Eric Garcia - Hot And Sweaty Rex

Four stars. Recommended.

Probably the best of the Rex series so far. Anonymous Rex introduced the shadowy world in which dinosaurs secretly live side-by-side with humans, cleverly disguised by prosthetic human suits, and Casual Rex dealt with a lot of back story that had been left blank by the first book. Now that all this has been established, Garcia seems to feel a lot more free and open in his storytelling. Hot And Sweaty Rex sees Vincent Rubio hired by one dino mafia family to spy on another. And as if that wasn't challenging enough, it turns out that one of the families is run by his closest childhood friend, to whose sister he was once engaged. And she still hasn't forgiven him.

You never forget that you're reading about a bunch of dinosaurs dressed up in rubber suits, but the story is strong enough that it would have worked even without the element of fantasy. Given that this is the case, you might wonder why Garcia chose to do it as a dino story at all, rather than as a stand-alone contemporary thriller, and the answer is: Vincent Rubio, raptor detective. The plot may revolve around a vicious turf war, but It's Rubio whose heart is mangled by the process. Garcia didn't want to tell just another crime story--he wanted to write about Vincent.