The Bestseller

In this e-published psychological mystery, author Stephen Leather shows both sides of the issue - paper books vs. ebooks - presenting their arguments before the general reading public. Us. It is interesting, though, that THE BESTSELLER can only be read via Kindle. Hmmmm I wonder which side Mr. Leather is on. But that's neither here nor there. This is a tense thriller that will have the reader wondering if who they think to be the killer will be caught, or will he escape justice and go on to kill again.Much has already been said about the plot and characters, so there's nothing I can add to the pot without spoiling the stew. Mr. Leather does promote his previous novella, a thriller called THE BASEMENT, which can be downloaded from amazon.com, as well as Amazon's Kindle ebook throughout the story. Could there be a connection? I wonder. Suffice it to say, this is a good read and will keep the interest of anyone who likes a good mystery. However, I don't think it is one this author's best. 3.5 Stars.

While not his longest book ever written, it does keep the reader interested, with more than a few twists and turns along the way - as Leather tends to do.Others have made comment on Leather's "plugging" of the Kindle device, something I didn't really notice at the time though on reflection, there is a bit in there. Being a Kindle fan myself is probably the reason it didn't "offend" me as it seems to have others.All in all a great read, in typical Leather style - keeps the reader interested from page one to the end, and tells an interesting story as well.

I read a lot of crime/thiller fiction and this was barely palatable.The story was predictable. The characters annoyed me. I did read The Basement before this and would give it about 3.5/5 stars. I thought it could only get better from there since Mr. Leather is a top selling author in the UK. I was, sadly, mistaken.A point of aggravation for me was the improper use of some phrases. For instance, when Adrian gets thrown out of the class by Grose, the author and his characters keep referring to is as "getting thrown off the course". While that is possibly how it would be said in the UK, that is not what we would say in the US. We would say "getting thrown out of class". There is also a section where Jenny asks Adrian if he wants to "get good marks" and Adrian says he isn't concerned about marks. Again, we would more likely say grades, not marks. Why not set these novels in the UK?If you are looking for other crime fiction set in the UK, try Mo Hayder. I will still purchase another novel by Mr. Leather, as I enjoyed The Basement. I think I will try the first Spider Shepard book.

A Creative Writing class turns ugly as the professor believes that one of the students is not writing a story but confessing to a crime. Isn't writing a story supposed to suck the reader in? That's what Stephen Leather's writing does to me. I read his novella 'The Basement' first where he actually outlines his storyline for 'The Bestseller', and since I loved the twisted-ness of The Basement, I knew that I would enjoy this book. While the police characters are a bit stereotypical (read ignorant) and I'm not convinced that the killer was found, it was still a very enjoyable book and I plan to read many more of Mr. Leather's books.

"The Bestseller" opens with a psycho-type scene on a yacht in LA, then switches to New York, where we find Adrian Slater, a Neo lookalike (shades, leather coat) in a creative writing class led by Dudley Grose, whose best writing was done 20 years ago, and who is involved with a student - Jenny. She is also the subject of Slater's affections. The tension gradually mounts after a murder takes place, and we're left guessing to the end as to whodunnit.

A murder mystery that was somewhat different than the typical murder mysteryIt did have a surprise ending and was well written

I had just read his book  The Basement  which was my first by this author, and was excellent. I never saw the ending coming. This book was mentioned in the first book, so I couldn't wait to read it. Sadly, I did not think it lived up to the first book.

This kept my attention for sure, but it is very bizarre to me how this particular author kept mentioning other books he had written within the context of this story and his other stories I've read as well. The twist was ok...kinda predictable though. Very readable, that much I can say.

Rubbish from start to whenever you give up.

'The Bestseller' is the story of an university lecturer who becomes convinced that one of his creative writing students is plotting to kill someone and write about it.I found this a fast-paced and thrilling read. It's cleverly written - Leather brings one of his other books into the story and one character admits that while it's a brilliant book, none of the characters were likeable in any way. The same could easily be said of this book. It's a gripping read and the suspenseful story kept me turning pages, but while the characters were interesting and believable in their own ways, none of them were the slightest bit likeable. I don't always finish books if I don't like the characters but there was no way I was putting this down until I found out what was going to happen!The story is well plotted and moves along at a fast, thrilling pace. I read it fairly quickly in one sitting, trying to work out how it was all going to end. I thought I had it figured out towards the end, but there is a really good, unpredictable twist in there which made it an even more satisfying read. This is the second of Leather's books that I've read and I will definitely be reading more of them.Overall this is a brilliantly suspenseful, fast-paced book. Highly recommended reading for fans of thrillers!

This brilliant book confirms my admiration for Stephen Leather's writing and detailed story telling.Based on the premise of a young writer working on a book that describes how he's going to kill a fellow student on an NYC university creative writing course in the search of fame and fortune, this story has all the usual Leather trademarks of a gripping plot with witty dialogue, and the added bonus of an unexpected 'killer twist' before 'THE END' appears (as mentioned in the title details). The descriptive passages and characters are so well penned it's easy to believe you are there. The prose flows so well I finished it in hardly any time at all, yet felt completely fulfilled by the experience (not always the case with fast-flowing literature). Very different from the other books by this author I've read, it's a great example of his versatility. At the price it's an absolute bargain. Highly recommended; a murder mystery of depth without an overload of gory detail that exposes the dark, self-obsessed underbelly of the publishing world (in America, at least). As 'The Basement' is mentioned as a book written by the student writer, the version by Mr Leather is now in both my Kindle and my wife's for subsequent pleasure.

This wasn't a bad weekend read. However, this is the second Amazon sourced book I've read which doesn't live up to it's hype. The constant cringe worthy references to Kindle are painful and absolutely no effort is made to soften them; they're crowbarred in. As most people will read it on a kindle- also quite pointless. I'm a longtime fan of leather but this certainly wasn't to his usual standard-,almost like he's funding a quick holiday. Unless I missed quite a large part of the plot- the reference to numbers in slaters book seemed to appear from nowhere- almost like it was edited out of the earlier part of the book, which was then forgotten, yet the end of the book relied on it. Odd.,

Stephen Leather is one of the few well-established authors I read who write specifically for the Ebook market, or so it seems to me.I don't know if he intends to write certain stories for the Kindle from the off, or if he waits to see how things turn out and then puts his best work out in print and the not so good on Kindle.This book seems a bit rushed to me - there are some errors or strange parts which I think an editor would have picked up on had this book been headed to print instead of the ebook market. I may be wrong on that but it's what I thought when reading it.The errors aren't huge and don't spoil the story, but if you are the type to pick up on these things then it might make your mind wander from the narrative!As a fan of Stephen Leather, I must admit to being left disappointed by this story. Not all bad, but I think had it been heading for print then he would have spent a lot more time on polishing it.Having said that, I don't feel I was shortchanged at the 69p price point!