Real Life & Liars [Paperback]

Sometimes you find happiness where, and when, you least expect it.

For Mirabelle Zielinski's children, happiness always seems to be just out of reach. Her polished oldest daughter, Katya, clings to a stale marriage with a workaholic husband and three spoiled children. Her son, Ivan, so creative, is a down-in-the-dumps songwriter with the worst taste in women. And the baby, impulsive Irina, who lives life on a whim, is now reluctantly pregnant and hitched to a man who is twice her age. On the weekend of their parents' anniversary party, lies will be revealed, hearts will be broken...but love will also be found. And the biggest shock may come from Mirabelle herself, because she has a secret that will change everything.

Riggle crafts a moving and accomplished first novel about a family coming to terms with change.A seemingly celebratory gathering brings joy, frustration, love and disappointment to a midwestern family in this wonderful debut novel. These are characters we know and care about from our own lives.In her wondrously affecting debut novel REAL LIFE AND LIARS, Kristina Riggle accomplished something authors almost never do anymore: she made me care about her characters - and what a wide-ranging cast of characters they are! She made me want good things for them. A must-read for summer 2009.Real Life and Liars depicts a family gathering with forensic precision: we see the characters raw in front of us. But Kristina Riggles moving and well-executed novel also embraces human fraility and serves up family complexities like a celebration buffet.Written with grace, passion, and insight, REAL LIFE AND LIARS is a deeply felt novel that draws a vivid portrait of a family in transition, and examines the very real fear of leaving behind all you hold dear.