Varied Traits

A nice straight up action thriller by Patrick Brown. He does a great job fleshing out the characters and their interactions and choices are depicted realistically, unlike other thrillers that have their leads make bone headed decisions that fly in the face of conventional wisdom and the experience their character is supposed to possess.
I loved the way Brown tied everything up especially how a murder gets Reid involved initially to help out a friend but stay on for different reasons. The twist at the end will surprise many of the readers.
All in all a delightful read. I hope we get a prequel that shows how Salem became what he is.
I'd like to thank NetGalley for providing me with a free review copy.

Engaging thriller

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. An ex-army owner of a security/limousine business finds himself involved in providing justice after a friend gets robbed and a prostitute dies of an overdose, all resulting in violent retribution.

The pace is excellent and it is a real page-turner, engaging and exciting. Our hero never puts a foot wrong, unlike other detectives/heroes of mystery thrillers.

One misgiving that I have is that, if you are not totally familiar with life in the United States, many references will escape the reader – that certainly happened to me (Blue Moon etc..). This is even truer if the reader does not know the city of Atlanta: there are lengthy descriptions of routes around Atlanta, various places and restaurants, all of which is meaningless to anyone outside of Atlanta.

However a quick and entertaining read.

Excellent novel. I thouroughly enjoyed the characters, setting and plot. Eagely awaiting more. (Amazon reviewed).

A well written action thriller. It has good pacing throughout the novel, but it times it does get bogged down in excessive description of scenes such as telling everything a person is wearing or every item in a room.

I should also point out that this book contains graphic violence and a girl being repeatedly raped. So while the novel's ending is satisfying, there are some hard moments to get through.

I received this book from NetGalley to give an honest review.

This was a pretty decent mystery book. We start the book off with two men Bud and Joey getting ready to go and visit the strip clubs. Bud ends up going one way and Joey the other. Joey ends up meeting a stripper and taking her to a hotel room, which ends up not being a good idea. When Joey wakes up some of his things are missing so he calls on his old friend Salem. Now Salem (which I think his name is pretty cool) ends up coming to his friends aid. This opens up a whole can of worms. The stripper is someone from Salem's past, and it is up to him to figure out what exactly happened to her and why was his friend Joey targeted. There is sex, drugs, murder all rolled into one. In the midst of finding out who is behind all of this he also finds romance with a woman he ended up saving from being hurt.
Now for me the relationship that Salem and Millicent didn't feel real.
(SPOILER)
For me it was like he saved her then she found him to thank him and then they ended up having sex. There was really no dating scenes. I liked how everything came full circle once Salem became involved. He is a strong and well developed character. The only thing that bothered me in the book as too much descriptions of either clothing or places. I literally can tell you what color shirt Salem wore and where it came from. Sometimes less is better. Overall a good book and maybe Salem will be brought into other stories. I think he would make a good character to read about in solving other crimes.

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1247480570?book_show_action=false

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3HJNMCWHKRVJJ/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/review/R38HOOZJQDM0QO/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

Barnes and Noble (Autumn2): http://www.barnesandnoble.com/reviews/Varied-Traits%2FPatrick-Brown/1121030502?rating=4#reviews-controls-1

Booklikes: http://anauling.booklikes.com/post/1145020/post

Shelfari: http://www.shelfari.com/books/38368551/Varied-Traits/reviews/4766339