The Mystery Writer

 

The Mystery Writer by Sulari Gentill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Quite often things are not what they seem. Sometimes it’s because we want them to be a certain way, so we ignore that little niggling feeling creeping around in our brain. Theodosia is a writer. I should say once an aspiring lawyer and now an aspiring writer. When she meets a quite reclusive but famous writer, she can hardly believe he talks about writing with her. When she finds out he is dead, she has no idea the depth of the problems she will face nor the trouble she will bring to those around her.

This is a quick read, one filled with lots of suspense. Actually, I rarely put it down. It’s well-written and flows well, and its characters are painted well enough that you become them a little or at least feel their frustration and concern.

I really enjoyed this book and its plot. However, there was one item that felt incongruent from the beginning, a key point of the whole story. There was little interaction at the start of the book with Dan the writer. In fact, there was so little mention of him that I couldn’t understand how they could possibly have been so in love. The book dwelt on the restaurant many writers worked at, and the amount of time Theo and Dan talked across a booth table. I was even confused about why she was walking outside his house when she found him. The beginning of the book made it sound like a deep infatuation or a fling to me and yet Theo cried and mourned over him throughout the book. This did not ruin the story for me. I just kept thinking “ok, give me a break” every time she thought over how much she loved Dan and teared up again.

Thanks to Netgalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an advance copy of this book. All opinions are 100% my own.

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