I had never heard of the author and bought this book, as I suspect many others must have done, purely for the anticipation of reading a novel where Oscar Wilde was cast as the main character, sleuthing his way across the American Wild West at that. Quite a challenge for the writer that!The action follows Wilde and an unusual entourage during his lecture tour of 1882. In their wake a maniac is leaving a trail of gruesomely murdered prostitutes, butchered Ripper-style. A gruff, alcoholic Colorado lawman , Bob Grigsby, has linked the murders to the towns the tour is visiting and he risks his job by following Wilde and his cohorts westward. Wilde himself is suspected, as is famous gunfighter and gambler Doc Holliday, who is also following the tour with his own agendas. So it's a serial killer murder mystery with celebrity trimmings, and an enjoyable rise at that. Satterthwait does a pretty good Wilde, replete with the expected epigrams and bon mots to go alongside the decadence. He has him turn his hand to detecting for a while, but quite rightly it turns out to be too much like hard work for him!Worth a read.
