The Fourth Wall

It's great to stumble across a book as fun and engaging as Beth Saulnier's The Fourth Wall. I hadn't really ever heard of her before and after reading this novel, I don't know why. The Fourth Wall is an excellent crime/whodunit novel with a terrific heroine. Alex Bernier is a twenty-something reporter in upstate New York with a detective boyfriend and an uncanny knack of attracting trouble in the worst way. Three dead bodies show up in the novel and only one of them is clearly a murder case--but it just happens to have been dead for about 80 years. The various story lines are very well entertwined and the resolutions are all plausible and satisfying. This is an excellent escapism read, very entertaining. Enjoy.

I've just finished The Fourth Wall, and I've already finished the previous 2 Alex Bernier books. This one is Beth Saulnier's best one so far. Alex is caught up in not just one but three separate murder mysteries, all pretty much unrelated but Saulnier links it all up pretty well. The parts of the book about Alex's personal life adds spice to the story and insight to her character. I liked the way Saulnier began and ended this book, absolutely fantastic.

Okay, I am becoming something of a regular here. I just blew through all three books in the series and loved them all. This one- Fourth Wall- is a bit more thoughtful than the others, less scary, more creapy. And there is a real chilling moment at the end that is so very good. It took a few chapters for me to settle in to it but then suddenly I was at the end, ink on my fingers. I was not a big mystery fan before I picked these up, and maybe I still am not (I tend mostly to non-fiction and hate(!) Agatha Christie), but Beth Saulnier is onto something here with this character and I am glad to be along for the ride. She has a new one coming out soon- I already preordered it. What can I say? I'm hooked. Buy it so you can say you read her before she was famous.

Beth Saulnier reaches new heights of frustrating the hell out of her readers with this, the third novel in the Alex Bernier series. Even for those of us who aren't great devotees of the pop mystery genre, if you believe you're a smart, perceptive person you often believe you should be able to suss out what's really going on, solve the mystery before the narrator/protagonist does. But not Beth's books - God love her, she drives me CRAZY with legitimate misdirection and intricately detailed subplots. This time, despite completely missing whodunnit, I even thought I'd found some holes in her plotting - but she managed to plug them all closed for me. (...)

The Fourth Wall is the third book about Alex Bernier, investigative reporter, and these books just get better and better. Alex, is a wonderful character with a great sense of humor, but she also has depth, which a lot of mystery heroines lack. It's written in the first person, so you really make friends with her. The mystery took several curves, and the end result suprised me. I'd definately recommend reading all the Alex Berneir mysteries, starting with "Reliable Sources".