History Literature / WeWereLiars

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Pay very close attention to when certain characters are "on screen" and when they're not. [[spoiler: Gat, Johnny, and Mirren are ''always'' finding excuses not to be around anyone but Cadence. Why? Because they've been dead for almost a year, and are either hallucinations or ghosts.]]

* LetThePastBurn: A dark variation. To the teenagers, Clairmont represented everything that was going wrong with their family. So they burned it down without really thinking it through, and the result was this: [[spoiler:all but one of them died.]]

* TwistEnding: What ''did'' happen in Summer Fifteen? [[spoiler:Gat, Johnny, and Mirren all died. Even though Cadence has supposedly been talking to them the entire book. Are they ghosts, or are they figments of her imagination? It's implied they're probably the latter. None of the readers saw this coming.]]

* FairytaleMotifs: The chapter where Cadence finally remembers the true events of summer fifteen is told in the style of a fairy tale, with her grandfather as king and her cousins as the children of the princesses [[spoiler:and casting herself as the wicked witch who cursed them all.]]

* BigFancyHouse: Clairmont, although this could pretty much go for all the Sinclair family's huge houses.
* BigScrewedUpFamily: The Sinclairs. Big time.
* DeadAllAlong: [[spoiler:Gat, Johnny, and Mirren.]]

* FourPhilosophyEnsemble: The Liars.
** Cadence: The Apathetic
** Gat: The Realist
** Johnny: The Cynic
** Mirren: The Optimist
* FourTemperamentEnsemble: The Liars again.
** Cadence: Melancholic
** Gat: Phlegmatic
** Johnny: Choleric
** Mirren: Sanguine
* TheKillerInMe
* LaserGuidedAmnesia
* LetThePastBurn: [[spoiler:A dark variation. To the teenagers, Clairmont represented everything that was going wrong with their family. So they burned it down without really thinking it through, and the result was this: all but one of them died.]]

* [[spoiler:DeadAllAlong:]] [[spoiler:Gat, Johnny, and Mirren.]]

* [[spoiler:LetThePastBurn:]] [[spoiler:A dark variation. To the teenagers, Clairmont represented everything that was going wrong with their family. So they burned it down without really thinking it through, and the result was this: all but one of them died.]]

* [[spoiler:TraumaInducedAmnesia:]] [[spoiler:Implied. What actually happened during Summer Fifteen was so horrific and scarring that Cadence forgot it happened.]]
* [[spoiler:TwistEnding:]] What ''did'' happen in Summer Fifteen? [[spoiler:Gat, Johnny, and Mirren all died. Even though Cadence has supposedly been talking to them the entire book. Are they ghosts, or are they figments of her imagination? It's implied they're probably the latter. None of the readers saw this coming.]]

* LetThePastBurn

''We Were Liars'' by E. Lockhart is a 2014 young-adult novel about [[BigScrewedUpFamily the wealthy, good-looking, all-American Sinclair family.]] The Sinclairs live under a facade of perfection, and they'd rather anything than admit and face their own problems.

''We Were Liars'' by E. Lockhart is a 2014 young-adult novel.

* BigFancyHouse: Clairmont
* BigScrewedUpFamily: The Sinclairs
* DeadAllAlong: [[spoiler:Gat, Johnny, and Mirren.]]

* FourPhilosophyEnsemble: The Liars

* FourTemperamentEnsemble: The Liars

* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness
* TwistEnding

* AnachronicOrder: The story jumps around, mainly between the present summer and Summer Fifteen

* FourPhilosophyEnsemble:

* FourTemperamentEnsemble:

* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness