The Little Liar Mitch Albom review

A Reflection on Truth, Tears, and the Impossible Choices of a Boy Named Nico

The Little Liar is a book written by Mitch Albom. It deserves to be read.

I had no interest in reading this book.

Not because I thought it wasn’t good—just… something about it made me hesitate. Maybe it was the title. Or maybe it was because my daughter had read it first and told me it changed her life. Sometimes when a story hits that close to home for someone you love, you want to hold it at a distance. You want to brace yourself.

But one afternoon, I opened it.

And I met Nico.

A boy who told the truth.

A boy who was taught that truth was everything.

A boy who, in one impossible moment, was used by evil in the cruelest of ways.

Why Mitch Albom’s The Little Liar Matters Now

I won’t walk through the whole plot. If you haven’t read The Little Liar, I hope you will. But I will tell you this:

It gutted me.

It’s not often I cry through chapters. But this one? It cracked something open.

Mitch Albom writes in a way that’s accessible—even simple—but somehow, it pierces deeper than many literary novels do. I usually gravitate toward classics—slow burns, long walks through a character’s soul. But this? This was its own kind of literature. A fast read with a slow ache.

Nico was put in an impossible position. And what tore at me most was not just the lie itself—but how long he carried it.

How grief and shame settled into him like old companions.

How the war may have ended, but for him, it never really did.

And yet… this isn’t a hopeless book.

It’s about mercy.

It’s about how we carry guilt that doesn’t belong to us.

It’s about what truth looks like when it’s tangled in trauma.

And it’s about how healing sometimes comes in quiet ways—unexpected ways—years after we thought it was too late.

I think that’s why I’m still sitting with it.

Because some of us are Nico.

We were just kids when the world asked more of us than we could bear.

We told the truth and still got punished.

Or we were lied to, and our innocence was stolen in the fallout.

But there is mercy.

There is always mercy.

It doesn’t erase the pain.

It doesn’t fix the past.

But it offers a way forward.

And maybe that’s why this story matters so much right now.

Because we are all, in some way, still trying to make peace with the lies we were told—or the ones we believed.

I know I am.

In a way, I feel like Nico.

I, too, was sold a version of the world that shimmered like something good.

I was told life was beautiful. That if I just walked in, it would open up with wonder and welcome. And for a while, it did.

I didn’t know about the hard things yet.

Growing up with less didn’t feel like less—because it was life, and it was mine.

We didn’t go on fancy vacations, but we caught fireflies and spiders in jars.

We picked apples from Ms. Riba’s tree.

We laughed in the streets and played until the streetlights buzzed on.

But then I moved up.

And that’s when I saw it—the scale I didn’t know existed.

What I called “more” suddenly looked like “not enough” in someone else’s light.

And that realization stung.

That sort of awakening can wound you, slow and deep.

But Nico? He wasn’t just wounded.

He was torched.

Burned by betrayal.

Scorched by the weight of innocence turned against him.

The reality of this book was all too real.

What do you do when you wake up from the innocence of childhood—when the magic fades and the ache takes its place?

What happens when the world breaks your heart over and over again?

I think of my husband.

He lost his mother at seven.

That kind of sorrow leaves a mark—a limp your heart walks with forever.

And I’ve seen it in him—that quiet ache. That missing piece.

So many times, when we’ve talked about his loss, I’ve wished I could go back in time just to hug young Siafa.

To let him know he wasn’t alone.

To weep with him for what he never got to keep.

That’s how I felt reading about Nico.

And the girl.

I wanted to say, Nico, I’m so sorry you had to go through this.

I wanted to hold his face in my hands and cry for the child who never got to finish being a child.

So Mitch Albom did something rare and beautiful with this story.

He pulled the curtain back.

He let us feel the full weight of grief and guilt and grace.

And even though it’s not the kind of book I’ll likely pick up again—it’s the kind that never really leaves you.

Like my daughter said, “It changed me.”

And now I know what she meant.

It changed me too.

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If this post spoke to you…

Share it with someone who might need it, too. Whether it’s a quiet encouragement or a new way of seeing things, these reflections are meant to be passed along.

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Martina Griffin is a Catholic convert, writer, wife, and mother of four. She writes about faith, motherhood, beauty, books, and the quiet ache of transformation. A lover of popcorn, deep questions, and old classics, she shares her heart at Big Bowl of Popcorn—one post at a time. Instagram | Facebook | Email Me

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