One of Us Is Back

One of Us Is Back is a YA thriller novel, the third in the One of Us Is Lying series. The first novel, One of Us Is Lying, begins when five students are given detention at Bayview High School for having cell phones despite the no phones rule. The students are Bronwyn Rojas, Nate Macauley, Cooper Clay, Addy Prentiss, and Simon Kelleher. The teacher leaves the room to check on a disturbance in the parking lot. Simon drinks water from a cup and dies of anaphylaxis due to his peanut allergy. The police determine Simon’s death is homicide. The investigation reveals that Simon ran an app called About That that revealed secrets about other students, and he had secrets about each of the four students in detention with him. These students are investigated as suspects and are dubbed the Bayview Four, or the Murder Club.

The Bayview Four initially accuse each other, but soon they become friends. Nate is arrested for Simon’s death, but the Bayview Four continue to investigate on their own. Addy befriends Simon’s friend Janae and when Janae stops showing up at school, Addy goes to her home to check on her. There, Janae confesses to helping Simon orchestrate his death in an assisted suicide. She also confesses that Jake Riordan was manipulated into helping by Simon, who told Jake that Addy cheated on him. Simon convinced Jake to help with his death, and in return, Janae would plant evidence to incriminate Addy. However, Janae planted the evidence to frame Nate instead. When Jake realizes Addy knows the truth, he attacks her. Jake is arrested and sentenced to juvenile detention until the age of 25.

The sequel, One of Us Is Next, begins nearly two years after Simon’s death. Eli Kleinfelter, Nate’s former defense lawyer, is receiving death threats at his nonprofit firm, Until Proven. At the same time, three juniors at Bayview High School—Maeve Rojas, Knox Meyers, and Phoebe Lawton—receive text messages from someone called the Unknown and are manipulated into playing a truth or dare game. Phoebe is the first player, and she chooses truth. The Unknown reveals that she had sex with her sister Emma’s boyfriend. The next few players choose dare. The dares are harmless.

The game continues, and another local kid, Brandon, takes a dare and jumps off a faulty landing to his death. Maeve, Phoebe, and Knox investigate the game and they discover that a man whose brother was part of a case Eli handled is behind the game. His name is Jared Jackson. They also discover that Brandon caused the accident that killed Emma, Phoebe, and Owen’s father. Emma planned the truth or dare game with Jared to get revenge for her father’s death. However, when Emma realized that Jared was planning to hurt people, she stopped working with him. Yet, when Emma and Phoebe are interviewed by the police, they see the more recent text messages between Jared and his partner and realize their 12-year-old brother took up where Emma left off. They choose not to tell anyone.

Eli is engaged to marry Addy’s older sister, Ashton. Jared plants a bomb outside Eli’s wedding rehearsal party. Knox and Maeve find the bomb and throw it into the woods behind the venue. The third novel in the series, One of Us Is Back, begins nearly three months after the events of One of Us Is Next.