THE OBITUARY WRITER

A disgraced investigative reporter gets a chance to reclaim his reputation while stuck writing obituaries for the famous.

Oster’s titular character is Wallace “Mack” McRae. Mack used to be an award-winning reporter for the Journal. Then his wife, Helen, began a long, slow decline while battling ALS, and Mack starting drinking to cope, eventually getting fired. Now he writes slimy advance obituaries of celebrities for the sleazy website dead.com, mainly because he gets a health insurance package that keeps pace with Helen’s medical bills. Then one day, Mack’s luck changes. One of his longtime obit subjects is Dieter von Gehlen, a German-born doctor, organic chemist, and perennial Nobel Prize hopeful best known for his contribution to well-known weight-loss drug LytheEZ. Von Gehlen calls, wanting to meet with Mack. Then the chemist is found dead by apparent suicide. This makes no sense to Mack, so he begins to investigate von Gehlen’s death. The writer discovers that the doctor’s laptop and file cabinet are missing. Mack later determines that von Gehlen had doubts about the drug trials for LytheEZ. By using his reporter skills to dig deeper, Mack gets on the radar of the rich and powerful who don’t want LytheEZ’s safeness questioned or his investigation into von Gehlen’s death published. So Mack ends up in danger as well. Oster closed out his long journalism career dabbling as an obit writer, which, he explains in his author’s note, inspired this mystery. The author is familiar with the underbelly of journalism, and that shows in his caustic descriptions of dead.com and its weaselly owner, Anton Teufel. It’s an ugly, new world of information gathering and dispersal. Mack is a sympathetic character, exhibiting a strong work ethic despite the turmoil in his personal life, as he tries to stay on the wagon while Helen is slowly dying. He deftly employs many of the contacts he’s acquired through the years to compile his comeback article. Oster also provides Mack with a plethora of potential overlords behind a dim Russian hit man pursuing him. The result is a layered, fast-paced thriller featuring a captivating protagonist.

An engrossing mystery that delivers a rich character study and a tale of redemption.