The Boyfriend

By: Thomas Perry

Narrated by: Robertson Dean

Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins

Publisher's summary

Jack Till, who has retired from the LAPD after a respected career as a homicide detective, now works as a private investigator, comfortable chasing down routine cases while visiting his 24-year-old daughter, Holly, who has Down Syndrome. But when the parents of a recently murdered young girl, about Holly's age, ask for his help when the police come up empty, Till reluctantly takes the case.

It was discovered after her death that the victim had been working as a high-class prostitute, and the police are content to assume she was killed by a client, common in such a dangerous line of work. Yet as Till digs deeper, he realizes that the victim is just one of several young female escorts killed in different cities in the exact same way - all had strawberry blonde hair, and all were shot with a 9mm handgun in the sanctity of their apartments.

Till must find his way around the tawdry and secretive online escort business, and decode ads placed by young women who all use false names, sometimes advertise using other women's pictures, and move from city to city every few months. Yet when Till is finally able to catch up with the killer, he finds that the man he's after is far more dangerous and volatile than he ever could have imagined. As the body count rises, Till must risk his life to find this seductive and ruthless killer whose murderous spree masks a far deadlier agenda.

©2013 Thomas Perry (P)2013 Tantor

Classic Perry

As always, a very engaging page-turner with aother unique plot. How does he dream these up?

More Thomas perry

Loved it. He gets right to it and provides a suspenseful story. Will listen to more by Thomas Perry.

A Good Story That Finishes Flat

Well, the sex was good for me! This book takes us into the ultimate male fantasy. Yes they are escorts, but they are stunningly beautiful, equally intelligent, and only too happy to please.

I loved the father daughter relationship featured in the story. Maybe it's because I've never been around the world of escorts, but I just couldn't believe the rest of the story.

Excellent suspense thriller!

Jack Till is a private investigator who is retired from a career at LAPD. In The Boyfriend he is investigating a sleazy escort service. I admit that this novel is not as good as most Thomas Perry novels, but I enjoyed it.

Dated, but still entertaining

Chauvinistic, dated, but I still found the story and character interesting. I was entertained albeit a little more than skeptical throughout.

I decent mystery and what you would expect from the author.

Great book!

I was very impressed. I expected alot of sex junk, but this book focused on detection and I liked that.

meh

Kept me somewhat entertained, but poor character development. The hero, Jack Till, was stilted, and the antihero, Joey was merely a cut-out sociopath. The story stumbled along in a predictable way until the inevitable conclusion. Perry has done a lot better in the past than this offering. I can only halfheartedly recommend to those who love novels about sociopaths.

A pretty good listen

A pretty good listen, with a decent narrator that kept my attention. Would definitely recommend to the novice listener.

Bye

Exciting story kept me going despite flaws

I had really mixed fillings. The action is really well written and kept me listening, but there were flaws that at best made me feel that this might have worked better as a comic book. It was hard to believe the young villain could be so functional yet pathologically detached, for one thing. Sure he was angry about the circumstances leading to his first murder, but would a young teen be able to hit the road running like that? Also the efforts at omniscient narration describing the detective's thoughts -- would a sex ad really remind him, a man with no stated art experience, of a pre-raphaelite painting?. The dialogue among the detectives was wooden as the author used that dialogue to provide background about plot pointsthe cops wouldn't have needed to talk about among themselves. Nevertheless, some elements were really creative. The "chick book" style intro was a great tease.

Disappointing

Perry has given us a well-paced story of a retired homicide detective from LA and the sociopathic assassin he chases. There is, for the most part, a logical development of the plot without too much reliance on magical happenstance.
That's the good news.
The bad news ? The characters are almost all paper dolls. The assigned homicide detectives are jaded and incompetent. The women, with the exception of his daughter, an extremely high functioning woman with Down's syndrome, are easily manipulated and not too bright. No one, not even our hero, has any depth.
The plot also has issues. For example, in the book, the investigation into the serial killer/assassin" is done by a single detective rather than the FBI. Finally, while the ending resolved the primary plot, the book felt unfinished.