Rating: 
Summary: A great start of a promising series
Review: This is a well crafted and suspenseful thriller though a trifle short. I finished it in one sitting. I just could not put it down. The mystery is engrosssing but it is also the endearing protagonist, Adrien English who keeps me glued to the book. Smart, sensitive and vulnerable, Adrien is an immensely likable character. One cares what happens to him as he becomes more and more entangled in the web. And the ending is great!
Rating: 
Summary: A Promising - and Fun Read
Review: This is the first of a promising new series. The protagonist is a bit of a smart alec bookish book store owner with a heart problem. He came into a bit of money from his grandmother that allowed him to buy the book store and apartment above and which left him financially comfortable if not rich. The inheritance has also, conveniently, left him with the time and money to persue these surprising little mysteries that fall in his lap. The character is a bit of a stereotype, but a very likeable stereotype in this case.The story develops quickly with an appropriate amount of red herrings thrown in to keep things moving along. A couple of characters pop up with very little backstory to explain them but that is a small quibble. One of two weaknesses in this book is a character whose self loathing and general nastiness make him repulsive despite descriptions of his physical georgeousness and appeal (which the author lingers over generously). The character just doesn't feel right in the story until quite late in the book. It takes quite a while for the reader to accept this character and a good thing they do because he's heavily involved in the second installment of this series. The other problem with the book - for all it's good qualities - is extremely bad editing. Misspellings abound and in one case a paragraph simply stops mid sentence, mid-page. Somebody's wordprocesser's delete key burped and it was never discovered all the way through press. That's hard to believe in this day and age. The main character reminded me a little of the fussiness of Angela Landsbury's character in the Murder She Wrote series. Although this character is a youngish, good looking gay man and has a heart condition - the way he acts still reminded me of the Murder She Wrote character... <lol> I've already read the follow up - it's better still than this first entry in this series. By the second installment you'll be enjoying this author as you might other gay oriented "whodunit" series books by authors like Michael Craft, R.D. Zimmerman, and John Morgan Wilson. Those authors began with somewhat weak entries but developed their characters and story lines into good strongly written character driven stories. John Lanyon's books are a less ambititous efforts than those other authors but are still recommendation worthy for a light enjoyable read.
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