Pretty Good Time Waster
The first installment in the Nikki Heat books from Richard Castle is a decent read. Unlike so many tomes now issuing from mystery writers, this is a slender volume and can easily be read in an hour or so. The Heat characterization is typical for a female detective, i.e., smart, tough, in charge, with male subordinates. The perpetrators are convincing, if somewhat overdrawn, which is also typical of the modern mystery novel (or TV show, for that matter). I wonder why, for example, fictional evil-doers are always so smart and seemingly invincible, whereas actual criminals are almost uniformly stupid bunglers. Literary license, I suppose. There is an obligatory sexual encounter which can be skipped without interrupting the story flow. Good enough to read once? Yes. Would I read it again? No. But then that's true of nearly all modern fiction.
