I think it was somewhere in the Twitterverse where goodreads asked, "describe your current read in three words. I was in the middle of this indie book at the time, and I described it as "New Potential Pratchett." That description still holds up. Or maybe Douglas Adams is a better comparison, because I'm strongly reminded of Dirk Gently.

Either way, I was pleasantly surprised. I wasn't expecting much, as G.M. Nair was an indie author I had never heard of, and debut indie books have a (possibly unfair) reputation for being hit or miss. But I've made a pledge to give lesser known authors a shot, and Duckett and Dyer crossed my path.

The story is a comedic scifi hardboiled detective mashup where two inept detectives, Michael Duckett and Stephanie Dyer, set out to solve a case of several missing persons that become weirdly connected. Okay, so from the start these two are not really detectives, but the universe seems to want to will that title on them for... reasons. Michael and Stephanie are roommates and best friends who can barely make their rent, and Stephanie's irresponsible streak has finally begun to wear thin on Michael. Then Michael's first date love interest goes missing, and a search to find her in a literal multiverse ensues.

This was a fun read. The characters were well drawn, and the story ended to satisfaction with the tease of a sequel.

I give this story a solid 4 out of 5 little twinkly stars. ( )

Michael Duckett is a shy, socially awkward guy who just can't seem to catch a break. Stephanie Dyer is a disaster bi who's fully committed to living in the moment. Someone has started a private investigator company in their names and placed ads all over town.

Neither Michael nor Stephanie are especially likeable characters. They're the kinds of people you'll find yourself constantly shouting 'DO BETTER' at. And I love them for that.

This far-fetched and utterly ridiculous time travel / parallel worlds novel delivers flawed characters bumbling through life, making one bad choice after the next, who eventually learn to accept themselves and each other and to – maybe, just maybe – learn to do better. ( )

This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
---
WHAT'S DUCKETT & DYER: DICKS FOR HIRE ABOUT?
I have been dreading this day for a little bit now, because I have to answer this question, and I'm not sure I can. At one point, Stephanie Dyer describes their
experiences as:

It's like Quantum Leap, but if Scott Bakula had a concussion.

I'm tempted to leave it there and move on, but you're going to want a little more than that.

So, Michael Duckett shares an apartment with his best friend since childhood, Stephanie Dyer. Shares is being generous—he pays the rent, utilities, and food bills. Stephanie tries not to cause trouble for him. Sometimes.

Michael hates his/their apartment, his job, and his life in general. What he doesn't hate is flirting with a particular woman at the laundromat. There's really not much more to say about his life—until a woman accosts him on the way home from the laundromat, demanding that he takes her case. He's confused, and she presents an advertisement for his detective agency.

He has no idea what she's talking about or where the advertisement came from. Stephanie doesn't, either. Soon they're hired to look into a woman's disappearance by that woman. Somehow, she knew she was about to disappear and wants them to find out what's about to happen to her/has happened to her by the time they get on the case.

Clear as mud? Yeah, I know.

Meanwhile, a grizzled detective is trying to take down a drug dealer—until he disappears in a way he can't explain. It's not long before he crosses paths with Duckett and Dyer and things get stranger for him (by this time, they're already pretty strange for the detectives, but it gets worse for them, too).

THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS
(with apologies to a certain franchise)

"That's it?" Michael scowled. "It looks like you took a stopwatch and glued some extra stuff on it."

Matteo slammed the box closed and yanked it away. "You make your own dimension hopping device on a grad school budget and see how it looks."

Without giving too much away, the duo finds themselves bouncing from parallel universe to parallel universe—some have a slightly asynchronous timeline, others have bigger differences—some have differences that are so small, like people's hair color.

The explanation for both their travel and the research that led to it being possible (and how they'll stop, I should add) is slightly more coherent than a certain someone's "wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey" speech. Coherent, but goofy and entertainingly explained. The jumping from universe to universe is a great joke delivery mechanism, Nair was able to let his imagination run wild here—and it was worth it.

THE HUMOR

"You're kidding me. You're traveling across dimensions using black holes?"

"Yeah. Plus I made the whole thing light up blue. Took me a whole weekend to figure out how to do that. I think it looks cool,” Matteo was quite pleased with himself.

Speaking of joke delivery mechanisms—Nair has quite a few of them at work here. Some of the humor is quiet and observational, some is the classic situational kind of thing that comes from the Odd Couple-esque pairing of Michael and Stephanie, and then there's the ridiculous SF/Multiverse stuff—I don't even know how to describe that.

This story felt like the love child of Dirk Gentley's Holistic Detective Agency and Comedy Central's Corporate, but sweeter. The humor is sophisticated and juvenile, subtle and broad, cynical and sentimental. Not only was the story unpredictable, but so was the humor—Nair almost never went where you thought he would go with the jokes.

SO, WHAT DID I THINK ABOUT DUCKETT & DYER: DICKS FOR HIRE?

"I can't believe there are people who actually want to hire a couple of detectives with no experience."

"Don't doubt the power of internet marketing," Stephanie said.

"Also, the ad said we've been in business since 1989."

"We were born in 1989."

She shrugged, "So, technically, I guess. It's true."

This was just absurd (in the best way). It's not novel to combine any of the genres involved in the novel, but the way Nair does it makes it feel fresh and original—why didn't anyone think of this before?

Both Stephanie and Michael are hard to like sometimes—okay, Michael is difficult to like as a person more than sometimes—mostly you take him because Stephanie likes him. Actually, just about every character is realistically human and flawed—very flawed. That's not something you often get in such a comic novel, it's nice when you do.

Duckett & Dyer: Dicks For Hire is a great start to this trilogy—it's an SF romp with just a touch of Detective Fiction. Once things get moving, it's one of the faster-paced books I've read this year, and the jokes keep the story moving well. You're not going to find a lot of books like this one—you'd better pounce on it (and the sequel) when you can. ( )

This sounds hilarious!