Book Review: Coffee, Shopping, Murder, Love

I was sent Coffee, Shopping, Murder, Love by Carlos Allende to review and the premise sounded really interesting so I was looking forward to reading it.

This book is described as a campy dark comedy and I would say that’s accurate.

Jignesh is an overweight, gay, Indian American man in his 40s living in LA. He is a bookkeeper for a rental housing company and has actually been embezzling money for years.

Charlie is a flamboyant, white, gay man in his late 30s who went on a date with Jignesh after meeting on a dating app. He works at a call center for marketing and likes nice, expensive things even though he can’t afford them.

Jignesh and Charlie are complete opposites and can barely stand each other, but end up needing each other. Jignesh has a short temper and lashes out when people make fun of him for his weight, sexuality, and his not-so-secret career as a romance writer. So much so that he commits murder and ropes Charlie into helping him cover things up for months.

The story is over the top and and ridiculous in an entertaining way. The book had me hooked because I wanted to know what would happen to Jignesh and Charlie, but I have to be honest and tell you I hate read most of it. I honestly could not stand Jignesh and Charlie. There are characters who are morally bad or morally grey in books that I absolutely love. Jignesh and Charlie were not them. I found them highly unlikable and I just wanted them to get caught and have to pay for all the horrible things they did to people.

It has some good reviews on Amazon and GoodReads so maybe I’m in the minority here, but I just not care for it. I’ll give the author props for writing a story that kept me reading but I just couldn’t like it much with the characters.