Sarah Lyu Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Sarah Lyu
Author Sarah Lyu grew up just outside of Atlanta, Georgia, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania.

She loves a good hike, however, can often be found with sweet tea in hand and a book in her lap.

Sarah’s favorite part of the writing process is when words flow and it feels as though she is entirely in the zone. There is nothing at all like it and it is the thing that keeps her returning to her desk. The toughest part of it is the bigger picture stuff like structure and plot. She would like nothing better than to just sit and write her two characters hanging out and talking aimlessly.

She was inspired by her relationship with her best friend. When she first got the idea for the novel, they were in their early twenties and right out of college sharing a tiny New York City apartment, and they felt like each other’s whole worlds, at the time. Like “Thelma and Louise” or Frances Ha. She admits this wasn’t the healthiest of relationships.

One day she stumbled on the Wikipedia page for “Heavenly Creatures”. She was led to the Parker-Hulme murder page, which was the basis for the movie. Here, she knew exactly what story she wanted to tell.

She didn’t come to her ending until maybe the fourth or fifth draft, about a year after her editor acquired this novel actually. Very late in the process. She struggled with the structure and plot for the novel. Up to this point, the novel was mainly linear. Once she came up with the idea of the frame story of Remy being interviewed by a detective, the ending clicked right into place.

The original way she planned the novel out, it didn’t work structurally because Remy had to examine each of the things that she had experienced. This wasn’t possibly without the look-back perspective she added in.

The book changed quite a lot from when she started writing it, however the way it opened has remained the same. Even when the story’s timeline was linear, she opened up with a prologue right before Jack’s death.

Elise’s inherited Pink Cadillac (and Pink Mansion) came from this huge house on the bus ride Sarah took to her middle school every day for two years. It had vast grounds and a tiny pond complete with pink swan boats out in front. The house grew in her imagination into the perfect place for Elise’s wealthy family.

In earlier drafts, readers got to meet Elise’s grandma, and she was a really eccentric and interesting person, and she just knew this lady loved pink. So she gave the house a coat of pale pink paint and added in the car, which was truly a real gift that Mary Kay cosmetics would give to their top sales reps. She thought it would be perfect for Remy and Elise, who would both find it cool since it was so very different from what everybody else was driving around in.

Over multiple drafts, Elise’s voice is something that Sarah came to be really proud of. It evolved and deepened in personality, however Sarah believes that it came to her pretty developed already. Much of Elise’s pain she was going through really spoke to Sarah. Elise has a lot of feelings, and is an open character, emotionally speaking that it was easy to converse with her.

Elise is brilliant when it comes to dreaming up the perfect revenge prank, however Sarah isn’t that clever so she had to do a bunch of research. Her favorite of the pranks she read about online involved pouring some tuna oil down into a car’s vent system, which Elise utilizes to great effect in the novel.

To Sarah, Elise and Remy felt entirely real. She would hear them talking to one another in her head, teasing one another in the early stages of their friendship or fighting one another about Jack’s presence in Remy’s life later in the book. Sarah would have to run to get a notepad or her phone to get down whatever they were saying. There was a lot of it that did not end making it into the book, but all of these conversations wound up helping to make both of these characters much more three dimensional.

Sarah’s debut novel, called “The Best Lies”, was released in the year 2019, and was published by Simon Pulse. Her work is from the young adult fiction genre.

“The Best Lies” is the first stand alone novel and was released in the year 2019. A toxic friendship that ends deadly.

Remy Tsai, age seventeen, once knew how her story would end. However, now she doesn’t know what tomorrow is even going to look like. She used to be happy. She had Jack, her boyfriend, and her best friend and soul mate, named Elise, who understood her much better than anybody else in the whole world.

Although, now Jack is dead, having been shot right through the chest. It was Elise who pulled the trigger.

Was it self-defense? Or something much darker than anything Remy could possibly have imagined? While the cops investigate, Remy does the exact same, sifting through each of her memories, looking to find a scrap of truth that might save the friendship that means it all to her.

The novel is highly engaging and readers feel drawn into the story of Elise and Remy. Fans found the depiction of toxic friendship was outstanding and it was like watching a train wreck happening. The novel is well-developed, intricate, dripping in emotional turmoil and it embodies every feeling a teen could have. The novel kept readers guessing the entire time, and felt the gears in their minds turning when considering just how things would play out and end.

Elise is an exciting, electrifying, fierce, and daring person. She is courageous and strong, standing up for others and herself, and sees herself as a sort of vigilante, supposed to right every wrong. The girl is intoxicating and beautiful.

Besides that, Sarah touches on some hard hitting subjects and is able to handle them all beautifully.