Cover Image: Swipe Right for Murder

Swipe Right for Murder

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Member Reviews

This book starts off FAST. First 20 pages and you're blasted off onto an epic adventure of a lifetime. Seventeen year old Aidan makes the GIANT mistake (we all make) of making some late night social media connections (wink wink) while in New York City for the night. Aidan is unapologetically gay (which is amazing). After having the most awkward encounter with a guy from his school (who doesn't seem sure of his orientation) Aidan is left wanting more so he returns to the app. This is the problem, as a SERIOUS case of mistaken identity puts him in the middle of a murder, a hacker, a terrorist group, and he has NO IDEA what to do or better yet, who to trust.

>Swipe Right grabs your attention immediately. There is no denying the action and thrilling drama that this kid is going through. You start to wonder how he is keeping his cool as well as he is. He also has secrets, which are divulged piecemeal throughout the book. They provide a new level of dimension to his character, so his arc is really cool to see.

Side characters are good, if not kind of generic. I wasn't really connected to any of the characters who make up his friend group. But, this may be on purpose as Aidan really is the star of this show.

The last third of the book is a web that you have to try to untangle, because you have no idea who is telling the truth and who is lying. Aidan really struggles with this himself as these events that he should not have been a part of keep happening to him.

For the most part, I enjoyed this book. I read it all in one day (which is generally my baseline for telling definitively whether I've liked a book) so it definitely grabbed my attention and held it. The writing was a bit hard to understand and follow at times, but as this is the unedited edition I give it the benefit of the doubt that this will be improved before publication. The ending however, left much to be desired. After the <strong>BIG EVENT</strong> ending, there were still several chapters of wrap up. After each chapter concluded I thought to myself, "Okay, that's a good stopping point", but there would be a whole other chapter after that! This happened a few times. I definitely didn't need that level of follow up. For these reasons, I knocked it down a star.

Swipe Right For Murder will be great for fans of action and thrillers. There is no slow build up, the book basically punches you in the face with plot. Buckle your seat belts and get ready for a wild ride!

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17 year old Aidan is staying at the Mandarin Oriental NY for the night when he gets bored. He checks out the gay hookup app, DirtyPaws, and see’s that this hotel has lots of options for fun. He responds to a request from a guy named Benoit and heads up to his room. A little nervous, even after a couple of drinks, Aidan figures he and Benoit are on the same page for a quick fling. When he wakes up to Benoit’s dead body and a laser target moving around the room Aidan realizes he’s fallen into an alternate reality. A reality where he’s been mistaken for someone else. His life changes from hookup to hunted.

Swipe Right for Murder starts fast and never stops. A really fun, politically charged action novel, our hero has to make a decision to get involved to save not only his own life, but the lives of his friends and family. Filled with intrigue, red herring’s, sexual innuendo’s, and fear filled encounters, Aidan is forced to grow up and face his questionable past decisions that led him to this place in his life. He also starts to question a world where what he is, a young gay man, makes him obscene to conventional society. His eyes wide open he needs to choose a side when both sides look wrong.

Aidan’s history made his story unique and interesting and his decisions very personal. A brother who dies suddenly of an enlarged heart, a sexual relationship with a friends father, and his parents questionable response to his being gay have altered his life’s path. He’s made a ton of mistakes and relives those memories over and over, shaping the decisions he makes while on the run. His psychoses led him to react in a way that was surprising, engaging, and made him more sympathetic a character than what we see at the beginning of the novel. By the end of his run, I’m all in, fingers crossed that he comes out ok.

Without giving anything away I’ll just say that Aidan’s a character you learn to like more as the book goes on and you learn more about him. The flimsy layers of Aidan’s personality peel away to reveal a delicious pulp that is real and about mid way through Swipe Right for Murder I settled in and gobbled his story up.

Through Aidan’s eyes we see how faulty society and our government is to those who live on the outside of societal norms. Or at least what society considers the norm. Derek Milman makes an interesting point by comparing our government to this made up terrorist faction. The outcomes may be slightly different, one protecting citizens, and the other harming them, but how they get to those points are pretty similar. Both factions maneuver and take advantage of everyone to get what they want, bulldozing over innocents to get the outcome they’d like. In the end I think Aidan grows enough to see this reality doesn’t make a world that he’s happy to be in and he makes decisions to improve his circumstances for not only himself but those like him. I liked this self discovery and Aidan more for having come to that conclusion.

Seriousness aside, Swipe Right for Murder, while delivering a lesson on what’s right and wrong in our world also delivers a hell of a story. It’s fast pace, interesting hero, and even more interesting side characters made this a fun novel to read. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for more from this author. ❤️❤️❤️❤️

I received a free copy of this book through NetGalley and the publisher for my honest review and it was honest!

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Unrealistic? Sure. Absurd? Of course. Entertaining and thought-provoking? Yes. I just had a lot of fun reading this, and I was so pleased with the fact that Milman fully explored the moral dilemma within. There are so many things I want to know more about especially since the Swans seemed to only care about one specific type of gay man. What about literally anyone else in the LGBTQ community? Obviously they were very self serving, but I would have liked to see that addressed.

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Overall this book was a really interesting read and a fun ride. While there were a few times where it seemed the story got slightly convoluted, I would definitely recommend this book. The author really unfolds the story pretty well. I haven't read mystery in a long while and YA mystery is something I pretty much never read. Reading this book may have just changed my mind. It wasn't typical of what you'd expect from a YA novel. It was much more mature. I think both teens and adults who read it will appreciate that. I loved Aiden and his heart. I thought he was a really great character and narrator for the story. I hope you all love him as much as I did!

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When I went to read this book, I wasn't quite sure what I was getting myself into. All I knew is I kept seeing it everywhere and the cover was stunning. When I dove into it, I was in for a ride. The MC is adorable, sassy and badass. The plot was intriguing. Plot twists, betrayal, heartbreak. It had it all. I truly enjoyed this book.

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SWIPE RIGHT FOR MURDER by Derek Milman is a fast-paced thriller about the worst hookup ever and the domestic terrorism that follows! And everyone is gay. Great voice! I had a lot of fun!

Honestly, the gay rep felt authentic without being mocking. Aidan reminds me of some guys that I know and I really felt for him. I love stories with teens who make mistakes and have to deal with the consequences and Milman weaves Aidan's troubled past into the story with finesse. I loved every twist and turn and how Milman wasn't afraid to get really real with so much (I can't say what without spoilers). I highly recommend this book! It's a fast and fun read.

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I didn't finish this... I couldn't. This book was absurd. To be honest I'm not sure how this book is getting praise with some of the content that's in here.

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This. book.

Let's start with the main plot. Aiden hooks up with a guy at the hotel, and he wakes up to find the guy dead, sucking Aiden into a massive web of conspiracy involving the FBI, his family, and terrorists. The plot was well-executed and captivating. I really don't have much else to say about that.

I had a major problem with this book: Aiden's relationships with older men. The man he hooks up with at the hotel is significantly older. Aiden also had a past relationship with a classmate's father. Other characters try to address the wrongness of this situation, but I never really felt like it was satisfactorily resolved.

Also, "closet-case homophobe" as homophobic bigot: sigh

I honestly just didn't like Aiden. I wanted to, but I just couldn't.

Overall, this was an intriguing, albeit frustrating, read.

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So unrealistic that the characters are not relate-able on any level making it impossible for me to find any anchors in the story. So this is a 2.5 out of 5. There is an audience for this, that will LOVE it… it just isn’t me.

However this book was an amazingly fast and easy read. It flows so well and is written very well. I enjoyed how the author described certain situations and some of the internal dialog. In the beginning Milman describes a laser point as Tinker Bell that was out to get him because he did not clap for her when watching a peter pan play as a child. This made me inappropriately laugh to loudly in public. There were many parts that were very fun.

This book is a high paced LGBT thriller. This story fallows 17 year old Aidan through his adventures. The story starts with Aidan in a hotel in New York City. After hooking up with the second guy of the night that he has found off of an app, he finds himself waking up next to his dead hook-up. He instantly realize that he is being hunted by the group that has assassinated the dead lover lying next to him. It is also apparent that he is being hunted by the authorities as well. He then starts journey to figure out how and why he was caught up in this situation while staying one step ahead of the groups after him.

Where I found trouble was in the small unrealistic set up and discrepancy s. Aidan begins at an expensive hotel after explaining that his family doesn't have a lot of money. He is there to see a heart specialist because of a problem that was discovered. He says that his mother is very worried about this. However neither of his parents accompany him to this very important appointment, even though they only live in Road Island. My mom would be there with me if I had a heart problem, and I am 30! He is overly promiscuous. In the first 3 chapters he is hooking up with 2 people and talks about how he hooked up with 2 others. Two of these are older men! I feel like a lot of these issues would be fixed for me if he was 19 and a freshmen in collage. But I just cant get on board with a high school student doing all of this and then just up and go on the run.

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WOW! I just don't know if it's a good wow or a bad wow.

This is a very fast paced book but I just couldn't really get into it. I think my issues were the small details and not the overall story. Some of the main story was pretty ridiculous though. I feel like every step the main character, Aiden, took I was asking why. This kid is on the run from a terrorist group and it reads like a mediocre thriller movie where you're just begging it to be done. Some of the lines are a little childish, I think I just wasn't the right audience for this book.

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Unfortunately, this book was not my cup of tea. I was expecting a contemporary, fast-paced teenage murder mystery, but I found it impossible to suspend my disbelief at the ridiculousness of the story's events. The mixture of real, contemporary issues with the unbelievable events made for a strange combination. While it's true I am not, nor have ever been or will ever be a teenage boy, I don't think that is the only thing that can account for me not understanding the main character's thought process. Instead of going to the police, or his family, he decides he needs to handle this all by himself, despite the fact that PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO KILL HIM.
Furthermore, Aidan's parents really annoyed me. To be honest, I am sick of reading about parents that can't parent because of something bad that happened to the main character's sibling. I'm not saying that isn't realistic, and I'm not saying all parents are good parents. But it doesn't make sense to me that in a lot of YA books, there are NO decent parental figures or guardians. I think that is what is unrealistic. There has to be someone somewhere that cares for the main character and could help to some extent, in most situations.
Another unrealistic thing in this book is that all of Aidan's friends are rich and attractive, and completely understanding and not in the least inclined to not believe Aidan when he tells them what is happening to him.
I could also talk about the terrorist group and its psychotic leader, but instead I'll say what I liked. Aidan really grew as a character by the end of the book, and when reading the wrap-up scenes, I liked that he was giving himself time to mature. Aidan didn't agree with the terrorist group's means of achieving their ends, which is the main point I would want others to take away from this book.

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Swipe Right for Murder was a whirlwind of a read. It's a fast paced thriller that is hard to put down.

Aidan gets sucked into involvement with a gay terrorist group and in typical teenage fashion tries to get out himself, which only winds him in to more trouble. But it's ok when you keep coming across the hottie you were eying up across the way. There is also some crazy FBI involvement.

It's a challenge to talk about things without giving spoilers. Trust me, it's best to read this one knowing as little as possible.

I did struggle with Aidan's past relationship in Swipe Right for Murder. It was not a healthy one (which will be obvious when you read it) and it continually got brought up as you learn more about Aidan. It's just personally something I have an issue with.

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Swipe Right for Murder is a fun, campyish ride about a guy who has a one-night stand, and when he wakes up the next morning - YIKES - his "date" is dead. On top of that, there are some hit men out to get our main character, as they have him confused with someone else. (Honestly, if this isn't a reason to ditch Tinder-like apps and get out to meet people then I don't know what is.)

So, if you're looking for a quick, easy read, that'll have you wondering "What the hell?" (in a good way, I promise), then check out Swipe Right for Murder.

Comes out 8/6/19

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Three point 4 so no chance to round it up to 4, full of action, fast reading, some parts are really enjoyable , facts about LGBTQ community and their struggles are so true and gave all my points for those stuffs but the rest of it a big NOPE stars!

Have you ever watched Shia LaBeouf` s movie named “Eagle Eye`,( from those times Shia may have considered as normal human being and just signed for Transformers series.) His character Jerry Shaw’s and also his family’s lives were being threatened and serious of increasingly dangerous situations were only controlled by everyday life’s technology were tracking his every step he took.

So if we put the equality, civil rights, realistic POV about the difficulties of being gay and adapt in modern life society, all the struggles, catch 22’s,complications ( which are so honestly and genuinely written) to the equation, we may reach a result like reading a book with full of actions, good sense of humor and bombardments of so many good social messages. But don’t get me wrong ! The social awareness part of the book definitely worked for me but action, humor, a young person’s ways to test his survival skills, all the conspiracy theory parts didn’t work for me.

The social and political awareness parts may be better fit with a dramatic, emotional YA adult book. All Michael Bay-ish style chasing and running parts are a little extreme for me.

But writing is really good, fast paced, gripping. I didn’t get bored or furious for wasting my time. It was entertaining, enjoyable page turner.

There are twists, surprises, double-crosses that mess with your mind. Aidan’s story about longing for real, true love and intense connection broke my heart. I truly empathize with him. All the loneliness pushed him made his own mistakes and put him in dangerous positions.

I also loved Jackson. He was just like a limelight of the book. At the darkest, depressing parts he appeared and brought back all the joy and fun.

So as a summary, characterization, pacing, development and writing were capturing but mixing different genres on this book didn’t work for me! Still I’m curious to read more books of the writer!

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This book was definitely a fast-paced thriller that will keep you guessing. I also loved that there is finally more YA novels out featuring LGBQT+ main characters.

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I struggled with this book.

I had a hard time connecting with the writing and the characters. I know that this is a YA thriller, but it seemed too juvenile, even for YA. I didn't get the thriller vibe.

I was excited for this one, but it turned out to not be a book for me.

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📚E-ARC Review📚
Swipe Fight For Murder by Dereck Milman
Release date: 8/6/19
🌟🌟🌟🌟
Ok first I would like to say . . . Sorry I haven’t posted in awhile. Life got in the way but I’m back (awkwardly waves hand) My thoughts are my own so this is an honest review on SRFM that I had the opportunity to read through @netgalley Anyway . . .
To say this book was boring would be . . . A flat out lie. If you weren’t reading about a anti-homophobes group trying to kill Aidan you were reading about his sad and dramatic past. I could not put this book down once I started reading it. With Aidan’s tragic tendencies to find trouble he was an amazing character to read about. The style of the writing was just like a teenager but at the same time it was battling with maturity (so was Aidan) I haven’t really read a thriller in a while so this was a change from the usual fantasy read. I absolutely loved the story line and definitely recommend it.
📚Book Report📚
We follow Aidan, a gay teen with kind of a dark past. He’s staying at the Mandarin Oriental in New York when he feels the need for some company. He goes to this guys room and he falls asleep but when he wakes up . . . The guy is dead and Aidan is believed to have something the Swans (the terror group/cult) want but he has no idea who they think he is. He is thrown into a world of murder and mayhem and every road he takes turn unexpectedly. (plot twist huns!!!) This book is LGBTQ+ and I really like the balance of thriller mystery to LGBTQ+. Also I LOVED Shiloh, a undercover FBI agent that is always trying to save Aidan.
Thank you @derekmilman for writing this work of art and thank you @netgalley and @jimmypattersonbooks for making this review possible. I hope you enjoy:)
#swiperightformurder #ARCreview #bookstagram #bookster #aspiringwriter #lgbtq🌈 #LGBTQread #youngadultbooksgram #thrillingread #readalot #bookreview #bookreport #derekmilman #netgalleyreview #jimmypatersonbooks

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I was sent an eArc of this book by NetGalley in exchange for my honest thoughts!

This book just wasn't for me.

This book is definitely action packed & twisty. Trigger warnings for slight homophobia, murder, gore, drug use, pedophilia (?)

This has FBI agents, terrorist hackers, innocent people being dragged into cyber terrorism.

It's an interesting plot but the pacing was so fast I couldn't keep up. Some of the character development is amazing but I wish we got more.

I definitely recommend this book if you like fast paced thrillers!

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I’ve been waiting for this book for so long!! It’s been all over Bookstagram and I wanted to read to read it!! I absolutely loved it!!!! Thanks so much for sending me an early copy!!!

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This book was quite a ride! Most times it was so over the top unbelievable it was hard to read, but if you can get over that aspect it was a great read!

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