Literary Thriller Review: The Mystery Writer | Sulari Gentill

Sulari Gentill is a master of the literary thriller game. She has this extraordinary talent to take the concept for a thriller and build it out in a complicated and daring plot that is unpredictable at each step and somehow lands at the finish with a standing-ovation-worthy ending! In her latest novel, The Mystery Writer, an aspiring writer finds the murdered body of her writing mentor, and it turns out that is only the beginning of her journey to the truth…

About the Book | The Mystery Writer

Theodosia “Theo” Benton has dropped out of law school in Australia to pursue a career in writing. She arrives unannounced at her brother Gus’s door in Lawrence, Kansas (and finds him at a slightly compromising moment) to ask if she can stay with him while she works on her writing. Gus is an attorney himself, but offers her a place to stay and support, though he encourages her to leave the apartment each day to write.

It is on one of these excursions that Theo happens to meet a famous writer named Dan Murdoch. Even more unexpected, the two have a wonderful conversation and over the following months Murdoch becomes a mentor to Theo on her writing. Despite their age difference, Dan and Theo share an intimate night together. When Gus learns that Theo has more than a casual relationship with Dan, he asks to meet him. However, when Theo arrives at Dan’s apartment she discovers he has been murdered.

In the wake of this terrible crime, things begin to get much more complicated. Theo is approached by Dan’s former literary agent who has expressed interest in her work, which she got from Dan. The publishing agency is known as one of the best in the world, but that comes with a rather strict contract should Theo sign with them. Meanwhile, the police are questioning how Theo came to be at Dan’s apartment and whether she knows more about his murder than she lets on.

Several strange occurrences seem to link to Dan’s murder, but Theo isn’t sure how. A neighbor drops off a letter that was mistakenly delivered to his house. The letter is from Dan to Theo and must have been sent before his death. Meanwhile Dan was involved in an anonymous underground conspiracy community that he says he was using for research, but they seem to know his real identity and that his unpublished manuscript may be the key to what they are searching for. Gus worries that Theo’s life may be in danger and asks his friend Mac, a private investigator, to keep an eye out when another murder happens that appears to tie into the web of mysteries surrounding Dan’s death. And that is only the beginning of what Theo will have to go through to understand what is really going on…

Review | The Mystery Writer

It was hard to write that plot summary for a couple of reasons. The first is that the story itself is highly complex and difficult to explain succinctly if you aren’t immersed in it. The second is that several things that happen early in the book make little sense until later in the book. Which leads to the third challenge of avoiding saying too much that may spoil some twists and turns that happen. In my opinion the official synopsis on Goodreads (which I will include at the end of this post in case you want to read it), includes pieces of the story that occur well past 50% of the story. I debated whether to include them or not because they do give a better picture of the bones of this mystery, but I also want to allow readers to experience the story themselves.

This is an intricately plotted story. I can’t even begin to describe how many different threads pull in that seem to distract from what really happened, until the end when everything is expertly laid out to show that not a single thread was extraneous to the conclusion. I don’t think this book will be for everyone—for those familiar with Gentill’s writing, she is an expert at an outlandish literary plot. Nothing about this is a straight forward murder mystery. But don’t forget the title—this is at its core a story about a mystery writer and all will eventually tie into that when the mystery comes together.

Theo is an infuriatingly naïve character and that leads Gus and eventually his friend Mac to be a bit over protective of her. But based on some things that happen, it seems they may not have been protective enough! Gus is an intelligent and funny person, and the backstory that you’ll learn about him and Theo and why they are living in different countries adds quite a bit of texture to the story.

As the plot teaser says, there’s nothing easier to dismiss than a conspiracy theory—until it turns out to be true. And this story has a lot of fascinating plot lines that surround conspiracies. The question is if and how they are related?

Dan Murdoch was deeply embedded in an online conspiracy group that he claims was for research. However, his murder only adds more questions about this group. Are they behind it? Is the conspiracy they believe in not-so-far-fetched after all? Or is Dan’s murder unrelated? Mirroring the shadowy online conspiracy group are the very public conspiracists that largely include Mac’s direct family. These characters were such a bizarre delight in the story, and they may just serve a purpose after all. It turns out that being a dooms day prepper means you have solutions, tools, and a social network in place to solve a lot of unexpected occurrences…

I loved this novel! I was fascinated by the direction the plot went in after Dan’s death and the investigation gets moving. At some point it switches perspectives and jumps in time. Gentill has a way of crafting her stories that always make the reader feel slightly off-kilter, which adds to experiencing the story. After all, her stories are twisted and feeling off-kilter matches what the characters are experiencing. The ending is intense and I suspect it may be polarizing for some readers! I’ve seen a few reviewers that thought this story went too far off the rails, but I felt the opposite. The story is a high-speed ride with no seatbelt on and I loved every minute of it!

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press for my copy. Opinions are my own.

Audiobook Review

I actually loved the audiobook for this story! The writer and main characters are Australian so the narration used an Australian accent as appropriate. Sometimes Australian audiobook narrators have a flatter tone that can make it so I have to listen extra attentively to follow the story. That wasn’t the case with Katherine Littrell’s narration of The Mystery Writer. Littrell narrates with a dynamic cadence that perfectly suits this slightly bonkers, twist-y, fun literary thriller.

About the Author | Sulari Gentill

Once upon a time, Sulari Gentill was a corporate lawyer serving as a director on public boards, with only a vague disquiet that there was something else she was meant to do. That feeling did not go away until she began to write. And so Sulari became the author of the Rowland Sinclair Mysteries: thus far, ten historical crime novels chronicling the life and adventures of her 1930s Australian gentleman artist, the Hero Trilogy, based on the myths and epics of the ancient world, and the Ned Kelly Award winning Crossing the Lines (published in the US as After She Wrote Hime). In 2014 she collaborated with National Gallery of Victoria to write a short story which was produced in audio to feature in the Fashion Detective Exhibition, and thereafter published by the NGV. IN 2019 Sulari was part of a 4-member delegation of Australian crime writers sponsored by the Australia Council to tour the US as ambassadors of Australian Crime Writing.

Sulari lives with her husband, Michael, and their boys, Edmund and Atticus, on a small farm in Batlow where she grows French Black Truffles and refers to her writing as “work” so that no one will suggest she get a real job.

Official Synopsis | Goodreads

When Theodosia Benton abandons her career path as an attorney and shows up on her brother’s doorstep with two suitcases and an unfinished novel, she expects to face a few challenges. Will her brother support her ambition or send her back to finish her degree? What will her parents say when they learn of her decision? Does she even have what it takes to be a successful writer?

What Theo never expects is to be drawn into a hidden literary world in which identity is something that can be lost and remade for the sake of an audience. When her mentor, a highly successful author, is brutally murdered, Theo wants the killer to be found and justice to be served. Then the police begin looking at her brother, Gus, as their prime suspect, and Theo does the unthinkable in order to protect him. But the writer has left a trail, a thread out of the labyrinth in the form of a story. Gus finds that thread and follows it, and in his attempt to save his sister he inadvertently threatens the foundations of the labyrinth itself. To protect the carefully constructed narrative, Theo Benton, and everyone looking for her, will have to die.