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When life becomes too much to handle, I reach for one of my favorite comic mystery writers—and S. J. Rozan is on that list. The characters in her Lydia Chin/Bill Smith mystery series are so full of spunk and humor that it brings out the sunshine every time—and Ghost Hero has the sun burning bright.
When an unusual case comes her way, Chinese-American P.I. Lydia Chin snaps it up—mostly because cases have run dry in recent weeks and she needs the work. Her assignment is to hunt down a couple of Chau Chun paintings, which may or may not be fakes. But she’s not the only one who’s been asked to find the paintings.
Lydia and her partner, Bill Smith, discover that another detective, Jack Lee, has also been hired to track down the paintings—except he’s getting shot at for his trouble. The three detectives decide to work together to unravel all of the secrets that everyone, including their clients, seems to be hiding.
What first appears to be a routine case turns into something a bit more dangerous because several parties are out to keep the paintings from surfacing—and they’ll go as far as they have to with their threats to keep it from happening.
A mystery doesn’t have to be about murder to hold readers’ attention—and Ghost Hero is fantastic proof of that. Author S. J. Rozan manages to make the world of contemporary Chinese art seem so interesting (and suspenseful). At the same time, she wraps it around a puzzling mystery—while tossing in plenty of humor to keep her readers laughing.
Lydia Chin puts up with the male egos in her life with witty sarcasm that’ll have you nodding your head in agreement. They might exasperate her, but you can still tell that she trusts them and cares about them. She’s a tough little Chinese-American, but she’s not above using her femininity to get results. I love that about her because she manages to make me laugh myself silly every time she does it.
Snappy dialogue, a challenging and intelligent mystery, and buckets of laughter make Ghost Hero a must-read private detective novel. I thoroughly enjoyed every second of it, and I whole-heartedly believe that you will, too.
