Fun read with a few more twists than expected; an altogether solid mystery and fun read if you take it as the metafiction of the fictional CASTLE characters fictionalized at another level. ( )

More plot, more action, more characterization, fewer television tropes. These are what I saw as improvements in this second installment of Richard Castle's crime novel series featuring Detective Nikki Heat, inspired by NYPD Detective Kate Beckett. This time around the victim of the murder they are investigating was a well-known and widely despised gossip columnist. The situation is complicated by the fact that Jameson Rook's (based on Castle himself) magazine article about Heat has just hit the newstands, with her picture on the cover.

Of course, Castle and Beckett are also just characters in a television show. The parallels between the two fictitious worlds are part of what makes this book a fun read. Most of the time, the tone and interplay between the two main characters just works and the reader has fun spotting the crossovers.

On the other hand, the parallel worlds are sometimes plain awkward. I still don't think the 'real' Castle would have made all of the main characters in his book quite so similar to their television world counterparts. Sometimes it gets a bit creepy. And I think he would have come up with a better moniker for the author character than Rook (castle, rook, chess, get it?).

Even so, this is great fun for Castle fans. ( )

That was just fun. An excellent summer diversion. ( )

The book isn't high literature and it's not intended to be. What it is, is a fun romp of a reasonably well written mystery. It fleshes out the characters a bit more and makes you like them a little better even than in the first book. Made me hopeful there will be a third installment in the series. ( )

Always fun to read the books that spun off from the tv series. The biggest mystery to me is WHO WROTE THESE? ( )