Quick Take
- Narration: Daniel Carter handles the period comedy and rapid-fire encounters with evident enjoyment, keeping the pace brisk without letting things tip into farce.
- Themes: LGBTQ+ erotic mystery, 1930s Britain, comedy of manners with explicit content
- Mood: Gleefully irreverent, fast-moving, and unapologetically adult
- Verdict: James Lear’s Agatha Christie send-up works best as sharp-elbowed comedic erotica; readers wanting more mystery than mansex may feel the balance skews heavily one way.
I came to The Secret Tunnel having already read The Back Passage, the first Mitch Mitchell mystery, and knowing full well what I was getting into. This is a series that wears its influences and its intentions with equal pride. James Lear is essentially doing what Agatha Christie did on the Flying Scotsman, except every compartment door opens onto something considerably less restrained than what you’d find in Murder on the Orient Express. I listened to most of this one on a long train journey, which felt either thematically appropriate or extremely reckless depending on your perspective.
Mitch Mitchell, the American-in-Britain protagonist, is back for his second outing, this time traveling from Edinburgh to London aboard the Flying Scotsman ostensibly to reconnect with his ex, referred to throughout as Boy Morgan. Within the first stretch of track, he’s encountered a Belgian named Bertrand, a sleazy starlet named Daisy Athenasy, her butch publicist Peter Dickinson, a contingent of kilt-wearing soldiers, and some very agreeable railway workers. A dead body eventually tumbles out of a toilet. The mystery is there, genuinely, though Lear is forthright about the fact that the sex is the main event and the plot is a pleasurable frame around it.
Our Take on The Secret Tunnel
What Lear does well, and what reviewers consistently point out, is that his male characters resist stereotype. The reviewer Aryael de Kaprii noted that Lear’s men are very much men, lacking the delicacy and femme coding that shows up in a lot of gay erotic fiction. Mitch is muscular, direct, and confidently physical. The encounters he has are presented without apology or shame, which gives the book an unusual lightness. In the context of 1930s Britain, a period defined by criminalization of homosexuality and mandatory concealment, there’s something genuinely subversive about a world where every man on the train is available and nobody’s pretending otherwise. Rosa, really, one of the more thoughtful reviewers, called it a fantasy/historical world that definitely touches the inner perv, which captures the spirit of the thing precisely.
The Christie parody is well-executed within its limits. The dead body, the closed setting, the assorted suspects with secrets: Lear hits the structural beats while openly mocking the decorum the genre usually requires. It’s affectionate parody rather than pure demolition job. If you’ve read enough Golden Age detective fiction, you’ll catch references that add a layer of comedy the casual reader might miss.
Why Listen to The Secret Tunnel
Daniel Carter’s narration is one of the genuine pleasures here. He handles the period setting and the comic timing with real ease, navigating accents and the sheer variety of characters without losing track of who’s who. At under eight hours, the pacing is genuinely propulsive. The reviewer K. R. Lunak called it super fun and quick, and that’s accurate: Lear doesn’t let the story breathe in ways that invite boredom.
One reviewer gave it three stars and noted that the ending seems a bit too contrived and convenient, and the sexual activities a bit excessive. That’s a legitimate reading, though it’s worth asking what one expects from a book this transparent about its priorities. The plot resolution does arrive with a certain breezy hand-wave. Lear is more interested in his characters’ horizontal adventures than in constructing an airtight mystery, and readers who lean into that will have a substantially better time than those expecting Christie-level puzzle construction.
What to Watch For in The Secret Tunnel
The explicit content is substantial and constant. This is not a mystery with occasional erotic scenes. It’s erotic fiction with a mystery scaffolding, and understanding that ratio before pressing play saves frustration. The Rosa, really review also noted an impressive lack of lube as a running observation across the series, which captures the book’s essentially fantastical relationship with physical logistics. None of this is meant to simulate realism. It’s meant to entertain in a very specific register, and for the audience it’s targeting, it largely succeeds.
The period setting, Scotland in the 1930s transitioning to London, adds texture without becoming a history lecture. Lear trusts his readers to know the era and lets the anachronistic sexual freedom function as part of the fantasy rather than trying to explain or justify it.
Who Should Listen to The Secret Tunnel
This is squarely for adults who enjoy explicit M/M erotic fiction and have an appetite for comedic, lightly plotted mysteries. Reading The Back Passage first adds context but isn’t strictly necessary. Listeners wanting serious mystery craft or who are sensitive to very explicit content should look elsewhere. Those who’ve been waiting for a gay Agatha Christie parody delivered with genuine wit and zero pretension will find this delivers.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to read or listen to The Back Passage before The Secret Tunnel?
It’s helpful but not required. The Secret Tunnel reintroduces Mitch Mitchell and works as a standalone adventure. Prior familiarity with the first book adds context for Boy Morgan’s significance and some character callbacks, but the plot here is self-contained.
How explicit is the sexual content in this audiobook?
Very explicit. This is primarily erotic fiction distributed through Audible. Multiple explicit M/M scenes occur throughout the listen. The mystery plot is present and functional, but the erotic content is the dominant element by a clear margin.
Does the Christie parody actually work on its own terms?
Yes, in a broad-strokes way. The train setting, the dead body, the ensemble of suspicious characters, and the eventual revelation all hit Christie’s structural markers. Lear isn’t attempting a serious puzzle mystery, but the parody scaffolding is recognizable and adds comic value for readers familiar with the source material.
Is this the second book in the Mitch Mitchell Mystery series?
Yes, it’s listed as book two, following The Back Passage. James Lear has written multiple novels in this world, and The Secret Tunnel continues the adventures of Edward (Mitch) Mitchell while introducing an entirely new cast of supporting characters aboard the Flying Scotsman.
