Reviewed by Chris
TITLE: Murder Takes the High Road
AUTHOR: Josh Lanyon
PUBLISHER: Carina Press
LENGTH: 250 pages
RELEASE DATE: April 23, 2018
BLURB:
Librarian Carter Matheson is determined to enjoy himself on a Scottish bus tour for fans of mystery author Dame Vanessa Rayburn. Sure, his ex, Trevor, will also be on the trip with his new boyfriend, leaving Carter to share a room with a stranger, but he can’t pass up a chance to meet his favorite author.
Carter’s roommate turns out to be John Knight, a figure as mysterious as any character from Vanessa’s books. His strange affect and nighttime wanderings make Carter suspicious. When a fellow traveler’s death sparks rumors of foul play, Carter is left wondering if there’s anyone on the tour he can trust.
Drawn into the intrigue, Carter searches for answers, trying to fend off his growing attraction toward John. As unexplained tragedies continue, the whole tour must face the fact that there may be a murderer in their midst—but who?
REVIEW:
This book has it all: Scotland! Book-Groupies! Jealous, Vindictive Ex Boyfriends! Murder?!?
When Carter Matheson originally booked two tickets for a week-long bus tour of Scotland to visit the many sites of inspiration for one of his favorite mystery crime author’s books, he did so as a surprise present for him and his boyfriend. Well two years, and one hellish breakup, later, and things have gone a bit off the rails. For one his ex demanded that Carter hand over his–very expensive, thank you very much–ticket to the new man in his ex’s life (which, yeah, no). And when Carter (rightly) doesn’t, his ex goes ahead an pays for the second ticket himself, so now Carter is stuck on a week-long bus tour with his angry ex and his asshole new boyfriend. Which makes things a bit awkward, to say the least. Then the rumors of a death on the previous bus trip start circulating, people start mysteriously dying, and the stranger now sharing his hotel room is acting all kinds of shifty. It is, to say the least, not the vacation Carter was looking for.
Though not terribly deep, dark, or daunting, Murder Takes the High Road is what I would consider a fun read. I was totally into the story for the entire length of the book, and it was a quick read because I kept wanting to flip to the next page to try and figure out what the hell was going on with this bus-tour.
The characters were by far the standout of the story. Quirky, annoying, mysterious, and downright odd, I found the whole cast to be rather memorizing. Carter himself, well, he was a blast. Especially when he was interacting with his ex. I loved their scenes so much. And while I don’t think John Knight (Carter’s mysterious roommate), and Ben (another fellow passenger) get quite enough fleshing out for my tastes, I found their individual interactions with Carter to work well with the story.
My one gripe with this book, really, is that the mystery–which I very much enjoyed for a large portion of the story–just fumbles around itself near the end. There is this secondary mystery that seems to come out of nowhere, and some character history that feels a bit rushed into the plot so that the story can wrap itself up nicely in a speedy manner. A lot of revelations happen in such a short span of time, that it kinda killed all the fun of discovering these things for myself. It was very much–here’s a clue, here’s a clue, here’s a clue…and here’s the answer! No time to breathe or ponder. I like all the parts that make up whole of the mystery, but the ending was so rushed that I didn’t get to enjoy half of them half as much as I wanted.
Of the two Josh Lanyon books I got the chance to read and review this month, I think I have to say that this one is my favorite…if only by a few decimal places. I just think I had more fun reading this one than I did The Magician Murders. I was never quite sure where this story was going, and while I think it flubs the ending a bit, overall the it was a very nice experience. It ended up being a fairly standard Lanyon mystery novel, but if those are your jam, like they are mine, I have a feeling you will enjoy this one as well.
RATING: 
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