This book is not for everyone. In order to solve the mystery of his brother Billy's death, Philip has to dig deep in to his very troubled and depressing past. He and his brother were molested by their mothers art mentor, whom they called Uncle Adrian. Uncle Adrian also molested other boys whose mothers he mentored. The book is very descriptive and in some parts too much so. The sex/molestation scenes did help with the understanding of Philip's past, but I felt that there was a little too much description of the acts. The descriptions of the art pieces and rooms was also a little over the top, there were quite a few times I lost interest in reading about the intricate details of the bathroom walls.

I really loved the flow of the book, each chapter (for the most part) kept on track with the solving of Billy's murder. The whole book also showed the evolution of Philip from a broken soul to one of understanding.

My biggest problem (probably because I have OCD about it) is the editing in the book.

The following excerpts were the ones that bugged me the most.

Page 666 of 1000 (iBooks on iPad):
And Ricky really didn't have a second in command here, so your Mother and I assisted Luka...
--Charles (Philip's father) is talking about Brenda (his second wife, not Philip's mother)

Page 800 of 1000 (iBooks on iPad):
"You all come join us over here. We're getting reading to have dessert."
--Obviously it should be ready.

Page 874 of 1000 (iBooks on iPad):
"That is, if you want to insure the safety of your niece and nephews."
--BIG slip up. The kids are Philip's half brothers and sister.


But overall I enjoyed the book. ( )

Investigative journalist learns of his brother's death and decides to investigate it. Police determine that Philip's brother, Billy, was murdered. They also learn that someone went into his computer when Billy was in the hospital. They think the killer might have been after something that is now in Philip's possession so give him a protection detail.

Billy was a well respected artist who painted men in sexually explicit scenarios. When Philip looks into the murder, he also learns that a friend of Billy was murdered and the cases were probably connected.

Philip has flashbacks to his and Billy's childhood. Their mother was a well known artist and her agent, Uncle Adrian, preyed on the boys and introduced them into sexual activity. Adrian also took advantage of their mother and other female artists to make himself rich. He liked dealing with woman artists who had male children so he could perform sexual actions with them. The author describes the sexual activities concerning Billy and Philip. The details of these acts seemed unnecessary to maintain the suspense of the story.

Uncle Adrian lives outside the country and is greedy so Philip has a plan to entice him back to the United States to recover an art collection that was very valuable.

The author is a story teller and the book is extremely long. Sometimes a first mystery has a problem with needed editing to make the story more concise. I did enjoy the story and how Philip got in touch with the children of other artists who were abused by Uncle Adrian. The details of art were well researched.

I'm sure some people would enjoy this story more but it was outside of my comfort zone. ( )

Philip Hampton's brother dies from what seems to be a drug overdoes, but it turns out that he was murdered in the hospital. Philip and a group of friends investigate.

I really wanted to like this book but in the end I had to give up when I found from my Kobo that it had taken me well over 5 hours to get about a third of the way through it.

Somewhere inside this book is a cleverly plotted thriller trying to get out but it is swamped by the author's relentless descriptions of the characters' lives and settings. Every new room gets several pages of description of the furnishings. Every time the characters have a drink or tea and coffee on the penthouse balcony we get the complete conversation about who's having what and every 'please' and 'thank you'. We even get told about it every time the dog poops. I just couldn't take another 10 hours of it. ( )