Book Review: The Shot by Sarah Sultoon (2022)

AD • I received a copy of this book from Black Crow PR on behalf of Orenda Books. My review is voluntary and opinions are entirely my own.

Hello friends! You know I love a good mystery, right? Mysteries or thriller reads make up a huge percentage of the books that I read every year and for good reason – I love the genre. And so I’m always on the lookout for mysteries that are a little bit different. The book that I’m reviewing today fit that bill. It’s sold as being a ‘newsroom thriller’ but the majority of it takes place in the Middle East in the early 2000s. As you’d expect, there are HUGE trigger warnings which I will outline below. It gets straight into the grittiness of war to the point that I almost DNFed it early on knowing that it was going to be a difficult read but still, I persevered. If I’ve piqued your interest so far, read on for my review of The Shot by Sarah Sultoon.

The Shot by Sarah Sultoon

Publisher: Orenda Books
Date of Publication: 28th April 2022
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Series: N/A
Format: eBook (276 pages)
Source: Review copy from Black Crow PR on behalf of publishers
Available Formats: Paperback • eBook

An act of mercy
Or the ultimate betrayal…
Who decides?

Samira is an up-and-coming TV journalist, working the nightshift at a major news channel and yearning for greater things. So when she’s offered a trip to the Middle East, with Kris, the station’s brilliant but impetuous star photographer, she leaps at the chance.

In the field together, Sami and Kris feel invincible, shining a light into the darkest of corners … except the newsroom, and the rest of the world, doesn’t seem to care as much as they do. Until Kris takes the photograph.

With a single image of young Sudanese mother, injured in a raid on her camp, Sami and the genocide in Darfur are catapulted into the limelight. But everything is not as it seems, and the shots taken by Kris reveal something deeper and much darker … something that puts not only their careers but their lives in mortal danger.

Sarah Sultoon brings all her experience as a CNN news executive to bear on this shocking, searingly authentic thriller, which asks immense questions about the world we live in. You’ll never look at a news report in the same way again…

Content Warnings:

• Graphic descriptions of violence and body horror including harm to women and children
• References to rape
• Set in war zones in the Middle East and also in Darfur during the genocide
• Descriptions of attempted suicide
• Descriptions of abuse
• Grief
• Alcoholism
• Murder
• Involuntary drug use
• PTSD

My Review

As I said at the start of this post, I nearly DNFed The Shot early on. It’s definitely not one for the faint of heart but it is an important read. The author manages to blend her experiences of working as a news executive to deliver this fast paced mystery that kind of creeps in out of nowhere because you’re so immersed in the horrors of war. I was a pre-teen at the time this book was set so my knowledge of these events was pretty much non-existent. And I guess anything that I could know would have been painted in a certain way by the media – which is an ongoing theme throughout the book.

Sami was a great main character. She’s got her own motivations for wanting to join Kris on location although these aren’t revealed until much later on. I loved the strength of her character especially in the face of the worst of humanity and the fact that she remains firm on her morality.

All in all, this won’t be a book for everyone. It’s brutal and devastating and incredibly graphic at times. But it’s also powerful and a great conversation starter on the role and responsibilities of the media. It’d be an interesting book to cover in a book club, that’s for sure. 

 Will you be adding The Shot to your TBR? Let me know your thoughts below.

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