Rating: 
Summary: A Disappointment
Review: Some years ago, a bookseller told me that John Dunning had decided not to continue the Cliff Janeway series. I was really sorry, because I had so enjoyed the two Janeway novels. Thus when I saw the announcement of "Bookman's Promise," I was thrilled. I ordered the book and read it at once.What a disappointment. Gone are the details of the rare book world that made "Booked to Die" so fascinating; gone is the careful delineation of Janeway's initially-complex character. In their place is a superficial tough-guy private eye caper, complete with scumbag gangsters (in the rare book world, mind you), macho posturing, and that annoying rapid-fire repartee without which private dicks are apparently not allowed to beat up crooks. According to the bookjacket, Dunning is working on Cliff Janeway #4. But I doubt I'll be reading it, now that Cliff has become just another Spenser clone. I'd suggest that Dunning and Parker collaborate on a cross-over, except that the characters would probably do nothing but trade smart remarks while they punch the crap out of each other.
Rating: 
Summary: Our hardboiled book dealer strikes again ...
Review: The third "bookman's" novel finds Cliff Janeway chasing high-end collectibles by the explorer Richard Burton. But this novel is sadder than the others, with too many losses to feel completely satisfied at the resolution of the various mysteries. However, Dunning's imaginative telling of Burton's missing months in the American South brings the history to life and conveys his own passion for this particular author and adventurer. I also enjoyed the witty (albeit unrealistic) repartee between the characters. I liked "Booked to Die" the most, and this one is my second choice. This book also exposes and rails against the unethical bookman and collector. As in the previous two in the series, accurate book lore is sprinkled throughout, giving a taste of the addictive potential of book collecting. You don't need to spend into 5 figures to enjoy the book collecting fever! Like Cliff, educate yourself and then collect what you love (and can afford).
Rating: 
Summary: Lame. Dunning needs a new editor
Review: This book was too long, had too many extraneous details that went nowhere, and had a totally unsatisfactory ending. Dunning's first two Janeway books were great, though. If you haven't read them yet, don't waste time here. If you have, you'll be disappointed with this.
Rating:
Summary: Dunning stumbles with Janeway III
Review: This third book of the Cliff Janeway series is a real disappointment. I still look forward to the fourth in the series, but now with considerably diminished hopes.
Somewhere hidden amid the flab of this book there are the bones of a better book. Whatever the actual course of development of "The Bookman's Promise," it gives the impression of a manuscript written long and then given to the printer without tweaking, tightening or any other discernable form of editing.
There are simply too many undigested lumps and whiskery cliches. Consider these few examples:
* The biggest lump, of course, is the long narrative of the antebellum South of 1860, Dick and Charlie's Excellent Adventure. This narrative was pretty clearly conceived as Charlie's first-person memoir. But there is still another memoir, Dick's, which takes the form of a handwritten journal, so the Excellent Adventure has been clumsily cast as Charlie's narrative . . . as imagined by his granddaughter . . . and then forgotten by her . . . and then reconstructed by a faddish application of memory recovery voodoo. . . then tape recorded . . . then pulled out of thin air by a character introduced for no other reason. Sheesh! Charlie, himself, while clearly prime fodder for an interview with Dr. Phil, or even Oprah, is singularly unconvincing as a member of the Civil War generation. He is terrified by possibilities that his contemporaries faced with grim determination. He is cast purely as an observer of the great crisis in American history, but his age, his profession, his financial status and his politics would almost certainly have made him an active participant--as a cartographic officer on McClellan's staff, say, just the man to march up and down the Peninsula, be steam-rollered at Antietam, and then maybe, just maybe to plot out a march for a corps on the road to Appomattox.
* Dunning holds on dearly to the cliche of the childhood buddy, now a Mafia don, who seems to be modeled more on the Phantom of the Opera than on Joey Gallo or John Gotti. Ditch the Don, Dunning, or do something clever with him.
* The relationship between Janeway and his new lady-love is seriously short of zing. What does she see in him, anyway? And why does this Colorado attorney take with such equanimity the very real possibility of an accessory rap on a proposed murder in South Carolina?
* I shall finish with Dante, a hood apparently descended from both Moose Malloy and Jason. Janeway incurs his undying wrath by causing him hurt and humiliation in front of his friends. Dunning builds up the inevitable second confrontation as something that should rank between the gunfight at the OK Corral and the sack of Troy. The actual meeting is, to say the least, less than we might reasonably have expected.
This is just an ordinary book from an author who has done extraordinary things. Let us fervently hope that Janeway IV will be heavily subjected to somebody's discerning blue pencil.
Rating:
Summary: The perilous world of old books
Review: When ex-cop turned bookman Cliff Janeway takes a giant step into serious collecting, his $30,000 purchase of a volume by British explorer Richard Burton lands him in a quagmire of fraud, theft and, ultimately, murder. This third in the series (years after "Booked to Die," and "The Bookman's Wake") is set in 1987, before the Internet made book searching easier, if not cleaner. The background booklore should fascinate anyone who likes books - from the searching of bibliographies and dusty shelves to the small world of serious collectors and occasional shady operators. Janeway's acquisition puts him in an awkward position between the two when a frail old lady shows up claiming that his inscribed Burton book is part of her grandfather Warren's collection, stolen, or at least fraudulently sold, after his death. Further, Mrs. Gallant claims that Burton and Charlie Warren became friends and toured the south before the Civil War. Her proof - an equally pristine Burton volume with a similar inscription - is hardly conclusive, but Janeway promises to pursue the matter. A brutal murder follows on the heels of the old lady's death and sends Janeway to Gallant's hometown of Baltimore, to an old bookstore with a sleazy reputation and to a woman who uses hypnotism to take oral histories from people like Mrs. Gallant. Which leads to a somewhat awkward flashback-like section in which Charlie Warren (through the taped medium of Mrs. Gallant) tells the story of his trip with Richard Burton and how Burton helped start the war. Armed with this knowledge, Janeway speeds things along and is soon mixing it up with arrogant academics, thugs, arsonists and murderers. And exchanging wisecracks and romantic sparks with a possibly untrustworthy lawyer. Although there's not a lot of depth to the other characters, Janeway is likable and sharp, as well as ruthless when he needs to be. The Burton back story (even the flashback) will make you want to rush out and get all the explorer's books (in ordinary readers' editions) and Dunning makes the antiquarian book world a fascinating and suspenseful place.
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