Dying for a Thrill - a Mike King Mystery

Author Mark Zubro re-enters the world of detective Mike King in the second (but hopefully not the last!) book of the series. Our poor protagonist still hasn't found love, and his friends and co-workers are still harping on the fact that every guy he sleeps with winds up dead! Talk about bad luck. But that doesn't keep Mike King from falling for guys during his investigation, nor does it stop him from taking on his latest case when a young man with blood on his hoodie stumbles into his office and promptly collapses. And that's just on the first page.

Dying for a Thrill is a rather intense murder mystery, as not only does it deal with much higher than ordinary stakes for a standard detective novel, but the reader is never really sure who is telling the truth and who isn't. When a young, gay hacker shows up in King's office with blood on his hoodie, it's clear that something is wrong. The young man, who says his name is Jamie, begs for King to help him.  "They're after me," he says. It turns out, though, that the question is not who is after him - the real question is who ISN'T after him! It seems Jamie and his group of gay hackers, who not only think of themselves as modern-day Robin Hoods, but also think that they can outsmart everyone, didn't quite cover their steps as carefully as they thought. Someone in their midst was a traitor, and now the government, terrorist groups, and radical religious rights groups are after Jamie and his friends. King agrees to help him, but even as he does, he knows that Jamie is not telling him everything.

You really have to pay attention as you read this book, as it becomes more and more difficult to tell who is real, who isn't, who's telling the truth, who's lying, who is using who, and who is the real villain in the story? The more King and his team learn about the situation, the more they get tied up into the violence, and the more they realize they may just be in way over their head. An accident that seems to have never happened (yet one cop is willing to tell King what he saw). The body of Jamie's friend that seems to have disappeared (and no hospital has seen hide nor hair of him). The numerous agents who seem to have no trouble finding and confronting King, asking for the whereabouts of Jamie and his friends (and none of them are who they claim to be). And then King has a very difficult time keeping track of his own client (who, by the way, transferred to King's account an astronomical sum of money to help him out). All the while, King and his associates find themselves targets of vehicular attacks, gun attacks, and physical attacks.

Then, just when you think things can't get any crazier - King finds out that Jamie and his friends may have uncovered a plot so detrimental to national security that the President himself could be a target!

There is absolutely no doubt that this mystery is one heck of a roller coaster ride, but definitely in a good way. Every time I thought I had it figured out, Zubro throws in another curve ball and send the story headed off in a completely different direction. There was one thing about the story that did bother me, however - not the fact that every agent and cop who was hunting for Jamie and his friends came on to, and one even slept with, King - no, it was the fact that each of these guys are all described as having well-endowed, bulging crotches. Yes, it's stretching it a bit to think that every agent, cop, or terrorist who confronts King just happens to be gay, but hey - this is a gay mystery, after all. But to think that every single guy is super-endowed? Well, that's pushing the envelope of believe-ability a bit too far. Some guys are well hung, some guys aren't. Some guys are showers, other guys are growers. It would just be nice, for once, to see gay fiction portray men in a realistic fashion, rather than having them all be "super-studs."

But, that was a minor thing, and it certainly did not stop me from turning page after page to see where this was all going to lead. I'm not finding any more books listed for this series, but I hope Zurbo doesn't place Mike King on a shelf - he's a great character with a diverse, fun supporting cast, and quite frankly, this would make for a terrifically great television series!

RATING:  9 James Bond villains out of 10 for keeping the twists and turns coming so fast I couldn't wait to see what was going to happen next!