THE FACT CHECKER

Jacques Roy offers a low-key narration of Kelley's novel about the tedious yet illuminating job of a fact-checker for a popular magazine. Roy delivers some priceless fact-checking phone conversations with celebrities such as Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier, as well as a fact- checker's delicate handling of the widow of a dead CIA officer who has purportedly been unfaithful. The protagonist is given an assignment to fact-check a story about the green market in New York City's Union Square. He meets Sylvia, a tomato grower, who mentions "nefarious practices" going on there. Her disappearance the next day sends him on a wild fact-checking journey. Roy's understated, almost impersonal, delivery makes the droll humor of this novel slow to land, missing much of the audiobook's fun. S.J.H. © AudioFile 2025, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2025]