Date: January 5, 2026
Author: Benjamin Stevenson
Title: Everyone On This Train Is A Suspect
Genre: metafictional murder mystery; definition of metafictional per Wikipedia, ‘a story that is self-aware, meaning it openly acknowledges its own artificiality’
I absolutely love a good how-many-people-will-survive-a-train-journey-style-story. I’d insert numbers for a headcount that boarded the train here, but I’m not quite clear how many there were, and does staff count in this head count? Regardless, this one didn’t capture me and here’s why…
I made it to just after the 10,000-word word-count. I know this because this was written as though a writer had boarded a train headed through Australian country with his girlfriend and others of the writing community. He was experiencing writers block and that was the focus thus far of the story. His writers block and powering through it by making writing goals and achieving them. It was a whole thing, and it seemed as though he was failing.
I can appreciate that for the right audience this is probably the bees’ knees. However, I didn’t understand the humor and having to read and re-read passages while attempting to and still unable to grasp the meaning doesn’t do much for me wanting to read on.
I’ll pass, but that doesn’t mean you won’t love it. I’d love to hear your thoughts.