owen uncovers a terrible injustice that looms over the same Preacher Woods he's claimed as his own, he must face a shocking truth about his own past--and write a better future.
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Our October MomAdvice Book Club selection was, "The Lying Woods," and I have to say that this one exceeded all of our expectations this year.
Owen Foster grew up wealthy and has never wanted for anything in his life.
That is why it is so surprising when his mother shows up to his boarding school and tells him that his privileged life has been funded by stolen money.
Owen's father had been embezzling millions and had been draining his employees' retirement accounts for years. When his father vanishes, he leaves behind Owen and his mother to deal with the fallout in their town.
No longer able to afford the pricey school he attends, Owen is forced to come back to his small town and deal with the aftermath at his high school.
Even though this has nothing to do with Owen, it is hard to not be resentful of the fancy life he had lead and how angry everyone is about their money being stolen from them.
What's worse is that someone is desperate to get revenge on them.
Owen's only refuge is the pecan orchard he works at, with Gus, who seems to know an awful lot about Owen's family.
It is here that he begins to unravel the mystery of his dad, his mom, and the secrets that were covered up to protect him so many years ago.
This was such a solid novel and yielded such a great discussion too. I listened to this one, on audiobook, and thought the narration was just incredibly done.
If you are looking for a satisfying YA mystery, I highly recommend checking this one out!
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