Review::Murder on Michigan Avenue by Jere Myles

Murder on Michigan Avenue by Jere Myles

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Murder on Michigan Avenue is not your average mystery.
It's also not your average LGBT novel.
It is a literary masterpiece that puts its author Jere Myles on par with other favorites of mine such as Hemingway.

Certainly there is a heap of murder within this trilogy. And a large mystery that unfolds to the reader. There is no doubt that the bulk of characters intersect or have lives that are bisected by gay and bi-sexual themes. Strangely, though this is not really just a mystery and certainly not an in your face LGBT novel.

This is a primer for a large discussion of an ever growing problem in the community of man. This is a story of love and how much our world today does to stifle anything related to it. The characters of Jon and Mieko and Eileen could be considered dysfunctional by many in the world because of their confusion of orientation. But, such a judgment would overlook the obvious. Their dysfunction is that they live in a world that has taught them to hold onto their love out of fear. Fear of rejection and fear of being misunderstood. The lives of these adults is only the tip of this iceberg. There is much more that is involved here. In these books we only see this piece. I wonder if Jere Myles will return to these characters and help explore the rest.

We have been carefully eroding love from society. If two close and old friends meet and hug and kiss. If they are women it may go unnoticed. If they are men it might raise eyebrows or more. We are taught from childhood onward that certain types of display of affection for members of the same sex are not appropriate. This of course in direct opposition to "Love thy neighbor as thy self." I'm talking about love here and not that sticky love/sex thing that people get hung up on.

Today we live in a world that is beginning to facilitate the denial of love of parent for children just out of fear of it appearing to be the wrong things to onlookers. We have even legislated ourselves to a point where protecting the young takes away a parents ability to reach out and lovingly care for their children. The lives of the people in these books is a mirror of the symptom of these problems. And it all goes much deeper. Because there are those who would point at these peoples lives and try to justify their problems with what they have chosen as a lifestyle while overlooking some fundamentals.

It's rather ironic since sex is more common to eating, sleeping, breathing, sensing. All pretty much autonomic responses. All at sometime necessary for continuing life. All at sometimes subject to subjective urges that go beyond the norm.

The shame is that society places Love as a lifestyle decision. Man was made to love whomever he chooses to love not whomever some lifestyle dictates. When a lifestyle chooses whom we love it restricts our ability to love to the fullest and that is definitely dysfunctional.

Yes. I suppose someone else could argue I took too much from these novels- but, I think not.

This book this trilogy is for everyone who's ready to handle it with a mature attitude.
For those who have read the other two- what are you waiting for?
For those who haven't- there is enough here to give you the full picture. But, I'd advise reading the other two.

J.L. Dobias author of Cripple-Mode Series.



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