More 3 1/2 stars. It had a good start and I took to Dan Chan's character immediately. I didn't even mind the first person telling and felt it suited.

Mark's vulnerability was a little overdone which had Dan running around in circles trying not to frighten him off yet getting mixed signals. While it made Dan a very nice guy, it lessened Mark IMO. He came across too emo, too sensitive and needed people walking on eggshells around him.

Dan, despite suffering from bouts of depression which caused him to contemplate eating his gun a few times, is fun, witty and didn't take himself too seriously. And that was at odds with the narratives describing his depression and his problems. I felt as if the author was telling me Dan is depressed yet the character as played out in the story, is anything but.

Still, it didn't bother me that much and I was able to finish NGD. One thing that *did* bother me was: (Spoiler alert)
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St Romaine blackmails Dan by producing photos of him and a prostitute to get Dan to sell his property to the consortium but Dan has his own set of incriminating photos of St Romaine in a menage and demands double the amount. St Romaine protests against the blackmail but pays up, anyway, and Captain Dan Chan of Riceland Police Dept is half a million dollars richer.

Maybe things work differently in the US but I would have thought blackmail is blackmail anywhere in the world and when the police do it, it's even more heinous. I'd rather someone else do the blackmailing. Mark, for instance, or Dan's friend, Jeff. But for the police captain to outright blackmail someone in order to enrich himself and his friend, Bert, doesn't sit well with me.

Mark does get better by the end of the story. At least well enough to want to live with Dan permanently. This is no heavyweight M/M love story and I didn't mind it despite Mark's insipid personality and that blackmail bit.