‘We Were Liars’ Returns: How Julie Plec, E. Lockhart and Carina Mackenzie Brought YA Bestseller to Life

When E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars hit shelves in 2014, it changed the way the world looked at teenagers. Beechwood Island looked like the perfect summer escape, but beneath the sun and salt was a twisted tale of grief, privilege, first love and buried secrets. The book became an instant bestseller, redefining YA with its moody words, foggy memories, and a gut-punching twist no one saw coming.

A decade later, the book is back in the spotlight, but this time as an eight-episode Prime Video series. Starring Emily Alyn Lind, Esther McGregor, Shubham Maheshwari and Joseph Zada, behind its screen revival are three women with deep roots in the genre: Julie Plec (The Vampire Diaries), Carina Adly MacKenzie (Roswell, New Mexico), and Lockhart herself.

The Hollywood Reporter India sat down with the trio to talk memory, love, and why YA storytelling is more relevant than ever.

“I think that my entire career has been built off the desire to make people feel really big feelings,” says Plec, who is the co-showrunner of the series with MacKenzie. “I live in a world that explores themes of love and family. This book, that I read so many years ago, was the beginning of my desire to make people feel those things.” A desire that made her fight for 10 years to own the rights to be the one to make it.

Like The Vampire Diaries, We Were Liars revolves around love stories filled with tension, secrets, and a sense of doom. “In Vampire Diaries, there’s this intense love story — and he’s the worst person for her to fall in love with,” Lockhart jokes. “In We Were Liars, Gat is also the worst person for Cadence to fall in love with, for two different reasons in two different timelines.”

That contradiction — the heart wants what it shouldn’t — is Plec’s “bread and butter.” “I love him, but he’s also not... there’s something huge and insurmountable between us,” she says, summing up the emotional knot at the centre of the show.

A still from 'We Were Liars'.courtesy of prime video

Starring Emily Alyn Lind as Cadence Sinclair Eastman, the series follows the teen heiress as she returns to her family’s private island — Beechwood — a year after a traumatic accident she can’t remember. As she pieces together the summer she’s forgotten, truths about love, privilege, and the tight-lipped Sinclair clan begin to unravel. The show’s visual style leans heavily into dreamy nostalgia — all blurred edges, seaside light, and carefully fractured timelines.

“It’s a really cerebral story,” says MacKenzie, who calls the project one of the hardest that she’s tackled. “In the book, Cadence’s confusion manifests itself in metaphors and fairy tales. [To show that on-screen], we had to trust in an actor, which was a little scary at the beginning.” The creator cheekily admits they did an amazing job with casting.

Lind, who plays a Cadence haunted by trauma and memories that don’t add up, had to embody two emotional timelines at once. “She played two characters in order to give us what we needed on either side of those memories,” MacKenzie explains. “And then our cinematographers and directors did a lot of work with light and camera angles to make it feel a little bit nostalgic. It feels a little bit like you're lying in bed at night watching an old memory, which I love.”

Lockhart, who wrote the finale episode, remained closely involved in shaping the show’s emotional tone. “It’s all much more beautiful than I ever imagined,” she says. “My imagination is in some ways less cinematic than this show. Our actors, our landscapes — they’re so unbelievably beautiful. Mostly, I’ve felt a kind of awe at how big the scope of the show is.”

She especially enjoyed being part of the post-production process — sending notes on edits, sound design, and final cuts. “To see the show rise up as the sound was layered in, the music added, the edits [tightened] — that was magical. I learned so much from that process.”

Fans of Plec’s past work will also spot a familiar face. Candice King, who played Caroline Forbes on The Vampire Diaries, returns to the fold in a breakout performance as Bess, one of Cadence’s aunts. When asked how they felt about working with her again, Julie Plec joked it was “the worst,” with Carina Adly MacKenzie chiming in, “Terrible.”

A still from 'We Were Liars'.courtesy of prime video

“When I was putting Bess's words on the page, all I heard in my head was Candice,” continues Plec. “We said, wouldn’t it be great if she was old enough to play this? And then we just made her audition. She might not have gotten it — but then she came alive on screen and was so believably perfect that it was undeniable.”

For MacKenzie, too, casting King was a full-circle moment. “When she came in to read for Bess — we wanted her to audition so that we could show everyone else that we work with what Candice is capable of — and she even surprised us.”

For all three women, We Were Liars represents more than just a twisty adaptation of a viral YA book. It’s part of an ongoing effort to take young adult stories seriously — and break them out of their publishing niche. “The best YA isn’t about sounding like teenagers,” says Plec. “It is when you approach it as a multi-generational story. The themes, the circumstances, the stakes — they’re adult.”

What she says to the world is this: Don’t put the YA in a box, because it is perhaps, the most accessible genre — across generations — that exists in television.

MacKenzie agrees. “This is my first time writing for teen characters. And I didn’t change the way I write. Teenagers have adult feelings. Their behaviour might be immature, but their emotions are real, valid and complicated.”

As We Were Liars lands on Prime Video, it carries with it the weight of old wounds and the glow of new beginnings — a story both timeless and very much of the moment. For those who grew up with the book, and those discovering it through Instagram reels, it’s another reminder: if you want to survive Beechwood, you better remember what you forgot.

We Were Liars is now streaming on Prime Video.