Critic Reviews
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From an acclaimed senior editor at Vanity Fair comes a "laudable" (The New York Times) debut novel about a young journalist who discovers a short story that's inexplicably about her life--leading to an entanglement with the author's widow, daughter, and former best friend.
Sal Cannon's life is in shambles. Her relationship is crumbling, and her career in journalism hits a low point after it's revealed that her profile of a playwright is full of inaccuracies. She's close to rock-bottom when she reads a short story by Martin Keller: a much older author she met at a literary event years ago. Much to her shock, the story is about her and the moment they met. When Sal learns the story is excerpted from his unpublished novel, she reaches out to the story's editor--only to learn that Martin is deceased. Desperate to leave her crumbling life behind and to read the manuscript from which the story was excerpted, Sal decides to find Martin's widow, Moira.
Moira has made it clear that she doesn't want to be contacted. But soon Sal is on a bus to upstate New York, where she slowly but surely inserts herself into Moira's life. Or is it the other way around? As Sal sifts through Martin's papers and learns more about Moira, the question of muse and artist arises--again and again. Even more so when Martin's daughter's story emerges. Who owns a story? And who is the one left to tell it?
The Mythmakers is a nesting doll of a book that grapples with perspective and memory, as well as the batteries between creative ambition and love. It's a "page-turner" (theSkimm) about the trials and tribulations of finding out who you are, at any stage in your life, and how inspiration might find you in the strangest of places.
All things books from The New York Times. You like reading, we do too.
Keziah Weir’s debut novel, “The Mythmakers,” is a fresh addition to the library of fiction about tortured literati. https://t.co/Xp5s4AnMHq
"A journalist reconstructs the history of a recently dead writer by stepping into the life he left behind... A thoughtful, if meandering, debut about what it means to make, and remake, a self."
Writer @NYMag & @TheCut Author, Good and Mad: https://t.co/7f4h2it3Wj… rtraister{at}gmail
Three books published yesterday that I wanted to tweet about and then forgot so here we are on pub Wednesday! 1. @keziahweir’s debut novel that I can’t wait to read: https://t.co/yreoeXrj5P
"In Weir's clever debut novel, a newly unemployed writer recognizes herself in a story by a semi-notable, now-dead writer in an important magazine. Her quest for his motivation and "truth"leads to personal and professional turmoil."
--New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)
"Keziah Weir's debut novel takes an age-old literary question--is this fiction actually based off reality?--and twists it into a compelling story about art, perspective, and the line between inspiration and transgression. The Mythmakers isn't from the perspective of a novelist, though: It begins with a down-on-her-luck journalist who recognizes herself in a short story by an acclaimed, and recently deceased, author." --Harper's Bazaar, ?The 45 Best New Books of 2023 You Won't Put Down
"Engrossing... [An] auspicious debut."
--Publisher's Weekly
"This is a page-turner that raises big questions about memory, truth, and who really owns a narrative."
--The Skimm, 17 of Our Favorite Books Coming Out this Summer
"Keziah Weir's THE MYTHMAKERS is a wildly inventive, thought-provoking page-turner filled with luminous language and resonant characters. It tackles the weightiest of subjects--love, art, inspiration, death--with grace and wit. This is the rare novel that will stay with me for a very, very long time."
--Tara Conklin, NYTimes-bestselling author of The Last Romantics
"In The Mythmakers, Keziah Weir has written a quiet, 'revelatory' first novel."
--Portland Press Herald