Little Bitty Lies

Little Bitty Lies is Mary Kay Andrews’s 2003 novel, an early entry in her contemporary southern fiction catalogue and one of the books that helped establish her as one of the bestselling names in the genre. The novel is set in suburban Atlanta and centers on Mary Bliss McGowan, a forty something teacher whose seemingly perfect life is upended when her husband Parker disappears. Parker has not just walked out. He has emptied their savings, taken their financial records, and vanished completely, leaving Mary Bliss with their teenage daughter Erin, an underwater mortgage, and the kind of practical crisis that the social pressures of suburban Atlanta make even more difficult to navigate.

Mary Bliss makes the impulsive decision to keep her husband’s disappearance secret from everyone, including her own family. She tells the neighbors and the wider community that Parker is on a long business trip in Europe, and she sets about figuring out how to keep up appearances while she tries to track him down and figure out what has actually happened. The little bitty lies of the title accumulate quickly. Mary Bliss has to lie to her mother in law about Parker’s whereabouts. She has to lie to Erin about why her father has not called. She has to lie to her oldest friend Katharine about the financial situation that is getting worse week by week. The stack of small lies starts to look more and more like a dangerous structure that any single careless moment could bring down.

Mary Kay Andrews handles the situation with her characteristic warmth and humor. Even as Mary Bliss’s situation becomes genuinely difficult, the novel is funny in the way Andrews’s fiction reliably is, with the supporting cast of suburban Atlanta neighbors, the church ladies, and the various other figures who populate Mary Bliss’s world providing the comic energy that keeps the novel moving. The Atlanta setting is rendered with affection and specific detail, the southern social codes are handled with knowing precision, and the eventual unfolding of what has actually happened to Parker pays off in ways that the slow building setup has earned.

For longtime Mary Kay Andrews fans, Little Bitty Lies is one of the early novels that established her brand. For new readers, it is a strong introduction to her contemporary southern fiction.