The Black Echo

Executive Summary: A few minor problems, but I ended up enjoying this a lot more than expected.

Audiobook: Dick Hill does an excellent job. He does a few voices that really adds that extra something to make the audio book worth it. I was disappointed he only seems to narrate the first few books of the series then it's all over the place. I was ready to continue on in audio. Now once Dick Hill's run has ended, I'll have to decide what I want to do.

Full Review
This book hadn't been on my radar. I was familiar with the character from the Amazon series but I've never watched it. I used to read a lot more mystery and thriller books when I was a teenager, but in my 20s I mostly switched to fantasy and science fiction.

I've tried to return to mystery genre a few times now, but very little has every really ever grabbed me like it used to. Urban Fantasy loves the detective/cop/mystery framing device, so I guess it was easy enough to get that itch scratched.

I ended up getting this from a buy one get one sale and decided to take a chance. It has a few issues with character development. In particular Special Agent Eleanor Wish initially felt more like male wish fulfillment than an actual character. Harry does come off like a bit of a cliche himself. As the book goes one both develop into something more interesting than they first appeared.

I will say the book did do a good job of keeping me guessing and while I figured out some of the details, others caught me completely off-guard. Most mystery books seem to require a high body count, which never really appears to me. I like heist stories and other crimes far more than another who dunnit. Thankfully that seems to be the case here. There are a few bodies throughout, but while Harry is a homicide detective the case goes much deeper.

We'll see how the next few books hold up. I planned to come back eventually, but that looks to have been moved up a bit with the second book coming up on another buy one get one sale. Hopefully I'll enjoy it as much as this one.