Graeme Kent, ONE BLOOD: Second in a Lively Series, Solomon Islands

Graeme Kent's series featuring Sergeant Ben Kella of the Solomon Islands Police Force and the determined young nun Sister Conchita has flavors reminiscent of Louise Penny's "Three Pines" series featuring Armand Gamache -- Kent, like Penny, has broadcast experience: in his case, head of BBC Schools broadcasting in the Solomon Islands for a stretch, and later an educational broadcasting consultant for the South Pacific Commission.

And it's irresistible to bring in G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown mysteries -- Sister Conchita, like Father Brown, has no doubts about her faith, but she's up against a formidable challenge, trying to persuade an outdated mission order of nuns to open up to the world again. (It's her assignment.) But the Stan Jones mysteries that feature Nathan Active may be the closest parallels to Ben Kella, who, after all, is a hereditary spiritual peacekeeper among the Lau people. As their aofia, he has responsibilities that far exceed ordinary policing. And slowly, he's convincing Sister Conchita that the "native" spiritual beliefs demand her attention.

But the carefully negotiated relationship between Ben Kella and Sister Conchita is far from the center of the action. In the second book in the series, ONE BLOOD (releasing Feb. 7), money, greed, and a callous disregard for both human life and island ecology -- in 1960, when ecology wasn't yet a by-word -- make a deadly combination that opens with acts of sabotage at a logging operation and a dead tourist in the mission church. By the time the two co-investigators (who surprised themselves by crime-solving together in Devil-Devil) realize their cases are related, they've also tangled in with the new American President coming into power: John F, Kennedy, whose naval crew spent time in the Solomon Islands. Is there evidence on the islands of what happened back then? What's it worth? Who will it hurt or help?

You'll get the flavor of this brisk, incisive, and often very entertaining author from a passage in the life of each main character -- first, this scene at Sister Conchita's "open house" at the mission, which the elderly nuns have resisted:

A bulky female American tourist in shorts stretched dangerously across her thighs had stopped in the open doorway and was brandishing a carved model of a turtle above her head.

"Where do I pay for this?" she demanded.

"We must all pay for our transgressions eventually," said Sister Brigid coldly before Sister Conchita could reply, her voice rising and falling like a dagger plunging with deadly accuracy into a body. "How and when lies in the hands of the Almighty."

Not if I get to you first, Sister Conchita promised herself vengefully, squeezing past and emerging from the front door of the two-storey mission house onto the stone terrace leading to the beach and the calm lagoon beyond.

And here is Sergeant Ben Kella, determining what's caused a work stoppage at the logging landing:

"If you know that I am the aofia, then you will know that my duty is to keep the peace among Malaitans," said Kella. "That is why I have come to Alvaro, just in time, I think, to see you preparing to chew on rifle bullets. What is the problem? Why haven't you started work yet? Are you so tired that you have decided to work the white man's hours?"

The Malaitan snorted contemptuously at the implied jibe. "The first work party that left to go into the bush this morning met a kwisi bird," he explained. "It spoke only once. Do you know what that means?"

"Of course," said Kella, comprehending the problem with some relief. The matter was serious, but not has grave as he had feared. "I may have spent many years away from Malaita at the white man's schools, but I still remember our customs. Leave this with me."

He walked back to the big Australian. "They have had a custom sign warning them not to work this morning," he said.

"Am I supposed to be impressed?" exploded the big man. "What those kanakas want is a boot up the backside!"

"You don't understand," said Kella. "Those men are Malaitans, the fiercest warriors in the Solomons." He raised his voice so the technicians could hear him. "You lay a hand on just one of them, and you and every one of your men will be dead on the beach before the sun rises further over the trees, and I'll have a hundred forms to fill in afterwards. I doubt if you're worth it."

Even though Kella finds a solution to the logging impasse, there are more threatening situations just ahead. And some of them will affect Sister Conchita as well.

UK cover

The US covers are at the start of this blog post, and I'm ending with the UK covers, for the sake of a cultural contrast. It's increasingly clear that "American" and "British" are two different languages -- I can't imagine a mainstream American mystery proclaiming "exotic" on the cover, as these UK versions do! Here's a rare exception, then, to the frequent discovery that British covers can show up better than the US designs ... because I would definitely vote in favor of the US ones here, from Soho Crime.

Much more to the point for readers of this series, Graeme Kent knows how to weave a good story and validate the local ways of belief, tradition, and community.

UK cover

If you've collected the Arthur Upfield books, you'll want the Graeme Kent ones on your shelf for a modern contrast. (If you don't know Arthur Upfield's work, or that of Stan Jones, mentioned earlier, you have some great treats ahead.) File this series also under spunky women, and wonderful independent local residents who know a whole lot more than the armed colonizers landing among them. And, of course, under respectable detection methods and marvelous psychological juggling of detective, criminal, and witnesses.

Farewell to Dorothy Gilman and Mrs. Pollifax

Now that I read the serious espionage of Alan Furst and David Downing, should I be embarrassed that I cut my espionage teeth on books by both Helen MacInnes and Dorothy Gilman? No, I refuse to blush -- I had a great time with each author's books, and I'll surely read them again. What better could a reader say, especially so many years later?

So I was sad this morning to hear the news that Dorothy Gilman died on February 2. She gave us a lively, independent, 60-ish widow from New Jersey who dared to travel the world and tackle the work of being a secret agent, no matter how much older she seemed than the people giving her instructions.

Here's the Mrs. Pollifax series, which actually makes up less than half of what Gilman wrote: 

The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax (1966)
The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax (1970)  
The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax (1971)  
A Palm for Mrs. Pollifax (1973)
Mrs. Pollifax on Safari (1977)  
Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station (1983)
Mrs. Pollifax and the Hong Kong Buddha (1985)  
Mrs. Pollifax and the Golden Triangle (1988)  
Mrs. Pollifax and the Whirling Dervish (1990)
Mrs. Pollifax and the Second Thief (1993)  
Mrs. Pollifax Pursued (1995)  
Mrs. Pollifax and the Lion Killer (1996)
Mrs. Pollifax, Innocent Tourist (1997)
Mrs. Pollifax Unveiled (2000)

The New York Times obituary is here; for another view, visit the Dorothy Gilman Fan Site.

PS -- as of this writing, Kingdom Books has three books by Dorothy Gilman available.

Chinatown Mysteries: S. J. Rozan, Henry Chang, More

The wide range of international mysteries suddenly available in the US is exciting. Equally intriguing are those set in American (and other!) Chinatowns, where another "country" seems just a few blocks away. It's a good time of year to indulge in Chinatown mysteries, with the start of the Year of the (Water) Dragon just behind us, and the beginning of the Chinese astrological New Year tomorrow.



Henry Chang has staked out generous turf in New York City's Chinatown with Detective Jack Yu, in a trilogy of police detection books: Chinatown Beat, Year of the Dog, and Red Jade. In an interview with fellow mystery author J. Sydney Jones, Chang announced last year that he's now working on a sextet of Jack Yu books to follow the first three. The books are set in the 1990s, Chang's way of creating a bit of personal distance -- and also some protection against accidentally revealing a prosecutable crime, as many of the details in his books come from firsthand experience in the Chinatown neighborhoods, as well as recollections shared by retired criminals. A native New Yorker himself, Chang has an immigrant heritage and uses the tension of parental and community expectations to ramp up the pressures on the characters in his novels. I'm especially fond of Chinatown Beat, and in this trilogy, I'd advise starting from the first book; there are details in the third one, Red Jade, that make a lot more impact if you've consumed the series in order.

S. J. Rozan, whose heritage is not Chinese but who spends plenty of time in New York's Chinatown, offers a very different set of perceptions and tensions in her Lydia Chin/Bill Smith series. The most recent of these is Ghost Hero.  Chin is increasingly warm toward Smith, her detection partner and possibly, some day -- if Chin's mother can't stop it -- a more intimate partner. But there isn't much time for the two of them to connect, as they involve another Chinese-American private investigator to help them probe the complex world of modern Chinese art and high-stakes investment. Unlike Chang, Rozan sets her books very much "now" and one of the best secondary characters is Lydia Chin's cousin Linus Wong, a computer geek with both edge and (oddly) innocence. There are ten other Lydia Chin/Bill Smith books -- the series alternates in narration, from either Chin's or Smith's point of view -- and in this case, there's no need to read them in order. Jump in anywhere. My current favorites are Ghost Hero  and On the Line.

The 2010 release of a work of nonfiction by Yunte Huang, Charlie Chan: The Untold Story of the Honorable Detective and His Rendezvous with American History, provoked a number of recent thoughtful investigations of American Chinese mysteries and their authors,  and Henry Chang shared with us an essay by Merle Jacob, surveying "Asian" mysteries over a wide range than extends to India and Korea as well. (Chan wasn't a Chinatown figure; that detective shows up in the 1920s books by Earl Derr Biggers, which have become very collectible.) The essay led me to pick up a crime novel by Ed Lin, Snakes Can't Run (2010) -- it's his third novel, and is the second featuring Chinese American detective Robert Chow. The Chow books are set in the 1970s in New York's Chinatown, and run dark and gritty; they're worth reading.

Finally being talked about more often are the reasons that Chinatowns exist in America, and it doesn't really boil down to "like lives with like" -- there's a nasty piece of anti-Asian bias in American history that came to a head in 1882 with the Chinese Exclusion Act, which, among other effects, prevented Chinese from becoming naturalized citizens. (This didn't ease until bodies were needed for World War I.) For a not-so-dark detective mystery that opens up these details a bit, there's Murder in Chinatown, one of the "Gaslight" mysteries by Victoria Thompson, set in turn-of-that-century New York.

If you have a favorite Chinatown mystery, or want to add to this list in other directions, please do leave a comment here. Meanwhile, a fortunate Chinese new year to you. Gung Hay Phat Choy!

Justice: Eliot Pattison Reflects on His Three Detection Series

Great news: Not only is Eliot Pattison's Ashes of the Earth (first of his post-apocalyptic detection novels) being released in softcover this April -- but also, there's a new interview with Pattison available through Blog Talk Radio: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/conversationslive/2012/01/28/author-eliot-pattison-on-conversations-live

Pattison describes his protagonist Boone in this series as someone who's "lost all hope" and says he's provoking readers to consider what it's all about, "who are you when you strip away your television, your automobile, your electricity, your technology ... what really is important, and how do you cope when everything else is gone?"

But fear not, Pattison (an international attorney) threads the demands of investigation and crime-solving just as insistently in this series as he has in his Inspector Shan series and his Colonial America series.

For a longer look at Ashes of the Earth, click here; other Pattison reviews are also on our blog.

Sunday Afternoon: Superbowl, or Mystery Reading??

Gee, is it really a question? Dave's got his focus, along with at least one crime fiction author in conversation today. How about you?

Dave says:

Paul Hornung/David Kanell at the 1964 New York World's Fair

 

Well, we are all waiting for the Superbowl game this Sunday.  My friend Dave Zeltserman is on the edge of his seat and waiting for the start of the game and for the Patriots to score first and often. My dad, who is a Giants fan, thinks that they will win the Superbowl. 

 

In 1964 my parents took my sister and me to The World's Fair. At that particular time in my life I was a Giants fan and they had a  number of great players: Y. A. Tittle, Andy Robustelli, and Rosey Greer.

 

One of the premier football players of the day was Paul Hornung, the Hall of Fame halfback of the Green Bay Packers and a member of the team that won the first ever Superbowl in January 1967.

 

My dad took this photo of Paul Hornung giving me an autograph at the Schaefer Beer Pavilion at the Fair.

DETECTIVE INSPECTOR HUSS, by Helene Tursten: Softcover from Soho Crime

Last week, Soho Crime released a softcover edition of DETECTIVE INSPECTOR HUSS by Helene Tursten. The hardcover came out in the United States back in 2003; the softcover timing, I think, is geared to the mid February release of Tursten's Night Rounds in hardcover by Soho.

Whether my guess is right or not, the timing sure works for me. Last year I read two other good Irene Huss police detective novels -- The Torso and The Glass Devil -- but this new release is actually the first in the series, and I'm really glad that Soho sent a copy here.

Don't mix Tursten's books in with the painful hauntings of many Scandinavian "noir" novels that have crossed the Atlantic in translation recently. Although it's a crime/police/detection novel, it's neither "literary" nor grief-stricken. As one of the few female detective inspectors in Göteborg, Sweden, Irene Huss finds sexism rampant within the police department, and sees domestic violence and family losses differently than most of her male colleagues. But she herself is (heavens, this is rare now!) a well-adjusted woman with a hard-working, kitchen-capable husband and a pair of teenage daughters with normal issues -- a bit of rebellion, a few too many risks. When Huss takes risks, she doesn't do it out of self-destructiveness; she calls for a partner or for back-up; she knows that investigation will solve the case through the gradual revelation of detail, motive, and human failings. I've got to say, I love this protagonist. Unlike, say, Lisbeth Salander, I'd love to sit down for coffee and pastries with Detective Inspector Huss.

Remember the ballad of Richard Cory? From a poem by Edward Arlington Robinson, Paul Simon created a bitter song in 1965 that was recorded as part of the Simon & Garfunkel Sounds of Silence  album. In the narrative, a wealthy man who owns half the town commits suicide, out of the emptiness of his life, and a poverty-stricken observer wishes he could have done the same. I couldn't help thinking of the song at the opening of DETECTIVE INSPECTOR HUSS, when tycoon Richard von Knecht lands on the pavement outside his high-rise apartment and Huss takes the call, gathering up her superintendent (Sven Andersson, a man whose blood-pressure issues are only crowded out by his genial old-time sexism), and heading across the soggy snow/rainy city toward the pavement death scene. She can't quite quash a hint of being titillated by the news, and by the chance to see how the very wealthy live.

But details quickly suggest that von Knecht's death -- plunging from a balcony when terrified of heights, clearly from a relaxed drinking session with someone -- must be murder. And Huss probes the not-so-happy lives of the moneyed family. An odd set of connections links some of the investigation with a second one into the Hell's Angels, drug crimes, and a situation that batters Huss and her partner in well-portrayed ways. Equally disturbing is the incipient racism that one of Huss's daughters is parading, thanks to a skinhead boyfriend.

Each page, each twist, each line of conversation (nice straightforward feel to the translation by Steven T. Murray) rings true to life. I never felt incredulous or skeptical; I never put the book down for more than a few minutes, either.

It's great to see the threads that Tursten established in this earliest volume of her series (watch for film versions, too). The quiet racism directed against "exotic" Finns intrigued me, along with the European ways of thinking and the Scandinavian relationships with winter darkness.

This one will stay on my shelf for reading again -- a sturdy, steady investigation that goes on for nearly 400 pages and stays fresh and enjoyable.

And, oh yes, I'm glad to say the same characteristics are represented in the newest translated Tursten, too. More about that, as we get close to mid February.
***
Note: Helene Tursten's earlier careers were in nursing and dentistry. She was born in Göteborg, Sweden, where DETECTIVE INSPECTOR HUSS is set.

Collector's Corner: A "Must Have" Vermont Postcard

From Dave:

We need some chuckles on this nasty weather day in the Northeast Kingdom in Vermont. We have, snow, freezing drizzle, rain, ice, and bad roads & driveways. The back of this postcard states the following: 

The legend of Lake Memphremagog's "fur bearing beaver trout." The first fur bearing trout was "caught" by Newport photographer Ralf Sessions during the winter of 1927–1928, shown below. Another Newport photographer, Harry Richardson, is shown above fishing near Owl's Head Mountain.

(postcard purchased at a Vermont Antiquarian Book Fair -- watch for your own!)

 

PS from Beth -- One of long-time book-collecting clients here at Kingdom Books was finally given an ultimatum by his wife: Switch from books to postcards. They take up less space. Gosh!

A January Collage: Carl Hiaasen on Florida, Snow in Vermont, Hints of Hollywood

Modern noir actor Sanam Erfani

It's a weather day up on the ridge here in Vermont: We got three inches of fresh snow, then three hours of rain, which iced things up and then made them very, very wet. Had to wear rubber boots to splash through the slush to get the mail. Somehow that leads to a collage of tidbits that I've wanted to mention.

First, I must be a bit slow connecting the pieces, but I just realized that the Carl Hiaasen I've heard for a long time on NPR is the same one whose Florida mysteries grace the shelves here at Kingdom Books. Duh! Oh well, I know more than I did a few hours ago. If you'd like to watch a 4-minute video of Hiaasen reflecting on Florida politics and the economy, check this out.

Next, "Uncle, Uncle!" to all the people who've asked me whether I've read The Book Thief, a young-adult novel set in Germany during World War II; I'm halfway through, so please don't spoil the plot!

Coming up in reviews: Helene Tursten's first mystery, Detective Inspector Huss -- I laid hands on a copy just in time to fill in the gaps before I review the newly translated Tursten title Night Rounds, coming out from Soho Crime in February (which is almost here). I'll be writing (with delight) about both of these titles in the next few days.

Also, I'm excited about the new title from Graeme Kent, One Blood. Kent's "Sister Conchita and Sergeant Kella" mysteries are set in the Solomon Islands and I could devour one per month if only there were more. This too is being released in February. I'm glad that Soho sends some of their advance reading copies up here -- it's a treat to get to read these before publication. On the other hand, I usually try to wait until the week before release, or the week of, so readers won't get frustrated by reading about a book they'll want, then having to wait to purchase it. I'd value your comments on whether this seems the right timing. (Books that Kingdom Books is purchasing in hardcover tend to get reviewed the week after release. Or thereabouts.)

Last but not least, Dave and I are happy to be hosting our family's pro filmmakers/actors, Alexis Savino and Sanam Erfani, for a long weekend. Today Alexis released his third in the "homevideo" series (jazzy!) he's creating for W Hollywood, an amazing residential hotel in Los Angeles. The four-minute film reminds me so strongly of those early noir mysteries that I'm putting a link to it here. If you enjoy it, you may want to look at numbers 1 and 2 as well (you'll see links to them on the side after you watch this one). Today's release and number 1 feature Sanam Erfani as actor. Gotta love the way she shows on film and in the photo up above ...

James McClure, THE SUNDAY HANGMAN: South African Detection

What a pleasure to read THE SUNDAY HANGMAN by James McClure (Soho Crime, Feb. 2012). Set in "apartheid" South Africa, around the 1970s, this is the sixth of McClure's eight books that feature Lieutenant Tromp Kramer of the Trekkersburg Murder and Robbery Squad and his sidekick, Bantu Detective Sergeant Mickey Zondi. The partnership of the two police officers -- one living in white comfort, with hot running water for baths, and a servant to make tea; the other scraping by with his wife in a dirt-floored home and a tin bath filled with a few gallons by hand (a perfect contrast provided early in this book) -- blesses the series with that special tenderness of grown men who care desperately about each other's welfare but are restricted to showing it through the equivalent of the American punch on the shoulder.

And, of course, through intense loyalty on the job, to each other and to their principles. And that explains why those who discover the McClure series are likely to become passionate followers, disappointed when they've consumed all eight books. (McClure died in 2006. He'd been a photographer, then a teacher, then a crime reporter.) The books won the Crime Writers Association (CWA) Silver Dagger and Gold Dagger awards. Soho Crime has been quietly bringing them to the US, and THE SUNDAY HANGMAN debuts in paperback in February.

The book opens with the unexpected death of a lifelong criminal named Tollie Erasmus. When Lieutenant Kramer hears that Erasmus committed suicide, he's frankly incredulous. Why would Tollie Erasmus hang himself, when he's got thousands to live on and has eluded South Africa's penal system? Because of the powerful class divisions in South Africa, and the multiple languages that go with them -- Afrikaans and English on one side, Bantu and other "native" languages on the other -- Kramer takes Mickey Zondi with him to investigate the rural death. And with Doc Strydom riding along, it's soon clear that the death is murder, not suicide.

But Doc Strydom pulls more out of police and court records, in a search to justify his outspoken decision on the death, and soon Kramer and Zondi are making multiple trips among Johannesburg, Durban, and the little rural hamlet of Witklip, trying to find points in common between this fresh death and other disturbing notes in the files.

This is a lively and compelling read, as well as a reminder of how desperate the apartheid situation was, so recently. The blatant and crushing racism of that time shows up in even the smallest casual conversations in THE SUNDAY HANGMAN, although McClure weaves it deftly into the narrative within a paternalism that feels a lot like a Kipling story. But the dangers of the racial prejudices show up in crimes and their investigation, and McClure spins a good tale.

Here's the entire series with its original release dates:

The Steam Pig (1971)
The Caterpillar Cop (1972)
The Gooseberry Fool (1974)
Snake (1975)
Rogue Eagle (1976)
The Sunday Hangman (1977)
The Blood of an Englishman (1980)
The Song Dog (1991)

For a good overview of the past fifty years of mysteries set in Africa (and published in English), try this article from Verna Suit at Mystery Readers International (2010).

From the review article, I was reminded that Henning Mankell's book The White Lioness (1993) is set in South Africa, as is Suzanne Arruda's Jade del Cameron series. I'm also a fan of a modern-day South Africa series by Jassy Mackenzie: Random Violence (2010), Stolen Lives (2011), and due out in April of this year, The Fallen (watch for more on that title later).

If you've been reading the Botswana series by Alexander McCall Smith, featuring the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, you'll find the McClure series more gritty and challenging. But underneath the two series is the same love of place, people, and the possibility of justice.