Author: John Inman
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Cover Artist: Kanaxa
Publication date: June 6, 2019
Length: 191 pages
Reviewed by Sammy
Synopsis
Kenny Long is living a new life. Blinded in an accident, he has taken control of his unexpected reality the best way he can, and it’s working out better than he hoped.
Of course Larry Boots doesn’t know any of that. All he sees is a beautiful man sitting on a park bench.
Larry has a few problems of his own: his mother. His job. The lack of romance in his life.
His job. In the course of that job, Larry strikes up a friendship with Kenny. The next thing he knows, he’s so head-over-heels in love, even his mother doesn’t seem so bad. Of course his career is still a problem, but he’s working on that. Hopefully he’ll have the problem resolved before the man he’s being paid to murder succeeds in murdering him first.
And before the man he loves finds out he’s a cold-blooded killer.
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Review
It's not that Larry necessarily likes his job—but he knows
without a doubt that it’s necessary. After all, when justice is somehow
circumvented and killers get away, they deserve to be punished and that’s where
Larry comes in. Maybe he does the job because he just can’t stand to see the
pain and anguish that lingers in his carefully selected client’s eyes or maybe
it’s because there is something in his own past that has never been set right
and this is a means of coping with that truth. Whatever the reason, Larry knows
that each time he snuffs out a miserable guilty life he loses a bit of his soul
and even though he must deal with that he can’t turn his back on those who have
no other avenue but to hire him to make sure justice is done and their loved
one’s memory is avenged. The last thing Larry expects is to meet someone during
a stakeout that moves him in a way that no one else ever has. Larry isn’t sure
exactly what he feels for Kenny but he knows that time spent with the quiet,
insecure man does something to Larry that has never happened before—gives him a
sense of peace and contentment that he never knew he craved.
Kenny struggles most days with just making sure the short
walk from his meticulously laid out apartment to the center where he works is
as easy as possible. He never expects that the man who will make his pulse
flutter in all the right ways will one day literally drop from the trees and
sit beside him on his favorite park bench. Larry is a mystery in two ways—his
job being one and his interest in a nerdy, bow-tie wearing blind man the other.
No one normally gives Kenny a second glance but Larry does—Larry sees him in
ways no one else ever has and that makes Kenny both a little afraid and a lot
excited. Surely Larry is too good to be true and one day he will wake up and discover
how much of a burden a blind boyfriend can be.
I make no bones about the fact that I think author John
Inman is one of the most talented authors in the m/m genre today. His unfailing
sense of timing, humor and incredibly unique and well-drawn characters combine
to make nearly every one of his novels a fantastic experience to read. Once
again, Inman has hit it out of the park with his latest release, Larry Boots, Exterminator. From Larry’s
irrepressibly quirky and pot addled mother to his two standard poodles who
either hump their way through the dog park or give the moniker, guard dog, a
whole new meaning, this novel offers up one hilarious moment after another. But
the humor is tempered with incredibly poignant moments when Larry meets clients
and learns just why they need an “exterminator” to rid their world of the
heartless criminal who took their loved one from them and escaped paying for
the crime. On the heels of those scenes are the beautiful moments of intimacy
between Larry and Kenny as they discover each other’s bodies and hearts. All
this–the emotion, the burgeoning love story, the dangerous interaction with the
scum of the earth and, yes, the incredibly brilliant moments of laughter and
joy all combine to make Larry Boots,
Exterminator a fabulous story that you will want to read not just once but
again and again just to savor the marvelous people who inhabit John Inman’s
well-crafted world.
If I could give this novel a thousand stars I truly would.
But I will leave this review with just this—authors who can create characters
who make an indelible mark on your heart and memory are few and far between.
For me, John Inman is one such author and I can only finish here by saying that
I highly recommend this brilliant story to you.
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