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Title: Disappointing
Review: This really gets 2.5 stars for me (rounded down to 2), because I was able to finish it, and found it interesting enough, but it really lacked something. I could not get into the characters, and the literary references all over the book were mostly over my head. The mystery was okay, convoluted enough to have an interesting resolution, but the investigation felt amateurish considering one of the protagonists was supposed to be an FBI agent. What's an FBI agent doing investigating the theft of books from a university anyway, even if they are valuable? If he'd been called in after the murders, maybe, but it comes across as really contrived to me. Murder by karate chop to the neck also came across as corny even if it is plausible. And the attempt at romance felt gratuitous and limp. I picked this up because it was supposedly nominated for several awards for best first novel but it was disappointing.
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