Review: Long Past Dues

Long Past Dues by James J. Butcher

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

(a reminder that I use the star rating tooltips on the goodreads site. 3 stars = “I liked it”.)

Butcher, the son, is back with another entry in The Unorthodox Chronicles. Book 1 was a buddy-cop plot. We’re back with the same characters and, roughly, dealing with the consequences of the first book. I say roughly because JJB seems to be copying his dad in that there is a greater over-arching plot - or at the very least not every plot point from the last book or this book is resolved. It also doesn’t seem that each book will be standalone. In light of that, it was annoying, and cost the book a star - that our protagonists had backslid a bit. That might be more realistic, vs a linear progression, but with only 2 books out, it seems to waste enough of a chunk of this book getting the characters back to where they were at the end of the last book.

For this particular mystery, I was able to call the 2 main plot twists early, but I view that as positive. It means the author isn’t cheating - all the clues are there for us to piece together.

I enjoyed the book and the characters enough that I’ll give book 3 a shot whenever it comes out, but beyond that I’m not entirely sure.

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