What I Saw and How I Lied

Blundell, Judy. What I Saw and How I Lied. New York City: Scholastic Press, 2008.

Fifteen year old Evie Spooner lives with her mother (Bev), stepfather (Joe) and Joe’s mother in post World War II Queens. Joe Spooner has come back from the war and done fairly well for himself, opening up a series of appliance stores, but his formerly happy-go-lucky attitude has begun to sour. After a phone call that shakes Joe up, he gathers the family and they leave on a vacation to Palm Beach. Once they arrive, they find that the majority of the town is gone for the season, save for one hotel. Settling in, the family becomes fast friends with the Grayson’s, a husband and wife who are hoteliers back in New York. Joe makes a plan to buy the hotel with Mr. Grayson and tells the family they may eb staying for a while longer. Soon after, Evie meets Peter, a handsome young man who just happens to know Joe from the war. Joe does not seem keen on Peter spending so much time with the group, but Evie continues to seek him out, falling deeper into infatuation. Evie reads all of Peter’s body language and listens intently to his words, only to convince herself of her intense feelings being reciprocated. Eventually, she learns that Peter’s trip to Palm Beach was purposeful rather than coincidental and Joe did something during the war that he can never take back. Meanwhile, the hotel deal has fallen through, and a hurricane is whipping up nearby. Joe convinces Peter and Bev to go out on a boat before they all leave; though the water is treacherous, Peter assures Evie he is good on a boat. The storm nears and passes, but the three adults did not return before it hit shore. When Evie’s parents return, they soon learn that Peter died on the trip and Joe and Bev are implicated in the murder. Evie must step up, swallow the knowledge that she has since gained (it seems that Bev was truly the object of Peter’s affections, not Evie) and help her family overcome the situation they now face.

The language and attention to detail in regard to the setting of the novel truly casts the story in the time it was set. Clothes, shoes, hairstyles and makeup are given extra attention, as they might be when a teen girl is the narrator of the story. In 1947, Palm Beach was a highly segregated community; Jews and African-Americans were not welcome into hotel or even on the island (no deed could be given to members of either community). Returning from a rather tense dinner, Mr. Grayson is given a message and it is revealed that the Graysons are Jewish. The demeanor of the hotel manager changes dramatically, every point of which Evie notes, down to the fact that the manager now seems disgusted to even have the Graysons in the lobby. It evokes emotions in Evie that remind her of how she watched a friend mistreat a Jewish girl back home in the neighborhood. Attention to detail such as this crafts a story that has a foothold in history. Jennifer Hubert remarks on this aspect saying, “Using pitch-perfect dialogue and short sentences filled with meaning, Blundell…subtly explores issues of post WWII racism, sexism and socioeconomic class.” (Booklist)

The whole plot of the story revolves Evie’s changing perspective; she is directly in the middle of her teen years, figuring out love and having her first pangs of affection. Burgeoning womanhood is coupled with a new view on her parents. Always an obedient child, Evie is beginning to notice that not everything that her parents do is in her (or their own) best interest. She starts to comprehend the way that adults communicate with each other, sometimes in subtle undertones and that not everything is on the surface. Evie grapples with the idea of justice, truthfulness and integrity, much as a teen reader would at the same age. She is discovering that not everything is as it appears, nor is everyone the same after traumatic events. Through Evie, the reader can appreciate wrestling with something that seems to difficult, but ultimately knowing and choosing to do the right thing.

Book cover can be found on http://nicolepoliti.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/what-i-saw-and-how-i-lied-by-judy-blundell/