Celebrate Lit / June 1, 2020

I’ll Take the Lie

About the Book, I’ll Take the Lie

Book: I’ll Take the Lie

Author: Nancy E. Wood

Genre: Christian YA

Release Date: June 28, 2019

Does the truth really set you free?

Paige Hall doubts it, after her boyfriend Justin tells her he’s over it, leaving her with a broken heart and crushed dreams. When Justin disappears, she can’t help but try to find out what happened to him. But when the more she searches, the more problems arise, she can’t help but wonder if it would be better to just accept the lie…

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My Thoughts on I’ll Take the Lie:

Christian fiction for young adults is quickly becoming a genre I read a lot of. It’s not because it’s my favorite genre. It isn’t. But, my children are getting older and I want to know what they’re reading is good and wholesome and encouraging. My children are growing and learning and I want what they read to not be a stumbling block. We can’t unsee or unread what we’ve allowed to enter our minds.

I’ll Take the Lie brings you a reality where the truth is stranger than the lie and where when you search for the truth you wonder if you should have possibly just left the lie as your truth.

This is a well-written book. I enjoyed reading it. But I’m on the fence on whether I think my 15-year-old daughter should read it. There is a lot of “real life” stuff in the book and lots of relationship issues both with parents and friends. In my personal opinion, this book would be better suited for an older teen or even a college-age person.

I have voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book which I received from Celebrate Lit. All views expressed are only my honest opinion. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the FTC regulations.

About the Author of I’ll Take the Lie

Nancy E Wood was born into a missionary family and lived in Hungary until she turned twenty. Her whole childhood, she loved reading and stories, writing some of her own, but never believing she actually had the talent to be an author. Speaking multiple languages, she never thought she would be good enough in any to become a wordsmith.

Her senior year of high school, she was encouraged to write short stories, one of which turned into Perfect, a novel that couldn’t stay short. After sharing it with a few people, she decided to get it published a couple years later. She went to college in Florida, where she studied English and Music. After graduating, she married and moved to California. She published her second standalone book, I’ll Take the Lie, in the summer of 2019 and is currently working on a sequel to Perfect. Nancy also runs a blog for young women, where she writes relatable and motivational posts that point to God. She has also done some speaking in different Christian schools and youth groups, encouraging teens to pursue Christ through some of the most difficult years of their lives.

More from Nancy

What’s truth? Why is it important? Does everyone have their own kind of truth or is there only one?

Those were questions I was dealing with in my college Apologetics class while I wrote I’ll Take the Lie, and I thought that theme would fit so well into the story.

The idea came to me a long time ago. I was really into The Great Gatsby at the time and wanted to write a story from a bystander’s point of view. Originally titled What’s Wrong with Alex?, Paige, the worried sister of Alex, who drastically changed over his first semester of college, wants to find out what happened to him. But the deeper I went into the story, the more Paige’s character shone through, and she soon became the protagonist with her ex-boyfriend’s mysterious disappearance. The whole theme tied into what I was studying about apologetics and truth, so the messy pieces all came together into a solid plot.

Paige isn’t a believer, and she doesn’t really care about the idea of truth and spirituality until she gets dragged into it. It’s my hope that this book story helps young adults like me think deeper and question their beliefs. We get so caught up with our own happiness, we don’t always want to accept the hard truth. But, like Paige, we need to think about whether we can keep living pretend lives or if the truth really does set us free.