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The Model Man
Posing as a psychic to get into the hottest L.A. parties, aspiring actress Christy Harris finds herself in hot water--and under the covers--when a gorgeous cop with a sexy Texas drawl hires her to "read" a crime scene to help solve a murder investigation. Original.
316 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 16, 2019
The weather has turned hot, the beaches are packed, and that means summer reading. So I hit the romance aisle and, after browsing a bit, picked up The Model Man by Genie Davis.
The book opens up from the perspective of a surfer/model called Ricky Littlejohn, whose life has gone down the tubes because of too many drugs, too many women, and too much partying. Eventually, with his career in the can, he’s found overdosed in his hot tub, an apparent suicide.
Christy reads about Ricky’s demise in a smutty newspaper while waiting for her new client to show up. She’s a not-so-recent transplant to LA, and has a smorgasboard of jobs in which she claims some expertise. She’s a pretend psychic, a pretend waitress, a pretend movie director—but a real con artist. She and her friend/neighbor Louie run different scams while waiting to hit it big in Hollywood. Because, hey, she’s gotta pay the rent, right?
When Joe Richter, a sexy cop from Texas, shows up at her workplace, she’s conflicted between her first, natural instinct that tells her to run like hell, and the equally strong impulse to confess everything and jump into the sack with him. He needs her help to figure out what happened to Ricky Littlejohn, as he’s convinced Ricky was murdered. Christy figures she’ll play along. It’s not really a con, but more of a paid vacation for her, since he hires her for psychic services. Her plan is to have a good time for a night or two, and then get the hell outta dodge.
But when people start trying to kill her, Joe is the only person she can turn to who might have some answers. The biggest problem is he’s not who he claims to be either. Christy needs to figure out if she can trust him and her growing feelings for him—or if he’s conning her.
The book was fast to read and somewhat snarky in tone, with a good balance of thrills, romance, suspense and humor. It’s not meant to be a realistic mystery, though – it’s told more in the hijinks and humor style of Janet Evanovich, with a strong thread of comedy running through it. Characters sometimes delve into the absurd, and the plot sometimes relies on coincidence rather than realistic detective work. It’s labeled as a romance, but it could just have easily been in the mystery category, as figuring out whodunit is the central motivation of the characters.
But all the elements of the book were great. It was exactly the type of page-turner that I was hoping to find to kick off my summer. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.
This review was originally published in the magazine Bewildering Stories, Issue # 725.
The book opens up from the perspective of a surfer/model called Ricky Littlejohn, whose life has gone down the tubes because of too many drugs, too many women, and too much partying. Eventually, with his career in the can, he’s found overdosed in his hot tub, an apparent suicide.
Christy reads about Ricky’s demise in a smutty newspaper while waiting for her new client to show up. She’s a not-so-recent transplant to LA, and has a smorgasboard of jobs in which she claims some expertise. She’s a pretend psychic, a pretend waitress, a pretend movie director—but a real con artist. She and her friend/neighbor Louie run different scams while waiting to hit it big in Hollywood. Because, hey, she’s gotta pay the rent, right?
When Joe Richter, a sexy cop from Texas, shows up at her workplace, she’s conflicted between her first, natural instinct that tells her to run like hell, and the equally strong impulse to confess everything and jump into the sack with him. He needs her help to figure out what happened to Ricky Littlejohn, as he’s convinced Ricky was murdered. Christy figures she’ll play along. It’s not really a con, but more of a paid vacation for her, since he hires her for psychic services. Her plan is to have a good time for a night or two, and then get the hell outta dodge.
But when people start trying to kill her, Joe is the only person she can turn to who might have some answers. The biggest problem is he’s not who he claims to be either. Christy needs to figure out if she can trust him and her growing feelings for him—or if he’s conning her.
The book was fast to read and somewhat snarky in tone, with a good balance of thrills, romance, suspense and humor. It’s not meant to be a realistic mystery, though – it’s told more in the hijinks and humor style of Janet Evanovich, with a strong thread of comedy running through it. Characters sometimes delve into the absurd, and the plot sometimes relies on coincidence rather than realistic detective work. It’s labeled as a romance, but it could just have easily been in the mystery category, as figuring out whodunit is the central motivation of the characters.
But all the elements of the book were great. It was exactly the type of page-turner that I was hoping to find to kick off my summer. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.
This review was originally published in the magazine Bewildering Stories, Issue # 725.
August 26, 2022
This book was a struggle to get through. It started very slow and seemed to not be building to anything. Finally got a bit interested half way through but was still far fetched. The ending really didn’t even make sense and felt very random.
July 4, 2014
This started as the kind of book where it's not interesting enough to keep picking up but not bad enough to put down. Around 80 pages in it still wasn't picking up for me so I read some reviews on Amazon that led me to believe I should keep going. About half way through it finally got good.
Interesting choice to have the lead character be a con artist, and her love interest a "cop". I use quotes because there seemed to be something off about him even before I read the reviews that told me I was correct.
The author did have good character development and she kept you guessing about who Joe really is, who killed Ricky, and where is the money. If you can get through the slow beginning......
Interesting choice to have the lead character be a con artist, and her love interest a "cop". I use quotes because there seemed to be something off about him even before I read the reviews that told me I was correct.
The author did have good character development and she kept you guessing about who Joe really is, who killed Ricky, and where is the money. If you can get through the slow beginning......
January 22, 2012
2.5
I just don't know about this book. It broke my cardinal rule of romance novels, no first person perspectives. The story was confusing and in the end I could hardly be bothered to read anything other than the dialogue. Sex scenes were less than satisfactory.
I just don't know about this book. It broke my cardinal rule of romance novels, no first person perspectives. The story was confusing and in the end I could hardly be bothered to read anything other than the dialogue. Sex scenes were less than satisfactory.
January 15, 2009
it's interesting, but slow also...
March 16, 2015
Ugh. Ok story, but not necessary to say the same thing 50 times. And the ending went on so long, I still don't know whodunit.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews