Tastes differ, even in matters as frivolous as an Archie McNally mystery, and the reviews of this book show that clearly. Many readers seem to find the Archie books written by Vincent Lardo just as good as the ones written by Lawrence Sanders. Sanders, of course, created the series but died the year after the publication of "McNally's Gamble", number seven. I do not find the post-Sanders books at all an acceptable substitute, and this is the last of the series that I shall read. The core of the series is Archie's character, and in this book -- while he is still superficially silly -- he isn't ineffably silly. That is, he does silly things, like getting involved in amateur theatricals, but he isn't eccentric, and he isn't daft. He is much less interested in clothes and food that has been his wont, and seems to me much harder edged about people, life, and just about everything. The character started to change in the first Lardo book, but the change has gone further in this effort. I shall not follow it further. A workmanlike crime story, which is why two stars rather than one, but it's not my Archie. ( )

kind of dull