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Dopplegangster (2010)

by Laura Resnick(Favorite Author)

3.74 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

1101159790 (ISBN13: 9781101159798)

languge

English

genre

Paranormal Fantasy

publisher

Daw Books

series

Esther Diamond

review 1: 3.5 starsEsther is an actress in NYC, currently working as a singing waitress at a restaurant known to be frequented by gangsters. On one of her shifts, a mafia don is shot at what is calculated to be an impossible angle. Then the mystery deepens as duplicated gangsters begin to show up. Esther and her magician friend Max try to figure out who is responsible and stop an all-out fight between gangs. Oh, and there is a really hot detective involved, too.A fun read, although I'd get lost a bit every now and again with the duplicated characters.
review 2: When I first saw the cover of Doppleganster, I was intrigued. I quickly learned I'd be circumnavigating the world Laura Resnick created without the context of book one to walk me through. Preceding Dopplegangste... morer, the first book in the Esther Diamond series, “Disappearing Nightly”’ which at the time was published by Luna, unfortunately disappeared almost overnight, likely because back in 2005 the publisher didn’t know what to do with it, and it was soon out of print.It appears that DAW recognized the potential and bought the second and third books in the series, released them and is going rescue and reprint “Disappearing Nightly” and finally give it the home it originally deserved. I highly recommend buying Dopplegangster and the new Sympathetic Magic. Hopefully good sales will influence DAW (a Penguin Imprint) to get busy and publish book one.Evidently, in book one, Esther became friends with Max, a 350+ year old wizard (who looks a youthful 70) and who with her help, defeated a bad wizard and they killed his evil assistant Hieronymus, something that had to be done, but weighs on Esther’s mind and something she can never tell her hopefully soon to be, cop boyfriend Connor.Esther’s life never goes to plan and she always ends up a mess, looking like a mess, or trying to get .herself out of one. It is almost a Lucille Ball kind of slapstick. She stumbles from one zany, crazy, silly, hilarious, mix-up to another. She’s like a pinball stuck in a game, being bashed around from one side to the other. Esther is just trying to find her way to that acting gig that will break her into the big time, trying to find some romantic time with the guy of her dreams, while being flung from one part of town to another, trying to solve the mystery and stay alive.What is so fresh and wonderful about the Esther Diamond series is Esther is the ANTITHESIS of what has become the norm in Urban Fantasy. The biggest weapons she carries are her four-inch high heels. She doesn’t know how to fight. There is no mystery about her parentage, other than how does her Mother always know to call when there is bad news. She has no magical skills. That’s right…none. She isn’t going to become some magical Queen; she doesn’t go around bossing everyone around because the whole world depends on her. Nobody seems to depend on her, she’s just trying to survive on her own, and maybe keep her boyfriend alive from the things he doesn’t know about that go bump in the night.Dopplegangster (again, this is book two) starts with Stella losing her acting gig. The play she was in, “Sorcerer” is canceled. Being a struggling actress in New York is no joke. She is damn glad to be rehired at her old waitressing job, even if it is as a singing server at Bella Stella’s, a known and notorious Mob Hangout.Unfortunately, her on again off again cop boyfriend Joe Morelli…oops, I mean Connor Lopez, a gorgeous hunk of Cuban and Scotch Irish parentage, doesn’t agree and thinks it is a dangerous place for her to work. He might have a point given the fact that there have been two mob hits there in the last five years and the owner Stella launders money for the Mob.To make matters worse, Lopez has just been promoted to the OCCB task force (organized Crime Control Bureau,) and his job is to crack down on organized crime. Chubby Charlie, one of her Mafioso regulars, and Esther both see an exact walking, talking double of Chubby Charlie and then he is shot at his table, from an impossible angle. This doesn’t help Lopez’s employment prospects as everyone thinks Esther had to have seen the murderer and is covering. She finds herself in the middle of a murder investigation and on the cover of a New York Tabloid publication looking like a mob girlfriend in the middle of a mob war. In a very short period, wise guys begin dropping like flies just after they see their exact double, the cops want Esther brought in for questioning and chaos ensues.The cops and the mob both think she knows more than she does. The only real people Esther can count on are Max, the Sorcerer with his trusty if slobbery familiar Nelli,, a Wizardly familiar, in the body of a massive hound from another plane of existence, and Lucky, a retired assassin wise guy who knows the truth and surprisingly accepts it quite easily.The scenes with Lucky are great. He’s the kind of guy where if it was his job, and he had to do it, he’d kill you, but otherwise, if he likes you…he’s gonna keep an eye out and try to help you out. And he likes Esther. Even though his concern is paternal, it is infuriating to Lopez, who cannot understand why Esther is hanging out with a mobster if she is innocent as she claims.Connor can only protect her so much, he can tell she’s lying, and various factions of the mafia are beginning to think Esther might be better off sleeping with the fishes. Connor also knows Max is hiding something and thinks he is a bad influence on Esther and he is incensed she is hanging out with retired mob enforcer, Lucky.Esther just wants her agent to return her calls with news of a great acting job, and to have sex with her boyfriend. Given the situations she finds herself in, none of these things seems likely to happen any time soon.The one-liners are hilarious, the side characters are incredibly nuanced and fleshed out, the heroine is hyper, smart and hilarious, and the hero is beleaguered. The book is much like Esther, an oddball mix. Part urban fantasy, part mystery, part screwball comedy harkening back to Katherine Hepburn and Carey Grant, It is a fun ride from start to finish. I just bought the third book, Sympathetic Magic, and I hope Esther and Lopez sort out their differences and get a HEA or at least get a chance to work off some of that sexual frustration. Given all that they’ve been through together, they deserve it. less

Download links for: Dopplegangster

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