2018/55: The Mystery of Nevermore -- C. S. Poe

there are 101 things in life I simply don't have the patience for, and finding someone else's rotting heart in the floorboards of my shop just about topped the list. [loc. 84]

Sebastian Snow, owner of the Antique Emporium, has plenty on his mind: cashflow issues, his collapsing relationship with closeted NYPD detective Neil Millett, and srock control. Arriving at the shop one morning to find that there's been a break-in, and that there is a rotting heart under the floorboards, does not help his equilibrium.

The lead detective on the case is, luckily, not the loathsome Neil, but one Calvin Winter, who is kind and good-looking and I think we can see where this is going. Or can we? Cal has problems of his own, and is certainly not out and / or proud. It doesn't help that Sebastian, under suspicion of murder (and on the hunt for an incredibly rare Edgar Allan Poe chapbook), ends up revealing his relationship with Neil to Neil's colleagues.

The relationships in this novel didn't ring true for me. I couldn't see why Sebastian had stayed with Neil for four weeks, let alone four years (though he does say that the rot only started when they moved in together) or why Cal, so prone to cute endearments (ugh), effectively makes a play for Sebastian and then backs off. The murder mystery is not especially mysterious (there is something dodgy about the villain the very first time we encounter them) and while Sebastian's visual impairment (he has monochrome vision) is intriguing, it has very little impact on the plot. When one's favourite character in a novel is the narrator's father, it doesn't bode well.