“Still, there might be something fitting about a friendship based on a common love of words being founded on an exchange of the same.”

The Boston Public Library’s opulent reading room is serene until a woman’s horrified scream breaks the stillness. Security personnel takes over right away, telling everyone inside to remain put until the threat is discovered and neutralized. Four strangers who happened to be seated at the same table while waiting for the all-clear engage in discussion and formed friendships during this period. Each person was in the reading room that morning for a different reason; it just so happens that one of them is a murderer. In the Boston Public Library, Harriet, an Australian implant writer, stares towards the ceiling in the hopes of getting ideas for a new book. Fortunately, Cain, Whit, and Marigold are seated at the same table when they overhear the horrifying sound of a lady screaming. They end up becoming friends quickly and easily after being shocked. only to learn quickly that the wailing woman had been killed. Who killed her? Could it be a person seated at the table?

This entertaining mystery is recounted from Harriet’s point of view. Leo, a reader of Hannah, the author of the novel we’re reading, is featured in alternating chapters that tell a story within a story. I’ll start by saying I liked this. Life intervened, forcing me to put it down, but it continued to circulate in my thoughts, which was a very nice thing. It was an unusual read because it was told in two tracks (first, the author’s writing of the title story and then, second, the communication of her beta reader responding to the narrative with comments and ideas). I’ve read novels in this style before, but this one stood out as being interesting.

I thought this part of the narrative was cleverer, funnier, and slightly creepier than the main one, and it built to its conclusion in a more gratifying way. Although it does demand some concentration and the primary plot’s resolution felt anticlimactic to me, I still found the mystery to be quite fascinating, though I did feel a little lost in the first few chapters as I tried to understand the characters. I do not doubt that this very original and modern interpretation of a murder mystery will be very well received. Readers are taken on a nuanced journey by Gentill into the confusing world of friendships, where things may not always be as they seem. Even though I figured this one out, the characters and plots are so deceptively camouflaged that it had no impact on how much I enjoyed reading. This tale is dark, suspenseful, and incredibly engaging. This will be a hit with mystery lovers.

The Woman in the Library is a layered murder mystery. Four strangers are seated together at the library when they hear a woman's scream. This event brings these strangers together, and together they investigate not only who did it, but what exactly transpired to begin with.

First of all, I loved that the story took place at the Boston Public Library, a famously old and beautiful location. The story itself was interesting with three different threads running through the book, the actual story with the four strangers, the notes/book that the author is writing based on the scream in the library, and a series of letters mailed to the author. While I loved this aspect, the storylines did get a bit muddled and confusing. I gave the book 3 stars for this reason. An excellent setting and great characters, but just a little too messy for me to enjoy. Would still recommend for someone who can focus on the storylines and enjoys a mystery within a mystery!

If you are looking for a murder mystery that is incredibly well crafted, will keep you guessing around every turn, and has a cast of characters that you will fall hard for… LOOK NO FURTHER!! I am absolutely enthralled with this book! The alternating chapter perspectives provide an additional sub plot that is just as intriguing as the main plot. I still have some questions about the ending, and it will probably live rent free in my head for a while. Highly, highly recommend this book!!

It seems readers are either absolutely loving this book - or not. Unfortunately, I did not. I did not finish. I like the premise, and the way it was written was so different, but it didn't hold my attention. I'm so disappointed that I didn't love it. Doesn't mean others won't. I hope they do.

DNF at 20%

Ultimately, I can’t get into this one no matter how hard I try. The writing style is odd, and audio being my primary form of consumption isn’t helping. I’d be better off putting this one down than forcing my way through a plot that I don’t really care about.

I was not expecting this. I went thinking one thing and end thinking otheer completely different. The plot was amazin true be told. Loved to see the 4 different povs. My mind just kept blowing troughout the entire book.

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill is a terrific whodunnit that very well be one of the most original novels I have picked up in some time.

Summary -

Four strangers share a table in the reading room at the Boston Public Library when the peaceful calm is shattered by a woman's scream. The four, Winifred, Marigold, Whit and Cain now find themselves thrust into a mystery. Who screamed and why? Security on first inspection could find no reason for the scream or anyone who actually witnessed it. Until the next day, when...

"...I look up. A reporter talking to camera. '...the body of a young woman was discovered by cleaning staff in the Boston Public Library.'
I close the laptop and turn up the volume, leaning forward towards the television. A body, My God, the scream! The reporter tells me nothing more of any use. I switch to another station, but the report is much the same. The body is not identified beyond being that of a young woman.
My phone rings. It's Marigold. 'The news! Did you see the news?'
'Yes.'
'That scream.' Marigold sounds more excited than frightened. 'That must have been her.'
'I wonder why they didn't find her then?'
'Maybe whoever killed her hid the body?'
I smile. 'They didn't say anything about murder..."

Now the four new friends are eager to solve the mystery of the dead woman in the library but in reality, they themselves are only part of a story being written.

"...Dear Hannah,
I sense my Marigold is in danger. Killing her would certainly enhance the sense of tragedy and tension, but it does run the risk of feeding into the cliché that the quirky best friend is there to be killed off. If you are going to take her (and I will mourn that), make sure you don't waste the opportunity to tear the reader apart with the horror of it. Marigold should not go quietly..."

Hannah Tigone is a successful writer embarking on a new novel. Her premise is a murder in the Boston Public Library. Four strangers huddled around a table quietly studying when a woman screams and then these four strangers are strangers no more. Hannah is corresponding with a fan and frustrated writer, Leo, who becomes her beta reader. Chapter by chapter, Hannah sends Leo the proof of the novel and he in turn, responds with his critique.

Only chapter by chapter, Leo's critique becomes more personal and he begins to behave as if the manuscript is actually his. As the messages are sent back and forth, Leo becomes darker and more sinister with each passing chapter.

"...What exactly did the FBI tell you, Whit?'
Whit falls into the couch beside me. 'Cain was convicted of murder in the first degree. He served nearly eight years. Got out about seven years ago, changed his name and wrote a novel.'
'And you didn't think this was something Freddie and I needed to know?' Marigold has recovered enough from the shock of the news to shout at Whit.
I interrupted. 'If he got out seven years ago, and he served nearly eight, he must have been very young when this happened.'
'Unless he lied to us about his age, along with everything else.' Marigold folds her arms.
'We don't know that he's ever lied to us,' I protest.
'He didn't tell us anything about prison!'
'That's not the same thing as lying. None of us has told each other everything.'
Marigold studies me. 'It's a big thing to leave out, Freddie.'
'It's also a big thing to confide..."

The four friends begin to unravel the mystery of the woman in the library and when one of them is attacked, they begin to realize that one of them may actually be the murderer.

Review -

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill is as near perfect a novel as you will ever come across. A tantalizing Russian nesting doll of a tale. The inner story, of the four friends and the Woman in the Library is a tense mystery where the four trust and mistrust one another as they realize how very little they truly know of one another. The outer tale, of Hannah and Leo, is a slow burn of terror and madness that strips away the veneer of normalcy and allows the reader to peer into the paranoia and fear that recent events have wrought.

What is most impressive is that Gentill writes both stories so well. Though the story of Hannah and Leo is more of a short story than a full novel, given the space it is given, it is still very much a well crafted and detailed narrative. The reader is engrossed in both tales and neither one seems to encroach on the other. Like Siamese twins joined at the hip, one does not live without the other.

The mystery of the woman in the library does not suffer from being a story within a story. The reader will care greatly about the characters and the emotional investment needed in such a murder mystery is powerful. You will want the best for Freddie. You will want Cain to be innocent. You will want Whit to act like a grown up and you will want Marigold to learn some boundaries. All the while knowing that they are characters in some one else's book.

The Woman in the Library is a damn good read.

The Boston Public Library’s silence is shattered by a woman’s scream. Security guards lock down the premise and rush to investigate. While they wait, four strangers talk at a reading room table, and an unlikely friendship begins. Each has a reason for being there, each has something to hide, and one of them is a killer.

The Woman in the Library is a brilliantly plotted story. Sulari Gentill takes what could have gone wrong in a million ways and twists it into a compelling and impossible to set aside tale. I would like to give specifics but can’t without ruining some of the elements of surprise. Instead I’ll say that, a story that could have easily tipped toward slow, proved gripping. A tale that, because of its nature, could have kept the reader on the outside became completely immersive. Even with an ever-growing number of strikes against the characters, I couldn’t help but root for them. I wanted an explanation for everything.

Gentill stacked everything up against herself, then she went on to not only overcome each obstacle but shine. Right on the back cover, we are told about four strangers, and one is a murderer. If that doesn’t narrow down the suspects and give the reader a big advantage, then I don’t know what will. But even equipped with that knowledge, Gentill leads us through a never-ending maze of twists and turns, culminating in the shocking ending.

My one qualm with the book falls completely under personal preference. I enjoy reading as a way of escaping for a little bit from the craziness of life. In The Woman in the Library, the author incorporated several occurrences ripped straight from the headlines. For example, Covid and other issues that have plagued our news cycles in the past few years. While they weren’t a predominant part of the book, they came up from time to time. It forced me to deal in fiction with what I already have in real life.

If you enjoy a smartly-written whodunit with a locked room feel to it, then I recommend The Woman in the Library.

The Woman in the Library is a thought-provoking, brilliant and well-executed mystery and thriller book. Hooked right from page one, I found myself musing over the fab four of the BPL who instantly bond over a scream, a murder they just heard. As each finds themselves on a quest to decipher what happens, friendships will be tested, betrayal comes knocking, and motives will be pending a thorough review. Trust backed by love and attraction complicates this, and boundaries will be pushed. Kudos to Sulari for pulling out such an unconventional manner of storytelling whereby the chapters of the book are presented first, followed by the email exchange steeped in reality. This is the marriage of inception and Agatha Christie. I could never have predicted the series of events leading to a well-thought and numbing ending. I went back to read it twice to understand the union between fiction and reality. For mystery and suspense fans, do not skip this one!

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for giving me this ARC. This honest review is left voluntarily,

My thanks to NetGalley for giving me a copy of this for my honest review. This book had high places and low places. I had to reread several sections as it did not flow and I could not keep characters straight. Four strangers are in the library and hear a woman's screams. Parts of the library are closed and after many pages we find out that a woman had been killed. I gave it 4 stars as some of the twists and turns are wonderful in coming to solve the mystery and some of the interactions and relationships. That being said many places I found confusing but all in all a good read.

This was a super-clever story within a story within a series of letters, and keeping up with it via audiobook was a little tough but well worth it.

The novel involves a best-selling writer who is sending beta chapters of her novel-in-progress to a fan, Leo, who is writing her back with ever-more-pointed critiques. Most of the novel is told via the beta chapters and this feels like the "real" story, so it is sometimes hard to remember that the real story is actually about the novelist writing the tale we are hearing -- especially because in the novel, the main character is a novelist who is writing about people she met in a library -- and she is setting her story in the library with those people as models for her characters! Whoa, trippy... but oh-so-fun!

The tale the novelist tells involves four people sitting in the fancy special books room at the Boston Public Library who hear a scream and then discover a murder was committed while they all sat there. The natural buzz that arises causes them all to start chatting with one another and before long they have struck up friendships that in some cases are budding romances. In addition, the Australian novelist in the novel is in Boston on a fellowship, and some of her fellow fellows are characters in her book, as well. Gentill does a fantastic job of keeping the reader guessing as to who-done-it without throwing in any red herrings. On the top level of the story, Leo's letters start to get darker and angrier (and more racist and sexist) as he can't find an agent to represent him, and the FBI have to investigate whether he's a threat.

Thanks to Netgalley and Poison Pen Press for providing me with a free advance copy of the ebook, and to the fabulous readers' app Scribd, which provided me with the audiobook by Dreamscape Media, excellently narrated by Katherine Littrell. There were lots of voices with both American and Australian accents, and everything was done well. The author was an astrophysicist, then an attorney, then a novelist who has won lots of awards for her Rowland Sinclair mystery series, so she is well-educated with wide interests and it shows in her delightful writing. I would be glad to read more by her.

I fear this is another case of a book being rated poorly over all because of bad marketing. The synopsis for this book isn't really accurate for what you're getting. It was a fine thriller, if a little predictable - like obviously the main suspect is a huge red herring.

Typically I like meta books - but in this one it just felt tacked on. Like what was the point of that? There wasn't much resolution there, and frankly this book would have gotten a higher rating from me if it hadn't been there.

For most of the book I was around a three stars, but the ending just didn't give what I needed it to give to get that three stars.

This is one heck of an action-packed murder mystery. Set in the Boston Public Library - which immediately had me hooked as I love a good library - this is a story about chance encounters, friendship and the complexity of humans.

The correspondence between Hannah and Leo is very clever and I was so hooked that I totally forgot that Hannah was working on a piece of fiction…

But fiction and fact can be very blurry, as we discover as we read further. This is a fantastic read and kept me entertained all the way through. An adventure from start to finish.

It's a closed room mystery - a group of 4 strangers sit at a table in a library and hear a scream. Someone is murdered in the stairwell. Who did it? As they are held for questioning, confidences are shared and friendships are formed. But one of them is a murderer. Who did it?

I did not see the killer coming in this one and really enjoyed my reading experience!

While sitting in a library a group of 4 strangers are brought together after hearing an ominous scream. The group finds out the scream was from a woman that later her body was found hidden in an upstairs room in the library. The group formed friendships from the time they spent together while waiting to be cleared to leave the library.

This is a well-written roller coaster of suspense. The characters are realistic and interesting. The story is full of twists and turns and red herrings. Every time I thought I figured out the killer I was surprised by another twist. I recommend this book to mystery lovers.

All thoughts and opinions are my own, and I have not been by anyone.

I started reading The Woman in the Library expecting a take on the locked-room mystery: a body is found in a locked room with no way in or out. Who is the killer? I thought the mystery would be pretty easy to solve, as there are only four primary suspects sitting around a library table when the murder takes place. Of course, I was wrong on all counts: not a typical locked-room case, not easy to solve, and not just one mystery.
Author Sulari Gentill starts with a straight-forward murder mystery and weaves a complex meta-mystery, a crime writer on crime writing. Australian writer Hannah is writing the locked room mystery from the point of view of Freddie, one of the four library patrons. The story is set in Massachusetts, so to give her some inside tips on Americanisms, she turns to local Bostonian Leo, himself a would-be writer. The mystery chapters alternate with emails from Leo where his helpful critiques of Hannah’s work gradually become less helpful and more disturbing.
I love this kind of meta-fiction, writing that is about the writing process, and Gentill constructed this narrative so well, with multiple layers to enjoy. I learned afterward that Gentill has written another stand-alone meta-mystery as well as a series, and I plan to check out more of her work. Read this book if you love Anthony Horowitz’s Magpie Murders or Hawthorne & Horowitz mystery series (both of which I also strongly recommend).

Ugh I HATE to DNF an ARC, it is so kind of the publisher and author to provide it. Unfortunately, I must be honest to maintain my integrity as a reviewer and book lover. I found this particular novel to be a chore to read and I wasn't not invested enough to finish. The instant "friendship" of the characters was unbelievable to me, and I so so wish I liked it more or at least enough to complete. Sorry, friends. This is a no-go for me.
1 star

This one keeps you guessing! The story is set up on an unusual framework. The main story involves an author called Hannah who lives in Australia. She is writing a mystery novel set in Boston. Since this is taking place during covid lockdowns, she is unable to come to the US to do any research about where her book is set. It's good that she has a writer friend, Leo, who lives in Boston. As she completes each chapter of the book, she sends it to Leo for his comments. So the book is one chapter of the story being written by Hannah, followed up by Leo's comments. He is also an aspiring writer and is not shy in asking Hannah to help him get some contacts in the industry.

The mystery centers around Winifred "Freddie" Kincaid, an author from Australia who has received a grant to write a book while based in the USA. She goes to the Boston Public Library one day for a change of scenery from her room and while observing some other patrons nearby, everyone is startled by a woman's scream. The four people seated near each other when this happens form an instant bond and begin meeting to discuss what happened, especially when they learn a young woman's body has been found in the library. Aside from Freddie, the other three are: Marigold (Freud Girl in Freddie's novel), a young woman with many tattoos who is studying psychology (and frequently remarks in passing that she's a genius): Whit (Heroic Chin) a young man from a wealthy family who is trying hard not to succeed at Harvard Law School; and Cain (Handsome Man), a published novelist working on another book. The four of them begin an unlikely friendship that involves meeting frequently and investigating the case. Of course, secrets come out about everyone, and Freddie begins to realize that no matter how much she likes these people, she really doesn't know much about them.

I really enjoyed the unusual way this novel takes shape. The "helpful" American friend, Leo, who is offering advice and suggestions to Hannah the novelist also becomes a character in the book, which Leo comments on in real life. There are many mysteries to sort out, and it's a lot of fun following the dual stories to the end!

This was a great thriller that built up and up. Layers upon layers and hey if you love books it's takes place among books and is about a character writing books!

I enjoyed the main character Harriet and this reminds me of "Only Murders in the Building" as they work to determine who the murder was and why.

Thank you NetGalley for this opportunity!

The Woman in the Library is a story within a story, within a story, which was one too many stories for me. I think the third story could have been dropped without any impact on the plot.
I was drawn to the premise of the book - woman murdered at the Boston Public library. Four people sitting at the same table hear the screams which leads to them forming a friendship. I think a friendship that happened rather quickly. I can’t say this was a fantastic murder mystery - I think, as I said before, the three books added to my confusion, actually it wasn’t so much confusion as a little bit of boredom. It didn’t move along as quickly as I would have liked and I found the end a little disappointing. Sorry but this wasn’t for me.
Thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for this ARC