Review: Looks Are Deceiving by Bill VanPatten

The tight-knit small town of Mañana, CA is turned upside down by a cruel hate crime in Bill VanPatten’s Looks Are Deceiving, a mystery novel featuring an endearing amateur sleuth and timely conversations about racism and homophobia in contemporary America.

Will Christian is a 49-year-old aspiring writer and gay Latino man who moved to Mañana to live closer to his sister. Everything is going swimmingly until he sets out for a bike ride in late June and makes a grim discovery: the body of a young man, subject to severe blunt force head trauma, a 22-year-old who also happens to be gay and Latino. When other locals with similar identities start getting murdered, Will knows that the victims have been the subject of hate crimes, and he decides to do something about it.

Will begins conducting his own detective work alongside the professional inquiry carried out by the police lieutenant Joseph Reed. The two sometimes share information as Will becomes more and more occupied with the case, going so far as to meet the victim’s families and make a fake account on a gay dating app for catfishing purposes.

Alongside this narrative are detailed scenes relating to Will’s personal life, such as his close relationship with his lesbian sister Laura and his budding romance with a sweet man named José. Laura and José both want to support Will’s passion for the case, but they’re also worried that he’s getting in way over his head. Will the team be able to catch the killer before he strikes again, or will this lethal form of discrimination continue to tear Mañana’s residents apart? And will our main character be able to uncover the truth without landing himself in some legitimately dangerous hot water?

VanPatten does an excellent job of balancing tough conversations about serious social issues with more lighthearted scenes of small-town life in this entertaining cozy mystery. Will is a frequent man-about-town, and the novel perfectly captures the friendly “Cheers” nature of being a regular at local businesses. The residents genuinely care about one another’s well-being, and the interactions between Will and bartenders, baristas, grocery store employees, and gym friends are realistic and sweet representations of positive relationships.

However, things aren’t always sunshine and roses in Mañana, and the more serious moments tend to be when VanPatten’s writing really shines. Although some of the plot points are a bit on-the-nose politically (for example, a known racist, homophobic man harboring a secret attraction to Latino men), the novel wisely connects fictional hate crimes to real-world events, such as racist incidents at the US-Mexico border. The ultimate identity of the killer is fairly easy to predict, and the pacing can sometimes be a tad slow and repetitive, but the novel has so many vital ideas woven throughout that it makes up for these faults.

Overall, by grounding a fictional world in reality, author VanPatten lends serious weight and stakes to his novel, transforming a simple mystery into a work of important cultural commentary, which is a rare feat in the genre.