I found this to be a slow and weaving story where not much is actually going on, but the tension between the two main protagonists ramps up and up.
It was an enjoyable story as a whole.

A fast paced addictive thriller about 2 bookstore sellers that both love true crime but for very different reasons. It’s a love hate relationship when it comes to the main character because her obsession becomes a little overboard sometimes and drove me insane but I love her because of how passionate she is for true crime and books in general. This book made me want to go and work in my nearest Waterstones

3.5 stars.

A really interesting story of obsession and true crime, though there were chunks of this novel that I really enjoyed, I did feel like this wasn't for me.

Perfect if you're a fan of creepy psychological thrillers.

The story follows bookseller, (Brogan) Roach, a true-crime obsessed loner with a penchant for Dark Fruits, serial killers and calling people 'normies'. She becomes obsessed with the new bookseller at her store, Laura, who is Roach's polar opposite. She's personable and put-together and absolutely loathes true crime. Roach thinks they have a connection that Laura just hasn't quite grasped yet, and for reasons Roach can't quite seem to understand Laura hates Roach.

A searing meditation on our obsession with true crime and the narratives surrounding/excusing it - if you want a refreshing, pacy new thriller then I would deffo recommend!

Death Of A Bookseller starts with an absolutely blistering prologue which really sets the tone for what is to come in the rest of the novel. It's tense and full of intrigue and the events of the prologue stay in your mind as we build up to the ending.

The chapters in Death Of A Bookseller are narrated by Roach and Laura. This technique helps us to gain insight into the characters' lives and personalities, although it is clear that both characters have mental health issues which may mean that their version of events is unreliable at times. Personally, I rooted for Laura. I was deeply touched by her background story and felt a lot of sympathy for her, whereas I found Roach incredibly creepy and at times she made my skin crawl. I love the way that Alice Slater has created characters that were able to provoke such strong reactions in me.

Being set in a bookshop, there are lots of references to well known books and authors and I loved this! I felt it helped to place the novel in a contemporary environment.

As I mentioned earlier, the prologue was always in the back of my mind as we approached the ending, so this made me utterly compelled to keep reading to find out what had happened! I could hardly wait for a chance to keep reading. I believe Death Of A Bookseller is a debut novel, so I'm really looking forward to seeing what Alice Slater writes in future, because she is definitely someone to look out for!

An intriguing book filled with characters that it’s hard to warm to. Tense storytelling in places and a keen look into where obsession can take you

As someone who has watched hundreds of hours watching true crime documentaries, I found myself excited at the premise and setting of this novel from the first few chapters, however, I quickly got bored as the story seemed to stall with a lot of repetition which takes away from the point of it being a thriller and killed the experience for me.


Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

You know when you’re at the very end of a book and all of a sudden you start slowing down and find yourself reading the same sentence over again just because you don’t want it to end? Well that’s what happened when I was reading this gem!

This debut novel by Alice Slater is utterly flawless and such good fun. As a bookseller, I was geeking out at the level of detail of the more mundane aspects of the trade. I felt seen! I can see booksellers everywhere pushing this one on every single customer!

Razor sharp observations, delicious detail and on occasion, laugh out loud funny, Slater slyly pokes fun at book lover clichés while stringing the reader along a merry dance, with the tension mounting all the way up to the perfect ending.

I think I was expecting more drama and action from this book which was quite slow paced and at times, repetitive. Both main characters, Laura the bubbly bookseller and Roach the antisocial misfit bookseller were well drawn characters but not particularly likeable. The research that has been done in this book is phenomenal (unless Alice Slater was a former bookseller and true crime obsessive) but I found myself drowning in the minutiae of details that weren’t really relevant to the plot. I did consider not finishing but in the end I am glad I did.

Slow burn (maybe too slow) for a thriller/crime novel. BTW: good setting (a bookshoop), interesting characters, good conflict. Perfect beach read.

This was an exceptionally dark book. It is told from the points of view of Brogan Roach, a neglected child who becomes a young woman obsessed with death, murder and true crime and Laura whose mother was killed when she was young. They both work in Spines bookshop in London.

The story is told very cleverly - the reader understands they are young women in today's world, but there is no silly 'gangsta' type language. However, she uses language to build the tension very well, and each character has a different way of expressing herself - for example, Brogan would say 'a clot of people left the shop', bringing blood and gore to mind.

We know someone is killed (hence the title), but that is almost incidental to the story, which builds as Brogan desperately wants to connect with Laura, wants to be like her, whereas Laura cannot abide Brogan and her obsessions. Life at the bookstore provides the backdrop, with characters like Eli, who Laura loves but cannot have, and their boss Sharona. As we build up towards the climax, the pressure is intense and the reader is drawn into their worlds, both spiralling beyond their control.

An exciting and very different book, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Thank you to NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The story was very unique and as someone who works in a library and has worked in retail, I could definitely relate to life in the bookshop and I enjoyed all the book talk in this. That being said, there were so many chapters that were just repeating the same point with no movement in the story. This book would be great for people who enjoy knowing every detail of what is happening to the characters at all times but I'm not normally a fan of this and this book tells you every single thing that every single character is doing to the point that it's more like a script at times.

Most of the characters were pretty unlikeable, especially Roach and Laura, but the way they perceived each other was very interesting and though I felt quite frustrated with this book and considered DNFing several times I found I couldn't resist picking it up again.

OH AND ROACH FED HER SNAIL THE WRONG FOOD AND IT MADE ME ANGRY

Alice Slater’s compelling debut is a brooding tale of obsession told from the alternating perspectives of two women, Roach and Laura thrown together through their jobs at a struggling bookshop in Walthamstow, an up-and-coming area of London. Both are drawn to true crime but for vastly different reasons. Roach is a veteran fan of true crime, much of her spare time taken up by podcasts, shows and books that delve into the practices and processes of serial killers from Ted Bundy to the Manson family. Laura’s drawn to similar narratives but for her it’s all about the victims, something that’s rooted in a traumatic incident from her childhood. Isolated and socially awkward, Roach outwardly despises the normies all around her but something about Laura makes her yearn for connection, while Laura’s repelled by Roach and her associations with the seamy and the salacious, as well as her shabby, down-at-heel appearance. Then a chance event gives Roach the perfect opportunity to get closer to Laura, in ways Laura could never have imagined.

Slater’s intelligent, slow-burning novel reminded me of work by writers like Louise Welsh and Caroline Kepnes - there’s more than a trace of Kepnes’s Joe in the character of Roach, albeit without Joe’s surface charm. Although Slater delights in setting up links that she gradually demolishes or transforms into unexpected variations on the classic red herring. Her narrative is atmospheric, carefully grounded in her background as a long-time Walthamstow local and former Waterstones’ bookseller - her portrayal of the daily organisation, the petty rivalries and resentments bubbling behind the scenes, in the fictional Spines bookshop are meticulously detailed, convincing and surprisingly fascinating. Her story also builds on extensive research into the true crime genre and its fandom, all of which inform the character of Roach who likes to ‘creepy crawl’ like the Mansons, and, like Patricia Highsmith, is closely bonded with a pet snail. The outwardly polished Laura with her bookworm tote bags and love of literary fiction is less obviously attracted to images of death and violence, although their lure are revealed in her attempts at writing, her poetry performances composed from mash-ups of “found” words and snippets gleaned from the pages of true crime.

Slater’s prose is well-crafted, as you might expect from a graduate of East Anglia’s prestigious writing programme. Her story is character rather than plot driven, leisurely paced, it could benefit from a little trimming. But I liked the way that she managed to work within the conventions of this subgenre of psychological crime and simultaneously subvert them. At first, I was worried that Roach was too obviously founded on dangerous stereotypes: the friendless, social misfit who most likely harbours psychopathic tendencies, surrounded by battered paperbacks bursting with tales of bloody, sadistic murders. It’s a popular notion of the true crime reader, who’re mostly women, despite evidence its followers tend to be more invested in survival than slaughter, often desperate for an outlet for overwhelming cultural anxieties and fears. It’s a perception that’s had harmful consequences like the dubious conviction of Damien Echols whose choice of clothes and fascination with Aleister Crowley were key tools for his prosecutors; it also neglects the genre’s more positive influence, the popularity of stories about Ruth Ellis and Derek Bentley, a major contribution to the shift in social attitudes that led to the abolition of the death penalty in England, Scotland and Wales. But fortunately, although she doesn’t entirely abandon it, Slater does departs from the standard script, building in a series of unanticipated twists and turns which force a reassessment of her central characters - although I can see her choice of ending being a divisive one.

You know you're reading an excellent book when you dislike both the MCs but you're not able to stop reading as you're having a lot of fun.
A dark, twisty, and very funny story, a fine example of dark humour mystery, that will bring you to some unexpected places and surprise with the twists.
There's a unhealthy obsession in Reach, the nickname of one of the MC. A weird girl since she was a child and a girl obsessed with true crime.
Laura is on the other side: all light and positive thinking.
They could be friend but it's not happening and Roach is obsessed by Laura and this will start a series of unfortunate events.
I liked the satire of true crime fan and the of the world of podcaster. The plot is solid and fast paced.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this arc, all opinions are mine

LOVED!! Dark and gross, I absolutely loved Roach. The plot was twisty and engaging and perfect for book lovers.

I'm sorry to say that this one just wasn't for me. I found some of the observations on true crime fiction interesting but otherwise I found the characters unlikeable and the storyline a bit longwinded and repetitive.

My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC of this book.

'Death of a Bookseller' is compulsively readable, darkly funny and, at times, really disgusting. It is impossible to put it down for too long and I am very excited to see what Alice Slater does next!

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this book when I started it. What I got was an atmospheric and darkly unsettling tale which kept me interested throughout.

It’s basically a tale about two book sellers, Roach and Laura, who are polar opposites of each other, and how their lives become intertwined after Roach basically becomes obsessed with Laura.

Quite thought provoking in places and overall I enjoyed it.

This is the first novel by this author, and based on this, I would read more of their work

Thank you to Hodder & Stoughton and Netgalley for my advanced copy. This review is my own honest opinion

Death of a Bookseller follows Roach, employed since her teens at an ailing branch of Spines bookshop in north-east London. A true-crime obsessed loner who wears that badge with pride as she consumes endless books and podcasts on her favourite murderers. When a new team is brought into the Spines branch to revive it Roach meets Laura. Laura is one of those put-together literary girls who matches her shoes to her beret and the difference between the booksellers is a stark contrast. But when Roach finds a true crime book in Laura’s bag (Roach operates on different boundaries to the rest of us “normies”) she fantasises that they might bond over a love of the macabre. A difference in ethics on the culture of true crime prohibits this and it’s a slight that Roach doesn’t take lightly. The two characters are diametrically opposed in how they present to the world but as the story unfolds they become as grey as each other.

This book hooked me from page one with its bitingly savage yet entirely relatable social observations. Being a millennial true-crime and literary consumer myself I felt like this book was written for me.

The microcosm of a bookshop in the run up to Christmas was the perfect setting. Anyone who has experience in retail will find this book disturbingly accurate. The portrayal of a certain type of British culture is also disturbingly accurate as the characters spend many evenings getting wasted as they deal with the stress of retail during the festive season. Alice Slater really captured the gritty realism of working class London life here with a skill that made it hard to believe this is a debut novel.

It’s a dark, character driven tale that examines the morality of true crime culture, packed full of paranoia, tension and atmosphere. It delves into slimy obsession, moral ambiguity and the banality of city life which Alice Slater mingled together to create a compelling and moreish book. The juxtaposition of the cosy bookseller, a dream that I’m sure many of us book lovers have, mixed with the shamelessly grotesque characters made for such an engaging read. The characters were truly unlikeable and honestly if you find yourself sympathising with Roach get to therapy asap 😂There were times where I physically cringed and any book that provokes a visceral reaction rates highly from me. I will definitely be recommending this quirky and original book to my weirdo friends.

Thanks to NetGalley, Hodder & Stoughton and Alice Slater for the ARC in return for an honest review.

Death of a Bookseller is Alice Slater’s debut novel and it is a corker! I can see why it is getting so much attention, I loved it!
Roach is a bookseller in Walthamstow, she is obsessed with true crime and doesn’t really like customers. The bookshop is struggling and a team are sent in to try and turn it around. It includes Laura who cones across as very sweet and wears matching shoes and berets. Roach sees through Laura’s perfect veneer and works out that she has been touched by tragedy. This begins an obsession, Roach wants to know everything and nothing will stop her.
This book is such a good mix, I loved the bookshop aspect, you have mystery and suspense surrounded by dark humour.
The pace is solid throughout with each chapter told by either Laura or Roach, you quickly get to know them and I have to say that I didn’t particularly like either of them. I liked that fact though, it was good not to have a cliched good character, bad character situation.
I would definitely recommend this book, I’m excited to see what Alice Slater writes next.