THE UMBRELLA MAN (THE INSPECTOR SAMUEL TAY NOVELS Book 2)

Detective Samuel Tay is a good cop. One reason for this is that Tay doesn't need the job. He has inherited enough money from his parents to live comfortably. He is a good cop because he wants to ensure that justice is done in the cases he works on.Then one night, several explosions rock Singapore.Like all good cops, Tay runs into danger. Unfortunately, he becomes a victim of the bombing. As he recuperates, Inspector Tay becomes restless. As soon as he can, he gets the doctors to release him.As you can imagine, the explosions are the greatest crime in the history of Singapore. And Tay wants to be a part of the investigation.Instead, he is assigned to investigate a dead body report in one of the poorest parts of Singapore. When Tay observes the body, the victim seems familiar to him. Then, a forensic specialist tells Samuel that a safe deposit box key has been discovered in an unusual place on the victim's body.So, Tay investigates further. Along the way he meets secret agents and international criminals. And he discovers that there might be a connection between his parents' inheritance and the explosions.In the end, I will leave it to you, Dear Reader, to determine if justice has been served with Samuel's investigation.I liked this book. To me, the novel reads like a television miniseries. The plot moves forward with each chapter. And in the end you have read a most enjoyable story.

A most refreshing, and entertaining story, with fascinating Singapore settings and well described supporting characters.Just begs for more Inspector Tay books, please Mr. Needham. Don't pass this one by. Here's one reader, of no doubt very many who can't wait for a new Inspector Tay adventure . Don't disappoint us.

Jake Needham continues his intriguing Singaporean policeman Sam Tay series with a superb sequel to the "Ambassador's Wife." I thought that this second book in the series of East Asian thrillers was even better than the truly outstanding first volume. The various characters are living and breathing in Needham's books, and Sam Tay is an all too believable detective with a lot of self doubts but who is routinely underestimated by his adversaries. I loved this book.

Samuel Tay is a good policeman and a fussy man. He laughs at the fussy rules of Singapore but is really a good example of those very rules. A good and thoughtful story.

The Umbrella Man is the second novel in the Singapore Inspector Samuel Tay series by Jake Needham. Tay, a twenty-year veteran of the Special Investigations Section of the Singapore police CID, wakes one morning to the news that terrorist attacks have occurred at three of the US named hotels in his city, with explosions causing major damage at all three sites. Racing to the area to help, Tay is injured himself spending a short time in one of the hospitals crammed with victims of the terrorism. When he regains consciousness, Tay expects to recover and play a role in finding the terrorists and bringing them to justice. Instead, he is forbidden by his CID supervisor, from having anything to do with the case. Tay's activity involving the US embassy and the CIA in a prior case has gained him a reputation of being a loose cannon by the The Internal Security Division of the Ministry of Home Affairs, a government organization that supersedes the authority of the police in Singapore.To get Tay out of the way, he is given a case involving the murder of an unidentified man in The Woodlands, a government planned housing project outside the main city. Tay has a feeling that the dead man is connected to the bombings though no one else sees it. As Tay and his subordinate Sergeant Kang investigate the crime, they uncover the identity of the dead man and discover a connection to Tay's father, dead now for 40 years. Approaching age 50, Tay discovers information about his father that changes his view of the past and forces him to re-examine his life.The appeal of this second episode of the Tay series is that the reader learns more about the personal history of the inspector that explains his motivations, strengths, and weaknesses as a man and police official. I had a very different picture of Tay in this novel compared to the one I saw in volume 1 of the series,  THE AMBASSADOR'S WIFE (An Inspector Samuel Tay Novel) . The Umbrella Man created more questions to understanding the complex character than it provided answers leaving me no choice but to read volume 3, when it is available. That is definitely something to look forward to. Tay is a hard man to like, but the more the reader knows about him, the more interesting he becomes. Readers should read volume 1 (with a better structure than this novel) first to get basic background on the inspector.

The first two Inspector Tay books were a fun read. I really enjoyed the descriptions of life in Singapore, although with a fiction book you can never be sure how accurate it is. I will be reading the next book in the series soon.

It's OK. Well written and a fast read (for me, on the pool right now, about 5 hrs.) Did I enjoy it? Partly. Would I read it again? No.I did not care about Samuel at all and HOW he "solved" the case... well, he didn't solved anything but was pushed around by others to find things. Was a bit like a jump-and-run videogame.Would I read the next one? Uncertain. I hope the next Jack Shepherd novel by Jake Needham is better and funnier.

Fast paced and a fun read. Tay is my new favorite gumshoe. I have always thought of visiting Singapore but after Tay’s observations I will leave it to the people who live there.

Personally I like my heroes less troubled than Inspector Tay but he is a well drawn character and Jake Needham writes perfectly nuanced prose and rollocking plots. Buy all books in the series for your Christmas stockings.

I plan to read the entire series as it is fascinating to learn about this part of the world while reading a great story with such well developed and quirky characters.

I found the story too far fetched and saw the critical connection too early in the book.

Plot twists galore! Set in Singapore, I devoured it in Bali!

This one is just as good as the first in the series. Another gripping story, however in this book, Sam Tay's investigations lead him to look back into his past and and his relationship with his parents. We think we are getting to know Sam a little better but then again, Sam's unrelenting stubbornness and thinly veiled cynicism, simply leaves us bemused. Still, he is tenacious and he ultimately does what he does best, very, very well indeed. He surprised us all in the end!