Book Review: Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty (No Spoiler)

Waktu baca sinopsisnya di Amazon, aku dan paksu udah ilfeel duluan, "Ih kok kaya Chicklit for Desperate Housewives ya?" Tapi ternyata genrenya masuk 'mystery' dan dapet penilaian bagus dari Goodreads readers, jadi dibeliin deh sama paksu bareng sama The Girl on The Train yang udah kubaca duluan.

Kesan pertama setelah baca 5 chapters: SUKAAA! Dalam sehari pertama aku bisa abisin 20 chapter. It's a record since I became a working mom. Ternyata Big Little Lies ini bisa kuselesaikan dalam 3 hari.

Karakter utamanya ada 3 perempuan, kaya di The Girl On The Train, tapi bedanya novel ini ga bikin 'gemes-jengkel' sama tokohnya. Pembentukan karakternya juga dapet; they got flaws in adorable and natural way. Sebagai pembaca, aku bisa relate sama perasaan tokoh-tokohnya.  Kekurangannya: penggunaan deskripsi yang berulang-ulang terhadap suatu karakter. Misalnya A nganggep si B 'feisty', terus ternyata C juga bilang B 'feisty'. Padahal kan bisa aja lively, gutsy, ato apaa gitu?

Interaksi para tokohnya nyindir ibu-ibu banget... judgey gitu satu sama lain, kepo tapi gengsi, cynical. Conversation-nya jail, gengges, witty, dan lebay; gaya bahasa kesukaanku! Ceritanya tentang ibu-ibu anak TK yang geng-gengan, lumayan menarik buat diriku yang 3 taon lagi jadi ibu anak TK. Jadi kebayang mungkin mirip-mirip gitu yaa... walau pastinya didramatisasi.

Settingnya juga adorable deh, aku sukaa... kota kecil di pinggir pantai utara Sydney. Trus ada cafe asoy dengan pemandangan ke laut dan sedia buku-buku bekas. Ihhh sorgaa!

Satu-satunya yang buatku agak annoying adalah adanya snippets di awal ato ending tiap chapter, isinya komen beberapa tokoh sampingan (biasanya para ortu lain di TK tersebut) tentang pembunuhan yang terjadi. Nah ortunya kan banyak, jadi awalnya aku agak bingung, ni penting ga sih buat dihapalin nama-namanya, apa perlu diperhatikan siapa ngomong apa? Siapa tau di situ letak clue-nya, soalnya pengarangnya niat banget. Ga cuma pembunuhnya yang dirahasiakan, korbannya juga (di awal-awal) ga dikasih tahu identitasnya. Dia juga bisa bikin pembacanya ngakak padahal novel ini kan bertema pembunuhan! Jagoan kan?

Penasaran... aku buka profilenya Liane Moriarty di Goodreads. Lucuuuk! Gini nih katanya:

About this author

 

 

Liane was born on a beautiful November day in 1966 in Sydney. A few hours after she was born, she smiled directly at her father through the nursery glass window, which is remarkable, seeing as most babies can’t even focus their eyes at that age.

Her first word was ‘glug’. This was faithfully recorded in the baby book kept by her mother. (As the eldest of six children, Liane was the only one to get a baby book so she likes to refer to it often.)

As a child, she loved to read, so much so that school friends would cruelly hide their books when she came to play. She still doesn’t know how to go to sleep at night without first reading a novel for a very long time in a very hot bath.

She can’t remember the first story she ever wrote, but she does remember her first publishing deal. Her father ‘commissioned’ her to write a novel for him and paid her an advance of $1.00. She wrote a three volume epic called, ‘The Mystery of Dead Man’s Island’

After leaving school, Liane began a career in advertising and marketing. She became quite corporate for a while and wore suits and worried a lot about the size of her office. She eventually left her position as marketing manager of a legal publishing company to run her own (not especially successful) business called The Little Ad Agency. After that she worked as (a more successful, thankfully) freelance advertising copywriter, writing everything from websites and TV commercials to the back of the Sultana Bran box.

She also wrote short stories and many first chapters of novels that didn’t go any further. The problem was that she didn’t actually believe that real people had novels published. Then one day she found out that they did, when her younger sister Jaclyn Moriarty called to say that her (brilliant, hilarious, award-winning) novel, Feeling Sorry for Celia was about to be published.

In a fever of sibling rivalry, Liane rushed to the computer and wrote a children’s book called The Animal Olympics, which went on to be enthusiastically rejected by every publisher in Australia.

She calmed down and enrolled in a Masters degree at Macquarie University in Sydney. As part of that degree, she wrote her first novel, Three Wishes. It was accepted by the lovely people at Pan Macmillan and went on to be published around the world. (Her latest books are published by the equally lovely people at Penguin in both the US and the UK)

Since then she has written two more novels for adults, as well as a series of books for children.

Liane is now a full-time author. She lives in Sydney with her husband, her new baby daughter Anna, and her son George, who likes to sit on her lap while she works, helpfully smashing his fist against the keyboard and suggesting that she might prefer to be watching the Wiggles instead.

Once upon a time she went heli-skiing and skydiving* and scuba diving. These days she goes to the park and ‘Gymbaroo’ and sings ‘I’m a Little Cuckoo Clock’ at swimming lessons. She has discovered that the adrenaline burst you experience from jumping out of a plane is remarkably similar to the one you get when your toddler makes a run for it in a busy car park.

Besok-besok mau baca lagi buku-buku dari pengarang ini ah, tapi mau kuseling pengarang lain dulu. Takut keburu bosen.

Satu hal lagi yang menarik: buku ini katanya sedang dibikinkan filmnya oleh bintang-bintang kece Aussie: Nicole Kidman dan Reese Witherspoon! Plus katanya penulis skenarionya adalah David E. Kelley (penulis skenarionya Doogie Howser, LA Law, dan Ally McBeal sekaligus suaminya Michelle Pfeiffer). Hmm... siapa memerankan siapa yaa? Aku sih pinginnya sih Reese jadi Madeline, Nicole jadi Celeste. Trus Rose Byrne jadi Jane dan Hugh Jackman jadi Perry. Semoga beneran jadi difilmkan!