The Ghost Wore Yellow Socks

Perry finds a gruesome dead body in his bathtub, when he returns early from his long-planned vacation. While he's panicking about, trying to get some help from the house's other odd tenants, the body disappears. Still, he finds unexpected help from ex-SEAL Nick Reno.

The first half of the book seemed kind of slow... or perhaps I was much too impatient to get to the "good stuff" if you ahem get my drift. Not as good as the Adrien English series I have just finished, but one must take into account that this is a standalone novel, not part of a whole series. Apparently there's going to be a sequel after all, though it would still be unfair to compare one book to an entire series.

Also, the dynamic between Perry and Nick seemed sometimes show more rather aggravating. Nick is not only ten years older, but also much "tougher" than poor asthmatic Perry. No wonder, after all the former is an ex-SEAL, while Perry's day job is being a librarian, though his real passion is painting. As such, Nick often refers to him as kid, or sometimes even Josephine or Camille.

All in all, an enjoyable read, with plenty of "heart-fluttering" moments when needed, as well as the occasional humorous quip.

=======================
Review of book 2: The Ghost Had an Early Check-Out show less

4.5 Stars

Loved this book! I loved Perry & Nick. Perry is just such a sweet innocent (in much more than the physical sense) and yet is possessed of a quick, sharp mind and an inner strength that allows him to rebound from hit after hit. Nick is a guy's guy - tough, macho, an ex-navy seal. Hoo-ya! These two should not be a match and yet slowly their accidental meeting develops into more...all at the same time they are trying to discover who is murdering people in the old mansion they both live in. An easy read with a mystery that is entertaining rather than heavy-handed.

Definitely recommended.

This has all the makings of a good mystery…a romance…and a little comedy. We also have in our mystery recipe… a dead man wearing a yellow sports coat and yellow socks in Perry’s bathtub..a creepy old boarding house complete with an assortment of eccentric residents, and weird happenings that begins with a disappearing corpse…though Perry didn’t think it disappeared quite soon enough. Josh Lanyon takes this scenario and carries it through with twists…scares… and clues along the way. I love the characters of Nick and Perry. They are so different yet so much alike. Nick is all business and Parry is all fun and adventure while sometimes bypassing how much danger he could be in. Other than “uglying” him blind…how much show more danger can you be in from a dead man? I read the second book first…I often do this on purpose but this time it was accidental as I didn’t realize that it was a trilogy. Since I had already read the second book I was a little confounded to find that the story resonated with many shades of the plot of the first book. Different local and the two guys hadn’t met yet in this one…but it was still very much the same, thus reducing the usual 5 star rating that goes to Josh Lanyon’s books. It was still a good read and she is still one of my favorite authors…but hey, Ms. Lanyon…FYI…these books are WAY too short. show less

Re-read this, as I am fan-girling on Josh Lanyon currently, and this book was one of my very first m/m-romances--read as a paperback, no less. If you enter the fray on such a fare it is no wonder that the sights get set high.

In hindsight I agree that Josh was still channelling a bit too much Chandler and not enough Lanyon with this, but I can't be bothered to give it any lesser rating. I might prefer the easy Lanyon prose of e.g. [b:The Dark Farewell|7747038|The Dark Farewell|Josh Lanyon|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1267370623s/7747038.jpg|10575405], but this one gets way over 5 stars already on it's so satisfying length alone.

I appreciated Lanyon writing a twink here, showing how a fellow gay man, a "real man" gets more or less strung show more up by his own devices and prejudices, and as ever his believable and clever rendering of male emotions and kindling of love. Lanyon so easily straddles this which eludes so many other m/m authors that it is a pure pleasure to read.

And as always: plot and mystery also are a pleasure to read, and I'm enough of a dofus that I most times, thus also here, don't guess the culprit in advance. A classical whodunnit with a fantastic opening. show less

The title is misleading. I thought it was going to be a ghost story, turns out, just a juicy murder mystery by one of my favorite authors. Perry comes home early from a trip to find a dead man in his bathtub. It wasn't enough that his boyfriend dumped him, but now a corpse is complicating things even further. Perry lives in a spooky, old rooming house filled with colorful characters. It's an 'Old Dark house' tale, complete with a hunky ex-NAVY SEAL coming to Perry's rescue. Will a romance ensue? Will Perry solve the mystery? Will he ever break his 'FRUIT LOOPS' obsession? It's alot of light hearted fun, a sexy romp, with thrills thrown in for good measure. A quick read. It is very frustrating to find that many of this author's title's show more are only available thru Kindle. Drat that little mechanical box!! show less

When Perry comes home early from an out-of-town trip, he finds a dead body in his bathtub in his rooms in his boarding house. But by the time he can get someone else to go up and see, the body is gone. And thus begins a slightly old-fashioned-feeling mystery story with a strong thread of romance between Perry and Nick, another renter at the house. This was mildly entertaining (and it kind of made me want to go read some older mystery stories that it sort of reminded me off--Whose Body and maybe The Norths Meet Murder), but ultimately both the mystery and the romance felt a little thin, with the result being that the itch for neither of those genres was really scratched.

Re-read a couple years after the first time in preparation for the sequel. Still good, but now a 3-star read for me, instead of 4. The slow burn could have been better developed, instead of kind of suddenly changing to sexing quite so easily. Again, as I said for "The Mermaid Murders," it seems too artificial, though not nearly so much as that book. Also, random POV switches from paragraph to paragraph present here, beware! Averaging and rounding up, so I'll leave the rating as is.

Original review:

Very good, got better the further in I went. It's not Lanyon's best work by any account, but it definitely has its charms and a different feel to it than her other works. I liked Perry, and how he had a lot of character and backbone. At first show more he seems like somewhat of a shrinking violet, but little by little he comes back into himself (after a depressing blow by his former love interest) and easily charms. Nick is strong and very competent, taking on the role of reluctant protector, and slowly is won over by Perry. He actually is rather rough and a bit mean at the beginning, and I liked how the dual points of view really let the reader into both characters' minds and backgrounds very quickly. The story is less engaging than Lanyon's other works--except for one other work I always give him five stars--but it is filled with a good murder mystery that reaches back into history, no solid clues to the perpetrator (so we can't guess early), and an array of interesting supporting characters. Well worth the read, it's quick and really fun. show less