This instalment was intriguing at the beginning and quite exciting for a bit towards the end, but the rest of it was dull. The plot was so convoluted and involved so many people that a diagram would have come in handy. ( )

A man is found dead in his bathtub, presumably a suicide. Slider and crew soon doubt that conclusion, but find it difficult to even identify the corpse, let alone why he might have been murdered. As the clues finally begin to reveal, it seems just when a potential culprit is identified, that another murder, again staged to look like suicide, further clouds the picture. It took dogged police work to finally identify and apprehend the killer in actually a somewhat amusing conclusion.

I'm glad Cynthia Harrod-Eagles hasn't gotten bored with the Slider character and I love the female cop from Ireland. ( )

My first Bill Slider and I was delighted to find that the author has written a whole series as I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story, which was very well plotted, had believable and sympathetic characters and some excellent witty dialogue. A mystery death of an unidentified individual, initially looking like suicide, arouses DI Bill Slider's suspicions and he relentlessly pursues all lines of enquiry to try to find out who the person was and why they were killed, unravelling a complex web of illegal activity and characters. Highly recommended. ( )

First let's be clear-I'm a huge Bill Slider fan. I've been reading this series since Ms. Harrod-Eagles began it, and have always eagerly awaited the next new book. This book though (the 15 in the series) just disappointed me. I didn't hate it, and I still love Bill and his cronies and enjoy seeing them work together to solve their cases. Also, the books are always funny, from the pun chapter names, to the jokes, and to the understated and hilarious similes and of course Porson's malapropisms. These alone make each book a delight. But I also always enjoyed the mysteries. They have always been a bit tricky and not easily determined. That is where this book fell short in my view. The mystery seemed to start out well-a corpse found that could so easily have been a suicide, but Bill and his crew dig enough to determine it was, in fact, a murder. There were lots of lucious suspects and a pretty good side story line as Shepherd's Bush CID do backgrounds on everyone that may be involved. But Ms. Harrod-Eagles pulled a fast one on one or two key suspects and all of a sudden, with no lead-up, we have new and unvetted suspects at the very end of the book. I don't like when mystery writers do this, so that is why my rating for this book is 3 1/2. I still enjoy Bill Slider and his quick wit so much that this will not turn me off the series. ( )

Another good book in this excellent series. ( )