Keeping the Reader in Suspense Why are mystery novels so interesting, and how does the author make the reader’s heart pound hard with suspense by just reading the novel? People like reading mystery novels because there is always a question, such as who is the killer and what was the motive for killing, asked at the beginning of the novel that needs to be answered. The reader is kept in suspense until the end of the novel when all of the pieces come together and the puzzle is solved. Authors of suspense novels create suspense in a number of different ways. In the novels “K is for Killer”