There is a specific kind of silence that falls over a room when Sarah Jenkins is reading. It isn't the polite quiet of an attentive audience; it is the taut, breathless hush of people who have forgotten they need oxygen. Transitioning from a decade of hard-hitting investigative journalism to the realm of literary fiction, Jenkins has brought a terrifying sense of reality to the psychological thriller.
Ahead of her upcoming residency and salon at The Hub, we sat down in the quiet corner of The Inkwell Café to discuss the architecture of suspense, the ethics of true crime, and why she believes the unreliable narrator is the most honest reflection of the human condition.
Sarah Jenkins photographed in The Gallery Vault.
The Bookora Your background is rooted strictly in facts. How difficult was the pivot from investigative journalism, where you are bound by truth, to fiction, where you are the architect of the lie?
Sarah Jenkins It wasn't a pivot so much as a translation. Journalism taught me how to observe the mechanics of a catastrophe. You learn very quickly that the monster in the room isn't usually a cackling villain; it's a quiet person making a series of very small, very rational compromises. Fiction just allowed me to take those observations and strip away the legal liabilities. I’m still writing about the truth; I’m just using invented people to do it.
"The beauty of the thriller doesn't lie in the twist, but in the slow, agonizing dread of the inevitable."
The Bookora Your upcoming salon at The Hub focuses on the "Architecture of Suspense." Can you give our readers a glimpse into how you build tension?
Sarah Jenkins Tension is simply withholding information while making a promise to the reader. You show them the bomb under the table, you show them the timer ticking down, and then you force them to watch two people argue about the weather. It’s about pacing. I spend more time mapping out what my characters *don't* know than what they do.
