This book was darker than I thought but also amazing. I was transported back to fall 2001 and the writing was so great it really felt like I was THERE! So many parts were heartbreaking and I appreciated that although this book has romance, it wasn’t the biggest plot line.

The Gallery Assistant by Kate Belli was an extremely slow burn for me. Rather than building tension through non stop action, Belli built tension through the character dynamics. Belli had a moody, atmospheric writing style here and she layered her narrative with sensory details, lingering tension, and a measured pace.

Regrettably, this wasn’t a narrative that engaged me enough to ‘wow’ me. I found the writing style flat and overly descriptive which therefore made for a slow pace and voided tension from what could have been a gripping mystery thriller. On the contrary, Belli expertly generated a strong female protagonist. Juliet was a thoughtful, guarded, and introspective woman in her early thirties. She was trying to piece her life back together after a deeply traumatic experience. While she appeared unassuming and quiet, beneath her reserved surface was a sharp woman with a strong sense of self preservation. Watching Juliet’s transformation from the start as an emotionally guarded woman then learning to trust herself and others to allowing her trauma to no longer define her by confronting darkness rather than running from it, was intriguing.

Although I wasn’t captivating by Kate Belli’s “The Gallery Assistant”, I am interested in trying other books by her. All things considered, I think this book would be most suited for readers who are art world enthusiasts and those who love character driven and slow burn mysteries.

Thank you to Net Galley and Atria Books for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

This was my first book by Kate Belli and I really liked it. It pulled me in right from the beginning and I enjoyed the ending. I look forward to reading more of her books.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

Slow, winding suspense. Half truths. A collection of painting hiding a secret. I really enjoyed reading The Gallery Assistant. It was not groundbreaking nor genre changing but it did provide a good bit of entertainment that I devoured in two days. As someone that grew up during 9/11 it was oddly cathartic to the event and the trauma it created used as a plot device. I will definitely be checking out the author's other works!

~thank you to the publisher and author for the e-arc~

I really should know when a book is advertised as "twisty and sinister" that it's probably going to be relatively bland. I don't have much to say about this one other than that it just wasn't memorable and pretty boring - characters, plot, setting, and more.

Part of what didn't work for me was the writing style. The author over-utilized run-on sentences to an impressive degree. One that I noticed early on had six commas, took over half a page, and wasn't a list. This may not bother everyone, but it made it difficult to connect with the writing for me. There was also awkward wording/phrasing scattered throughout, adding to my disconnect.

If you're looking for a slow mystery set just after 9/11, then you may like this one. My thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

A murder mystery set in NYC art scene. Quick and easy read and loved the NYC setting and descriptions. Wasn’t expecting to run into a 9/11 terrorist plot and ultimately it took me out of the story a bit. Overall a decent thriller.

The Gallery Assistant* by Kate Belli is a smart, stylish mystery with just the right touch of glamor and grit. With its art-world intrigue and a compelling protagonist, it’s a fast-paced, addictive read. Perfect for fans of whodunits with a modern, metropolitan edge.

A solid five stars for The Gallery Assistant. Yes, even though I’m cranky by nature and annoyed by the rest of the world, I relished The Gallery Assistant. I received a free copy of The Gallery Assistant from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Why five stars?
1. I like the MC. She’s vulnerable but not whiny, though she has her share of vices. Now, I’m a Mom and a Granny, so those parts of me wanted to sit her down for an intervention. She drinks too much, smokes too much, takes ridiculous risks—walking home late at night in a sketchy New York neighborhood--and she hooks up with unsavory guys on impulse. But she’s dealing with trauma—something we all dealt with at this time. (see #2) I want her to find a way out of this, and I kept reading, in part, to see if she would.
2. The setting is compelling. We are in New York shortly after 9/11. The MC was in the North Tower when the first plane crashed. She made it out alive through sheer good fortune and the guidance of a total stranger named Maya. Her memories of the event are chilling. The author captures the atmosphere so well, I admit I relived that day as I read. The MC, like the entire country, struggles to come to terms with what happened.
3. Shit goes down! After a late-night party, the MC can’t remember how she got home—or much else about the night. Her roommate is acting weird. Her bosses at the art gallery aren’t talking—at least not to her. Oh, and the artist hosting the party turns up dead the next morning and the cops turn up at her office soon thereafter. Are her faulty memories of the night and the ever-present terror of 9/11 conjuring conspiracy theories, or is something rotten? If she could only piece together the fractured images of that night. The plot percolates until it bubbles over—Nicely paced.
4. Solid writing. Imagery, check. Character development without info dumps, check. Plot points clearly lead to a conclusion, check.
5. A little love. Yep, even my blackened heart can appreciate a sweet romance. Can’t say more about that except that it worked for me.
I loved the inside look at the fascinating, high-stakes art world. The plot is intriguing and moves right along. The characters are distinct and believable. Thoroughly enjoyed this book and highly recommend it to urban mystery lovers.

Do not pass this one up! It kept me up late trying to figure out all of the plot twists. Chloe is a gallery assistant who is trying to get by in a post-911 world. She drinks to numb the memories and what she witnessed. The novel starts out with Chloe trying to remember how she got home from a late night party at an artist's home. The novel than propels forward when the artist is found murdered and Chloe still can't piece together what happened the that night. The novel gives an interesting glimpse into the art world as you try to figure out who is responsible and to what extend everyone is involved.

Yes lord! Finally a thriller that was well written, great characters, twists and turns. I felt like I was in NYC post 9-11 the way Kate Belli wrote. Also learned a ton about the art world, galleries, auctions which was super interesting.

It was refreshing to find such a different take on the genre and I highly recommend this little novel.

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for the arc!!

Date of publication: October 14, 2025.

Chloe wakes up in her apartment with no memory of how she got there. She heads to work at an art gallery where she is met by her boss and detectives investigating a murder. Chloe is sure that she was not involved in any way. But, she also can't remember anything about the night before.

This is quite a ride!

The Gallery Assistant was a very good thriller. It kept my interest. What a nightmare it would be to wake up not knowing how you got into your bed or not remembering how you got there!
Kate Belli is a very good author and I would recommend this book to others.

First 5 star thriller of 2025! Thank you net galley for the opportunity to pre read this incredible book! Loved the plot, the characters, the time period…everything! It’s a slow burn, but the ending is worth the read. Highly recommend for anyone looking for a thriller with lots of realistic twists and turns. Excited to read more from this author.

Gallery Assistant
Chloe’s life has been anything but easy since the terrorist attacks of 9/11. She’s working the best she can as a gallery assistant and forgetting about the past few weeks by drinking her worries away. Problem is, she gets blackout drunk.

And one of the times she gets blackout drunk is the night an upcoming artist for her gallery gets shot and killed and Chloe is one of the last people to see her alive and she remember almost nothing.

As she starts to remembers flashes of memories and meets with people in Inga’s life, the more she thinks this is more than a random murder.

The art world is always complicated but now it includes the reappearance of a Monet, the death of an up and coming artist with hidden messages, and the world on edge from the recent terrorist attacks which makes for a high stakes mystery.

Follow Chloe as she tries to unravel the mystery of Inga’s death and the parts of the night she can’t seem to remember.

Set a couple of months after 9/11, and narrated by a young woman who was actually in one of the towers that fell, The Gallery Assistant is both an art world murder mystery and a novel about navigating a post-traumatic world.

The titular gallery assistant, Chloe Harlow, works for a family-owned art gallery in the Upper East Side. She wakes up one morning with hazy memories of having gone to a party the night before, but no idea how the night ended and how she got home. She learns the answer to the first question when she gets to work: the gallery's hot new artist Inga Beck has just been found dead, and Chloe may have been the last person to see her alive. As Chloe struggles to piece together what happened that evening, she learns things that makes her wonder who she can trust.

This is a pretty good thriller. I enjoyed getting a glimpse into the fancy art world in NYC, and I was drawn into the mystery of who wanted Inga dead and why. Details like how art auctions work and how much a famous artist's sketches are worth were fascinating. I also really liked the bit about how anxious the art world was about the state of their market in the wake of 9/11; with everyone so terrified, would they still bid on art? It turns out the answer is yes, which is a relief to the characters, but also could be a commentary on the state of the world. I'm not sure if I'm comforted that rich people can still care about things like art after something like 9/11, or troubled that commercialism can move on so quickly from tragedy.

I also appreciated the little details about what it was like to live in NYC post-9/11. There are a couple of scenes where Chloe's friend Vik has to deal with racism because of his skin colour. And another scene where a transit delay causes major anxiety for Chloe and other passengers, because, what if it's another terror attack?

I do feel that a subplot about hidden messages in Inga's artwork could have been sharpened further. The hidden messages were useful in establishing that Inga knew she was in danger, but I wish the hidden messages actually contained important clues that Chloe had to puzzle out. Apart from one message that put Chloe on the trail of a suspect, the rest were pretty repetitive. Granted, this may be just because I enjoy puzzles in general, so with something as intriguing as hidden messages, I really want more.

The romance also lacked chemistry, and there were references to Chloe sleeping with other characters that just felt kinda random? I'm all for a sex-positive heroine, but this felt more like the literary fiction type of an active sex life, where the encounters feel more empty and perfunctory than pleasurable. The actual romance that develops does play into the plot, but ultimately feels more like a plot device than an actual relationship.

Also, and I admit this is a personal gripe, while I do appreciate the author specifying that Chloe comes home every day to feed the cat even while she's at her boyfriend's house for safety reasons, I wish she'd asked the boyfriend earlier on if she could bring the cat over. Being in Chloe's apartment also puts the cat in danger, and I wish they'd thought more of his safety beyond just being fed.

Overall, this book was pretty good. I appreciated the 9/11 elements, and thought the art world mystery component was interesting. It's just a quieter, slower-paced novel than I expected, and it quite grip me nor keep me eagerly flipping the pages as much as I'd hoped it would.

+

Thank you to Simon and Schuster Canada for an e-galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A thriller with a lot of complexities, PTSD moments that tangle the web, and a setting teeming with real world 9/11 ripples. It’s a lot of moving parts that had me lost a few times but overall I’d say worth a read.

I had not read Kate Belli previously but I will again now. The Gallery Assistant is a murder mystery set in the art world taking place in NYC during the aftermath of 9/11. Chloe Harlow is the unreliable narrator who is suffering from panic attacks and drinks to excess to bury the reminders of 9/11. She wakes up one morning unable to remember how she got home the night before. Going into work she learns that the host of the party she attended the night before has been murdered. Suspicious things start happening and she doesn’t know who to trust. Is everyone she knows lying to her? This story kept me guessing to the end. Highly recommend to any one who enjoys a suspenseful murder mystery. Thank you to Atria/Emily Bestler Books and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was an intense thriller that took place in post 9/11 New York in the posh art gallery scene. It included one of my favorite tropes, an unreliable narrator, and the writing style kept me intrigued and engaged with the story. The plot mainly focused on solving the murder of an artist, but it quickly unfolded into something much more sinister. I will say that there are several trigger warnings for violence, alcoholism, gaslighting, and depictions of 9/11 events in the towers. Overall, I greatly enjoyed this one!

I enjoyed the book although a bit slower than I like but it kept me engaged enough to where I had to finish and it kept me coming back for more!

Sometimes the storyline was predictable but overall a good ending.

The Gallery Assistant is trying to gain a space with all the current thrillers, but it just doesn't hold a candle to books like Ruth Ware's. It's clunky, and the pacing is not great. The 9/11 tie-in is fascinating, especially considering that fact that Belli was living in NYC during that time. It made those scenes more poignant, but they didn't save the book because the main plot fizzled out. It's not even that the ending was super predictable; I just didn't care about it by the time I got there.