From the Bookshelf of Q&A with Josh Lanyon…

High Concept

Whitley Gray

Start date: October 1, 2013

Finish date: October 31, 2013

Discussion: Book of the Month Club

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What Members Thought

May 06, 2014 Otila rated it did not like it

Shelves: dnf

DNF @ 51%

I started reading this in July of 2014. I couldn't really get into it so I put it aside. I picked it up again thinking that maybe, since I was already almost 1/2 way through, the book might somehow get interesting--it didn't.

Beck is a homicide detective looking into a case that left 5 people dead, including his partner. He's not at all happy when the FBI gets involved. Especially when he finds out the agent he'll be working with is Zach, the guy that turned him down 2 years before. Zach had been in a relationship back then but was always attracted to Beck. Even though he's single now, he's still not sure being with Beck is a good idea mainly because they're working on a case together but also because they both have lots of baggage.

I didn't feel any chemistry between Beck and Zach. There's supposed to be all kinds of sexual tension between them at the beginning, at least that's what the author keeps telling me, but I didn't see it. Once they do have sex it lacked any heat. It just left me feeling meh. There's lots of issues they're going to have to deal with like Zach's needy and clingy ex, Beck's PTSD, the fact that Beck is in the closet and I'm sure they come up later on in the book to provide some angst but I don't care enough to find out.

This isn't a mystery. The reader knows who the bad guy very early on. The MCs suspect him too so it's just a matter of proving it. Now I understand the police work in RL is probably not as interesting as they make it seem on TV. When I'm watching Law & Order they tend to skip or skim over the boring stuff like paperwork and going over every detail multiple times in a conference room. There's no skipping or skimming over the boring stuff here. Nope. It's all there. Not only are there mundane details of the case but also of the characters everyday lives. I really don't need so much detail when someone brushes their teeth. Then there was the scene that showed the bad guy coming home to reheat his dinner. I'm sure that it was meant to show the reader how bad the bad guy is, since he's thinking about the murders as a way to advance his political career but it went into too much detail about everything else. He reads a note the maid left him that details everything that she left for dinner, what temperature to set the oven to and for how long to heat it. Why is it necessary for me to know all that? Then he scoffs at the note and just uses the microwave.. because bad guys don't use the oven? *shrugs*

Which brings me to my final complaint. There are too many POVs. The bad guy is very one dimensional so I don't understand why there were so many scenes from his perspective. Every scene drives home the point that he's evil but there's no other layer to him. He's a douche to everyone, he sits around making plans to kill anyone who gets in his way, yada, yada, yada.

There's another bad guy who also gets his own POV which seemed completely pointless to me. I think his scenes were there to show how it was possible for him to steal a phone and make a call to Beck from prison. The problem is they really didn't and it just felt like more unnecessary details bogging this book down. ...more

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Dec 12, 2014 Brandilyn rated it really liked it

Shelves: mm, read-2015

Reviewed for Prism Book alliance

I didn't know if High Concept from Whitley Gray was going to earn four stars from me. There were times it seemed to drag on, and it took me about half of the book to finally sink into the story. However, in the end there was enough to hold my interest, and that in itself is saying something.

http://www.prismbookalliance.com/?pos...

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Oct 22, 2013 Sarah rated it really liked it

3.5 stars
I found this took a while to get started and there were a lot of loose ends. I liked Beck and Zach, but there were times when I felt one or both of them needed shaking.
Overall fairly enjoyable though.

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