Linda Conrads is a famous novelist who is a mystery to her fans and the media having never set foot outside of her home for the last ten years. She is extremely successful with a comfortable life despite its highly artificial nature. Over ten years ago, Linda found her sister Anna in a pool of blood and saw the murderer fleeing. His face has haunted her dreams, but he has never been apprehended. It is a tremendous shock to Linda when she glimpses his face on the TV and realizes he is a high-profile journalist, Victor Lenzen. With this knowledge, Linda decides to devise a trap for Victor by writing a novel based on the death of her sister and promote its release via an interview with Victor.

THE TRAP is a novel translated from German and rings in at less than 300 pages. It is a slow burn psychological thriller (or maybe suspense would be more apt?) with some interesting and unique features. The storytelling feels disjointed and almost flat at times, but this is unclear as to whether there is a loss of context/depth due to translation or by design.

I really enjoyed the unreliable narrator aspect of this novel which was well done and added a certain tension to the read. It is a compelling story with some red herrings and some unclear motives. THE TRAP features short sections of Linda's new novel within certain chapters that seemingly serve to give context to Anna's murder, but other times have an unclear purpose.

Overall, this is an intriguing story with a decent ending that provides adequate closure.