A story within a story, within a story. A fascinating crime novel with so many layers, it will keep you guessing until the end.
Four strangers in the Boston Public Library hear a blood-curling scream, and it bonds them together. Then, they discover that the screamer was murdered - and the mystery commences. Hidden agendas, secret longings, and a whole lot of red herrings make this mystery a compelling one. Who murdered the woman in the library?
As the story develops, we also get a glimpse into the writing life of the author, and find that art might imitate life just a little too closely...
A great read for those mystery readers that want to shake things up a bit.

I loved this one! The narrator was amazing, and while I usually don't like it when they change tones or accents for the different characters, she did it seamlessly and never sounded as though she was overacting.

I loved the story within a story, and I found myself always wanting just a little bit more from the real life story. I thought the story within the story was wrapped up excellently. My only complaint was that the protagonist, a smart, confident, independent woman for most of the book, turned into a lovestruck ditz once the love story started.

All in all, I would definitely read more by this author. 4.5 rounded up to 5.

The woman in the Library was a highly anticipated who done it, for me.

I devoured this book.
It begins with a murder in the library. You will be flipping the pages to uncover the twisty web of exactly who did what.

This book was not what I expected and I actually never finished it. I was expecting a locked room mystery that takes place in the library but when they characters all left to get coffee the day after the death without knowing it had happened I was disappointed.

Four students hear a scream in the library and become bonded over the mysterious death of a woman in the library. Told by one narrator who uses various voices to differentiate between characters the narrative flows smoothly and kept me engaged. I'm am unsure what the point of the beta reader storyline was, I honestly didn't feel that it was worth having. Sure there was a little sense of terror as we realize there is more to the beta reader than what is on the page, but I found it distracting from the story of the students and the mystery involved. The characters were well developed, even if the relationship that evolved felt a little too insta loving for me. Worth a listen.

The story begins at the reading room at the Boston Public Library where we find Winifred ‘"Freddie’" Kincaid, an Australian writer, sitting with three strangers at a table when there is a terrifying scream. Security guards come quickly and instructs everyone to stay where they are. Freddie and the three strangers begin talking to each other and their friendship begins.

As the story continues, it turns out to be mystery within a mystery. Hannah Tigone, a Sydney based author of mysteries, is writing a book set in Boston and enlists the assistance of Leo Johnson a fellow writer who makes sure her details about Boston are correct.

Sulari Gentill's two mysteries keep you guessing until the end of what really is going on and what was that terrifying scream. She explores the complexity of friendships and how appearances can be deceiving. I kept reading to find out what had happened in the reading room...

First I have to say the structure of this story is unique as we have the story happening and we have letters from an outside character about the story your reading. however this wasn't a win for me and it all boils down to the fact that I really didn't like the main character. I really enjoyed the atmosphere and the mystery was fun to follow along with.
since this was an audio review copy I will say that the audio was fine our main character was temporarily living abroad in America from Australia so the narrator had what I hope was the right accent but I am unfortunately not that knowledgeable in accents
There is definitely an audience for this story.

Overall, I really liked the way this book was setup! It was about an author writing a mystery and receiving advice from a character Leo, while living through a murder mystery. There were times that I felt confused but ended up enjoying it once I understood the concept. The ending was not a huge surprise to me, and I wish it would have been tougher to figure out. However, I would still recommend this as a quick, mystery. I listened to the audiobook and really enjoyed the narrator.

I got the Audiobook for Woman in the Library from NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for an honest review and I loved it! The 2 stories running concurrently is a new take that I haven't encountered before and they both had me hooked. I don't want to say too much in case I ruin it for anybody but if you love mysteries this is definitely a book you need to pick up. I also really loved Katherine Littrell's narration she did a fantastic job with all the different voices and really got me hooked into it from the get-go.

I thought this book was extraordinarily confusing with too much going on at one time, too much back-and-forth. I did not even finish it.

The mystery in The Woman in the Library is like one of those Russian nesting dolls. It’s a mystery inside a mystery inside yet another mystery.

Mystery writer Winifred (Freddie) Kincaid is sitting at one of the long reading tables in Boston Public Library’s Central Library on Boylston Street staring up at the ceiling for inspiration for her next mystery. When the ceiling fails to inspire, she observes her neighbors at the long table, and begins constructing a story around her three nearest neighbors, who she labels “Freud Girl”, “Heroic Chin” and “Handsome Man”.

Then they all hear a scream from a nearby room. As they wait at their table for security to investigate, they strike up a conversation. The characters on Freddie’s page become real people to her, and the story of who they really are becomes the second story.

But there’s a story wrapped around that, as we see correspondence from a writer named Leo, who seems to be making comments on the story of Freddie and her three new friends, Marigold, Whit and Cain. Now Freddie isn’t the author, Hannah is the author and Freddie and her friends are just a story while “Freud Girl” and her pals are the story within the story.

However, we don’t see the mysterious mystery writer’s responses to Leo’s commentary, so we don’t know if Leo is really writing to a fellow author or if he’s just making it all up.

But we do read the chapters about Freddie and her new friends as they form a surprisingly tight little group. The more they learn about each other, the more we learn about them. Cain McLeod, AKA Handsome Man, is an author like Freddie. Whit Metters AKA Heroic Chin is a law student determined to fail in order to avoid spending the rest of his life under his mother’s thumb as a member of the family law firm, while Marigold AKA Freud Girl is a graduate psychology student who seems to be in love with Whit as well as obsessively intrusive about the entire group.

And then it all goes a bit pear-shaped, as someone starts sending threatening messages to Freddie. The situation escalates when Whit is attacked and Cain’s past as a convicted murderer is brought to light even as Freddie realizes that she’s in love with Cain as much as Marigold is with Whit.

But along the way the comments on the manuscript from the mysterious Leo get creepier and creepier. The reader starts wondering about just how much of everything is either going on in Leo’s head – or is being caused by the increasingly unhinged would-be author.

That’s when all the stories inside the stories all blow up at once and we finally are able to start winding the ball of string that we thought was rolling in a straight line – only to discover that we’ve been wandering through a maze all along.

Escape Rating A: I would have loved to stick with the audio of this, because the narrator was doing an excellent job with the large cast and especially with all the accents. I just ran out of time and switched to the text. But the narrator was very good and I’d be happy to listen to her again. She did a particularly terrific Australian accent – unless she is Australian in which case she did several terrific and different American accents!)

That the narrator did such a good job differentiating the characters made it easy for the listener to distinguish who was speaking and or writing as the story twisted and turned. Because this is definitely one of those mysteries that twists and turns and doubles back on itself until the reader doesn’t know which end is up, down or sideways in the story, the story within the story, or even the story within that story. Or even which story is the story and which is supposed to be real life.

We don’t really see Freddie’s story about Freud Girl, Handsome Man and Heroic Chin, and at first it seems like Leo is commenting on the story we’re not seeing. That particular deception doesn’t last long, only for it to be replaced by questions about whether Leo is really communicating with his fellow author Hannah or whether he’s deluding himself and/or us because we never see Hannah’s side of the correspondence.

Once we do, the situation gets even crazier – and possibly so does Leo. At first his comments just seem very meta, literature commenting on literature. Then he seems obsessive and we start wondering whether he’s a true colleague or just a crazed stalker-fan. In other words, was the reference to Stephen King’s Misery a bit of foreshadowing or just a red herring?

But the story of Freddie and her new friends also gets more compelling – in spite of Leo’s increasingly creepy commentary. And even though we know that Freddie is a creation of some author’s imagination, we still become completely invested in her budding romance with a man who might be a serial killer. Or might just be the victim of an elaborate frame.

Freddie likens her own creative process to boarding a bus and watching as the characters drive that bus to a place or places unknown. Freddie’s story careens all over the road. She’s the only character we don’t suspect might be the murderer. There’s enough of a stew of clues and red herrings to make any explanation plausible.

Which is what makes this thing so damn much fun. We know it’s a story, so as much as we are invested in Freddie’s life, we also know it’s not real or serious. Leo, on the other hand, might possibly be both. Whatever conclusions we thought we had come to, in the end the resolution of all the mysteries is cathartic and surprising. It’s like arriving at the end of a roller coaster ride, smiling and laughing because it was fun not in spite of the thrills and near-spills, but because of them, even though our legs are still a bit wobbly as we depart. And because we feel just that tiny bit of astonishment that we survived everything that was thrown our way. Although there’s a ghost of a hint of a possibility that maybe neither story is truly over.

And isn’t that just a chilling way to end a mystery!

The Woman in the Library immediately caught my attention because who doesn't like books about books -- but what I didn't realize was that this book was a book IN a book! Or was a it a book IN a book IN a book? Let me try to explain...

The book opens up with a letter from a reader to Hannah Tigone, a writer who cannot travel to Boston to research her current book due to restrictions. The reader is there to offer suggestions, insights, and research. Then, the book moves onto Chapter 1 (of Hannah's book) where we meet Winifred aka Freddie as she's writing her own novel. As she's researching her own novel at the Boston Public Library, she and three others hear a scream. From that moment, those four were all immediately bonded. From then on, each chapter of Hannah's book is followed by a latest letter from Leo, the reader. You learn more and more about Leo as both stories progress -- ultimately leading to TWO mysteries.

While I enjoyed this premise, there were so many parts that left me feeling confused and parts that felt not incredibly realistic. One thing that bothered me was how immediately obsessed the group of four was with each other -- kept me wondering "didn't they have other friends or aspects of their life?"

If this sounds like your type of book, I would highly recommend skipping the audiobook version and getting your hands on a physical copy. With the changing stories, it was REALLY hard to keep track of what storyline we were in while listening to the audiobook.

Thank you Netgalley for an advanced e-audiobook in exchange for an honest review!

This book being told in a book was so fun and fast paced. Being able to see how a writer takes everyday events and uses them in a book was great. Almost a locked room story, it kept me on edge until the final page.

3.5 stars. I liked the book but it was a tad confusing. The end was a jumbled mess and it just made me even more confused. I liked the characters and the style of going back and forth from one story to another.

Side note: I received a physical finished copy from the publisher and it came with a piece of paper that explained the book and it definitely helped me u dersrsnd things a bit better.

A story in a story isn’t always easy, but this title was well written. The narrative was very strong. Characters well developed. There is a novel within the novel which I find interesting. I really liked the ending

I was so excited about this one! The synopsis sounds right up my alley- a murder in a library?? Sign me up.

Although the story was interesting enough, the story within a story aspect really didn't work for me. I don't think it added anything to the plot. These interruptions from the main storyline really slowed down the pacing and made me less interested in the story. I found myself skimming and sometimes even skipping over these passages.

A bit of a disappointment for how excited I was for this one. Good idea..lackluster execution.

There is a scream that shatters the silence in the reading room at the Boston Public Library. A dead body of a woman has been discovered by a cleaning lady. This leads to four strangers, who just happen to be sitting at the same table, to become sleuths and fast friends.

I enjoyed the setting of Boston and the Boston Public library. It is now on the bucket list. The story itself is just ok. I had trouble connecting to the characters. But, I did enjoy the mystery and the convoluted way the author gets you to the killer!

The narrator, Katherine Littrell, did a pretty good job. She needs to work on her southern accent though.

Need a good book in a good setting…THIS IS IT! Grab your copy today!

I received this novel from the publisher for a honest review.

A murder mystery where the actual murder is the sub-plot.

What makes this book intriguing is the story within a story plot, which I had expected to love, but something about the writing just didn't work for me. The characters felt "too much" which pushed them out of realistic people, and the intensity of their first meeting to inseparable friends was a bit much.

Listening to the audiobook did make following this convoluted plot a bit harder, especially when two characters shared the same name.

This is a novel and review that are riddled with dichotomies. I have to say that I really enjoyed this mystery within a mystery, a novel about novels. The two narrators really tip-toed through the timelines and the line of reality vs. fiction in an almost masterful way. I felt both drawn to the characters and deeply confused about their actions/motivations. I stopped trying to guess the plot twists pretty early on and ended up being quiet surprised by how the ending wrapped up....almost too much so. I'm really going to need one of my friends to read this ASAP because we need to discuss the last lines of this book because I'm feeling like I missed something? Or things were more interconnected than I originally assumed...? I can say, for this reason, The Woman in the Library would make a great novel for book clubs!
Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by this novel, and the audiobook narrator was fantastic, so I will be interested to see what Sulari Gentill writes next!

I read this book partially as an ebook and partially as an audiobook. I enjoyed the experience immensely. The book itself is amazing and full of twists and unreliable narrators. I also liked the audio version where the narrator did a fine job distinguishing between character voices, A great summer treat