The Less Than Spectacular Times of Henry Milch

The Wyandot County Mysteries, Book 1

By: Marshall Thornton

Narrated by: Jackie Meloche

Length: 6 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

A new mystery series from the award-winning author of the Boystown and Pinx Mystery series.

Things have not been going well for Henry Milch. After a Saturday night clubbing in his beloved West Hollywood, he took one pill too many and ended up banished to Northern Lower Michigan to live on a farm with his ultraconservative grandmother. It was that or rehab.

While working a part-time job for the local land conservancy, he stumbles across a dead body in the snow—as if things couldn’t get worse. But then, things take a turn for the better: There’s a reward for information leading to the man’s killer. All Henry has to do is find the murderer and claim the reward, and he can go back to his real life in LA.

©2020 Marshall Thornton (P)2022 Marshall Thornton

Flawed protagonist but a good mystery

I bought this book because I was a fan of the authors previous series pinx video, and although this is similar in that it’s a mystery with a gay main character, it’s a very different series but still enjoyable if a little less fun.

Our protagonist here is a drug addict who is in deep denial about being a drug addict. He’s hard to root for at times because his selfishness shines through. Henry is out to solve this murder not to bring a killer to justice, but to get the reward money, so he can head back to LA and get the hell out of small town Michigan. Ironically, this hurts his investigation process since he is determined to solve it all on his own. I assume this series will be about (at least partial) growth for him, which is why I am intrigued to read on. Plus, the author does a good job of writing a mystery no matter the situation, and has a talent for writing passages that are very affecting when you least expect it.
I do hope Henry becomes less of a loner and an overall better person in future installments, along with being able to kick his habit. If I had to put this in a genre, I would say it was a dark comedy mystery.

Jack Meloche did a great job as narrator although I admit I’m not a fan of when when authors reuse narrators for different series but that’s not his fault. I got over it a few hours into the book, and really enjoyed his performance.

A cozy queer mysterie

This was so well written and so well narratored that im automatically buying the second book now , it starts a bit slow gathering its place for what you need for a series, but its a fun ride