Sarah Manguso’s Liars is a haunting novel that dissects a marriage doomed by its own foundations. The novel begins with Jane, an aspiring writer, meeting John, a charismatic filmmaker. Both share lofty dreams of love and artistic success and they waste no time in getting married. Yet, cracks in their shared vision quickly appear. John’s ego and failures begin to overshadow Jane’s growing successes, shifting their dynamic into one defined by his control and her diminishing agency. As John’s whims, whether it’s borrowing money or mocking her accomplishments, take precedence, Jane’s role narrows to one of service, tethered to him by financial dependency and their son.
Through sharp, journal-like prose, Manguso chronicles Jane’s tumultuous partnership with John, exposing the relentless tension between ambition, domesticity, and the narratives society imposes on women.
“The purpose of marriage was to get stuck, I thought, so that one was forced to fix the marriage in lieu of leaving.”
Manguso paints Jane as a woman suffocated not just by John’s narcissism, but by the cultural expectations that valorize self-sacrificing wives and mothers. Jane’s compromises feel achingly familiar, and the choice of the archetypal names “John” and “Jane” underscores the universality of this dynamic. Manguso uses these characters as a canvas to explore how women are conditioned to view domesticity and motherhood as ultimate fulfillment, even when those roles stifle creativity and autonomy. Jane’s lies, unlike John’s self-serving falsehoods, become a means of survival—ways to reconcile herself with an unyielding reality.
‘Liars’ has powerful themes, no doubt, but I felt the weight of repetition marked by constant relocations, thwarted ambitions, and John’s disdain. This narrative loop effectively captures Jane’s sense of entrapment but makes for claustrophobic reading. Manguso’s restraint in revealing John’s perspective adds to this sense of incompleteness. While the omission highlights Jane’s silenced voice, it also denies the reader the complexity of his motives. I also don’t know why the son was referred to as ‘child’ all the time, either.
In the end, though, the novel does rise above some of its flaws as it pushes us to reflect on our actions – should we judge, and wonder why Jane doesn’t leave this despicable man or understand that it’s not as easy as we think it is?
“I thought, If I had the energy I’d leave him, and then I folded up that little thought, wrapped it in gauze, and swallowed it.”
In that sense, it’s a striking portrait of modern marriage and the quiet resilience of women trapped within it.
An unsettling read.
