Review: Title Should Be Tiffany’s Epiphanies
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 25, 2014
Richard Sherlock is the main character created by Jim Stevens for a series of mystery-whodunits, but it’s a wonder this character survives as his only claim to being a private detective is his previous failure as a policeman.  The really big mystery of the book is why Tiffany’s father, who has enough money to employ the very best, would hire such a klutzy loser as Sherlock to protect her.  Tiffany is a cardboard character, quite unrealistic, but a lot of fun.  She provides an interesting contrast to Sherlock.  It’s too bad Sherlock didn’t have his own epiphany.On the plus side is the writer’s ability to tell the story without taking it seriously.  The humor is campy and often forced, but Stevens includes enough creative expressions to make it fun.  Sherlock probably wishes he could be like Philip Marlowe or Sam Spade, but he has too many strikes against him (an ex-wife and two daughters) ever to be accepted in the fictional league of professional detectives.Negative aspects of the book are typical grammar and punctuation errors, which frequently left me re-reading passages to get the intended meaning.  So many characters were introduced that I needed a cast-list to keep them straight, especially at the end when author Stevens created a pseudo-Agatha Christy wrap-up gathering during which Sherlock awkwardly stumbled on to a solution of the case.In spite of all this, I enjoyed the book.  It has its weaknesses, but when I put it down I wanted to pick it right back up and keep reading.  So I give  it four stars.