A Phat Death: A Nina Halligan Mystery Book

I guess it's a rule to most action adventure books: the grander the scale, the less endearing the tale. This is the sequel to "The List of 7," an eye-opening superfuntoread experience. The same characters, Arthur Conan Doyle, Jack Sparks, Alexander... all return. If this were The Mummy franchise, 7=The Mummy; 6=The Mummy Returns.

There is to be a congregation of six figureheads at a dark tower in the middle of Arizona. Doyle travels the ocean (has some obstacles... his brother accompanies him on his American Book Tour), from NYC to Chicago to Phoenix. Many characters are added on, most of them interesting and unconventional. Then the climax arrives 20 pages before the last page. So much effort, and the payoff seems... weak. There is a hint of betrayal here. The writer could have left his swashbucklers in the first book, but this extension brings them forth, completely out of their element. "List of 7", played upon the stage of Victorian England, with its foggy cobble-stoned streets & ill-lit lamps, was ambiance personified. Here Frost explores the new world, and the experience is less claustrophobic, emblematic, endearing... and that is the problem.