Unbelievable
Quotes from the Book
I'm still here, bitches. And I know everything." -A
You know what they say about hope. It breeds eternal misery!
I kind of have to go to the bathroom," Aria said woozily. Ezra smiled. "Can I come?
Only two can keep a secret if one of them is dead.
When someone covets something they desire and lust over it.Usually it's something they can't have. You've always had that problem...
,the rest of the girls pretended not to notice. That's just what best friends do.
SPENCER: Hide and seek was my favorite game with Melissa. You want to know why? I always won.
Mike drank straight from the carton, wiped his mouth, and stared at her. "You've been acting freaky. Are you high? Can I have some if you are?
I've always hated biology who cares how a cell divides, it just does
It's like you're reading a book and every time someone's tearing the pages.
Holy shit,” Spencer said. She held her T-shirt up against her naked chest. “What is it? Wren asked. Spencer stepped back. Her throat was dry. “Oh,” she croaked. “Oh,” Wren echoed. Melissa stood outside the window, her hair messay and Medusa-like, her face absolutely expressionless. A cigarette shook in her tiny, usually steady fingers. “I didn’t know you smoked,” Spencer finally said.
So then they’d snuggled up to each other, naked, and started to talk. Ezra told her about the time he was six and sculpted a red squirrel out of clay, only to have his brother squash it. How he used to smoke a lot of pot after his parents got divorced. About the time he had to take the family’s fox terrier to the vet to have her put to sleep. Aria told him about how when she was little, she kept a can of split pea soup named Pee as a pet and cried when her mom tried to cook Pee for dinner.
You know what they say about hope, it breeds eternal misery
You’ve been acting freaky. Are you high? Can I have some if you are?
DON’T MIND ME, I’M JUST DEAD!
Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead." -Benjamin Franklin.
They felt kind of like dolls, with Ali arranging their every move.
I’m still here, bitches. And I know everything. —A
Three may keep a secret if two of them are dead. -Benjamin Franklin
I bet you thought I was Alison, didn't you? Well, sorry, but I'm not. Duh. She's dead.
Did you know?
- Pretty Little Liars was published by HarperTeen in October 2006 as the first book in the series.
- The story is set in the fictional affluent town of Rosewood, Pennsylvania.
- The four central friends are Spencer Hastings, Hanna Marin, Aria Montgomery, and Emily Fields.
- The main Pretty Little Liars series comprises sixteen novels.
- A television adaptation loosely based on the novels debuted on ABC Family on June 8, 2010.
- Author Sara Shepard loosely based the series on her own upbringing in Pennsylvania.
About Sara Shepard
About the book
Pretty Little Liars is the 2006 young-adult mystery novel that launched Sara Shepard's bestselling series. Set in the affluent suburb of Rosewood, Pennsylvania, it follows four teenage girls -- Spencer Hastings, Hanna Marin, Aria Montgomery, and Emily Fields -- whose tight-knit clique fell apart after the mysterious disappearance of their charismatic leader, Alison DiLaurentis. Three years later, the former friends have drifted into separate lives, each guarding a private secret, when they begin receiving taunting messages signed only 'A,' a stranger who seems to know everything they thought was buried.
The novel weaves together suspense with the everyday anxieties of high school -- popularity, family pressure, first love, and the fear of exposure. Each girl narrates her own strand of the story, and the anonymous threats from 'A' escalate as the mystery of what really happened to Alison deepens. Shepard drew on her own upbringing in the suburbs of Pennsylvania to render the world of privileged teens, and the book's blend of glossy detail and creeping dread became the template for the fifteen novels that followed.
The book became a cultural touchstone for a generation of readers and was adapted into a hit television series that debuted on ABC Family in 2010, broadening the franchise's reach far beyond its original audience. Its central themes -- the impossibility of keeping secrets, the fragility of friendship, and the ways guilt and surveillance shadow ordinary lives -- gave the story a resonance that helped define the wave of twisty, ensemble-driven YA thrillers that came after it.
Key characters
- Alison DiLaurentisThe clique's magnetic leader whose disappearance sets the story in motion
- Spencer HastingsIntelligent, fiercely competitive overachiever
- Hanna MarinPopularity-focused girl reinventing herself after Alison's vanishing
- Aria MontgomeryQuirky, artistic outsider hiding a family secret
- Emily FieldsAthletic swimmer wrestling with her identity and feelings
- AThe anonymous sender of threatening messages who knows the girls' secrets
Book details
- First published
- 2006
- Length
- 304 pages
- Reading time
- 5 hours
- Author
- Sara Shepard
- Genre
- Contemporary
- Goodreads rating
- 3.84 (216k ratings) →
- First line
- “Imagine it's a couple of years ago, the summer between seventh and eighth grade.”
Series & reading order
- 1 Pretty Little Liars
- 2 Flawless
- 3 Perfect
- 4 Unbelievable
Movie & TV adaptations
- IMDb
If you liked this, read…
- 1The Lying GameAlso by Sara Shepard, another suspenseful YA mystery about secrets and a missing girl
- 2One of Us Is LyingEnsemble YA thriller where high schoolers' secrets drive a central mystery
- 3Gossip GirlPrivileged teens in an exclusive world stalked by an anonymous, all-knowing narrator
Keep reading
The Lying Game
Out of Sight, Out of Time
Fangirl
Burned
Flawless
Cracked Up to Be
The Queen of Zombie Hearts
The Princess Diaries
The Secret Place
Seventh Grave and No Body
The Dead Girls' Dance
Secret
Through the Zombie Glass
Jealousy
The Summoning
Marked
Good Girl, Bad Blood
Supernaturally
Remember Me?
Girl of Nightmares
The Shining Girls
One of Us Is Lying
The Fine Art of Truth or Dare
Gone
The Darkest Minds
Evernight
The Basic Eight
Twisted
Unmade
Battle Royale
Evermore
The Opal Deception
Shadowland
The Rule of Thoughts
Only the Good Spy Young
A Visit from the Goon Squad
Losing It
Never Fade
Untold
Epilogue
Peeps
Runaway
All Together Dead
The Impossible Knife of Memory
The Rules of Attraction
Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet
Caught
Beautiful Creatures
Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy
The Archived
Dead, Undead, or Somewhere in Between
Neverseen
The Name of the Star
Fade
Awry
Dead as a Doornail
Alienated
Flat-Out Love
Last Light
Half-Blood

