Dark Longings and Dork Disasters, in THE MOTION PICTURE TELLER from Colin Cotterill

 Is it crime fiction or is it magical realism? Colin Cotterill's Dr. Siri Paiboun forensic tales, set in the collapsed corruption and congenial community of working Laos, have already shown this author must blend the two. 

In THE MOTION PICTURE TELLER, Cotterill leaps to 1996 Bangkok and the run-down but almost cute -- in a very dorky way -- lives of two unambitious men running a video rental store. Pay attention to Supot, who delivers mail for the Royal Thai Postal Service. (Cut to a view of his uniform, shabby perhaps but worn with some muddled pride as he dodges unpleasant dogs with his pack of letters and parcels.) Supot's "real life" begins after work each day, assisting in a video shop and watching films with Ali, the official owner. (Ali can be quite mischievous to his customers, but he makes ends meet.)

When these two nerdy, film-obsessed guys discover a film called "Bangkok 2010" that could be the greatest ever -- the kind that makes Supot's almost girlfriend consider, for a moment, actually fooling around with him, before opting to watch the film again -- they tumble into a bottomless mystery: The actors are unknown. The production company has vanished. How could they be holding a copy of the greatest film ever, and be unable to find out anything about who made it and when it's going to be released? Wait -- is this the only copy ever made?

When Supot finally reaches someone connected with the mysterious film, mystery readers will know the tale has just taken on danger (beyond that posed by dogs to mail carriers), as the letter offers a strong of urgent questions:

Where did you find 2010? Is it a copy, or is it the original film? Has anyone else seen it apart from you? If your answer is yes, how many people have seen it? ... I want you to promise me that nobody else will watch it, and that no copies are made of it.

From here, the story threads get wilder and Supot is soon way out of his comfort zone. The charm of Cotterill's writing is that this video fanatic, in love with a vision of an actress, is so believable, so close to the dork in each of us, that the pages must keep turning. 

THE MOTION PICTURE TELLER could be the strangest mystery you read this year, or even this decade. And you absolutely won't forget it.

Releasing January 17 from Soho Crime, an imprint of Soho Press.

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

Finale of the Poke Rafferty (Bangkok) Series from Timothy Hallinan, STREET MUSIC

[Originally published at New York Journal of Books]


“Despite the classic investigations that Poke leaps into, with violence and threat and red herrings and regret, Poke Rafferty is a person who cares enough to listen, to experience, and to change, even in this final volume of the series.”

One of the best loved international crime fiction series ends this season, as Tim Hallinan’s Street Music is the ninth and final book on his Poke Rafferty Thrillers (Soho Press). Catching attention in the fourth book with an Edgar nomination for The Queen of Patpong, Hallinan's Poke Rafferty Thailand novels have won wide acclaim. 

For readers already following the series, Street Music represents a bittersweet farewell to the “little family” than Hallinan has nurtured. First there’s been Poke Rafferty himself, an American writer who settled in Bangkok, won over by its people and sense of community. Poke’s marriage to Rose, a “bar girl” and former “Queen” of the Patpong bars, created the frame for their eventual adoption of a much-battered but creative, caring, and eventually loving daughter, Miaow, a child of the streets.
Street Music opens with the presence of a new member of the family, a baby that’s already been highly controversial earlier in the series. It’s a boy! But Poke’s not finding “natural” fathering impulses; Rose’s ever-present set of women friends crowding him out of the bedroom and onto a lumpy couch has a lot to do with this. But so does the kind of parenting he’s already been doing, growing into protecting and nurturing Miaow. Her street roots have engaged her in peril multiple times, and Poke routinely mobilizes friends, especially one in the Bangkok police force, to help.

What peril approaches Poke and especially Miaow when a mysterious street women begins to follow him and asks him for a huge amount of cash as “protection money” to keep her from destroying the little family? How can Poke handle the resulting chaos without upsetting Rose and bringing risk to the baby as well? It’s rough when you find yourself lying to the people you love best, in order to take care of them.

An Afterword by Hallinan recaps his approach to the series, and the startling effect that setting up a first scene that involved Poke + wife + daughter + groceries = family. “The word family did the trick,” he explains. “I barely knew who these people were but the moment I realized they were a family, I thought that it might be interesting to drop a normal—if intercultural and self-assembled—family, who are trying to preserve relationships along traditional lines, into the world capital of instant gratification”—that is, into Bangkok.

Not only is Poke Rafferty being followed and blackmailed in Street Music—he’s also coming to terms with his understanding of poverty, which doesn’t always lead to crime (although he’d about to find evidence of possible murder). Another former bar girl, Toots, lays it out for him: “Some lady no good. I poor girl too, Poke. Then I lucky too much, marry Leon, but before, when I have no money, I not take. Not good for karma. You know, you are poor and you good, you win. You poor and you bad, poor win.”

This is exactly the kind of moment that makes Hallinan’s crime fiction, especially the Poke Rafferty series, so interesting and unusual: Despite the classic investigations that Poke leaps into, with violence and threat and red herrings and regret, Poke Rafferty is a person who cares enough to listen, to experience, and to change, even in this final volume of the series.

What does Poke learn about Miaow’s original parent(s), after all this time raising her? How will he come to grips with being the father of a baby boy, and the husband of a woman who’s just experienced her own major transition? Which friends will lead him into more danger to his family, and which will help him walk through it and survive?

Street Music is very readable without the earlier books in the series. But it’s a richer read when placed in their context. Read the others before it or after; chances are, once you’ve entered Poke Rafferty’s community, you too will experience some of his reasons to change.

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.  

Vibrant New Poke Rafferty Bangkok Thriller from Timothy Hallinan, FOOLS' RIVER

There are a lot of great reasons to grab the new Bangkok-set thriller by Tim Hallinan. Readers of his Poke Rafferty series actually "need" this book ASAP, because the little family that Poke Rafferty loves and protects in corrupt and dangerous Bangkok has bonded to readers' hearts. How is Poke's pregnant wife doing? And the couple's brilliant bu wounded adopted-street-child daughter Miaow? What about Miaow's friends, whom we've also become attached to, seeing them through the half-incredulous amazement that Poke feels as he comes to appreciate, love, and yes, try to rescue them?

But if you're a stranger to this series, here are some other reasons: A chance to "see" Bangkok in its heartbreaking complexity (instead o of laughing at the pain the way John Burdett's books do). A willingness to meet and care about complex characters in the midst of very human and very dangerous stresses. Eagerness to see how a skilled author who can blend suspense and attachment on a single palette will craft the necessary (and terrifying) twists of a page-turner.

Poke's attention is mostly on his pregnant wife right now -- the couple hadn't expected to add a child to the already complicated and tender household they've formed. So it takes sserious persuasion from Miaow to have him look into the disappearance of the dad of Miaow's almost-boyfriend Edward. Once Poke tunes in to the crisis, he's quick to see a pattern -- one that means Edward's dad has a very short life ahead of him, if indeed he's still alive somewhere in the crowded city.

Don't worry about the title, FOOLS' RIVER. It's almost irrelevant, part of a different layer of suspense. Attention belongs most of all with Poke in his urgent search for the totally immoral scam artists and killers who have Edward's dad. And with the power of a 48-hour deadline, Hallinan packs the action and danger, page after page.

Don't try to do anything else. This is what a truly fine thriller is for: to let you, force you, to ignore the rest of your life and accept that all the love that needs saving, all the life that matters, is in the next chapter. Yes, the book really just covers 48 hours -- so hang in there for the next in the series. [Too bad the author and publisher, Soho, can only produce one per year ... but this year at least, there's an extra helping of Hallinan's Bangkok adventures in a compact and haunting tale included in Soho's holiday special, The Usual Santas, about two Bangkok street kids with a significant set of discoveries at the holiday season. I can't get it out of my thoughts ... or do I men, heart?]

PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

Risk, Danger, and Love, in THE HOT COUNTRIES, Timothy Hallinan, Thailand

The seventh Poke Rafferty Bangkok thriller is out -- and it's a fantastic wrap-up to this part of the series. THE HOT COUNTRIES tackles crime in one of the world's most notorious cities for crime, but from the point of view of a travel writer who's fallen hopelessly and forever in love ... with Bangkok, with his wife Rose (who knows the sex trade from the inside), and with his firmly adopted daughter Miaow. The trouble is, love may have put its rose-colored lenses in front of some other parts of Poke's life, where it's not a wise idea to feel mushy and warm about what's going on.

The action opens with a moody and sweet scene at the Expat Bar, a local men's hangout where Poke's wandered more often than usual lately, escaping the surge of British TV watching that Rose and Miaow (or Mia, in her new teen persona) are indulging in. The oldtimers at the bar have made him welcome for years. So in Poke's mellow evening, there's no reason to worry about the presence of a new fellow in the line-up at the bar, Arthur Varney. At least, not until Poke realizes that Varney is the mover-and-shaker behind some very threatening messages coming his way, messages that threaten his family (and by the way, Rose is pregnant) and also his friends. Especially at risk is Treasure, a street waif who's seen horrendous abuse and is recovering very slowly after Poke's managed to settle her into a group home for kids who share her past experience. And the threat is being delivered via messages to Poke himself.

Treasure says, "I'm frightened."

"I know," Poke says. "But we're not just going to keep you away from him. We're going after him, and when we find him, you'll never have to think about him again."

A rash promise.

Here's where that highly technical term "part of a series" come into play. Yes, this is number 7 in Timothy Hallinan's Bangkok series, but it's also the third -- and completing title -- of a set of the Rafferty books that focus on how and whether Treasure can actually be saved from both the horrors of her past life and the overwhelming power and wealth of her abuser(s). As he did with number 6 (For the Dead), Hallinan is playing Poke Rafferty's almost naive drive to save the people he cares about, against the sweaty tropical weight of a culture that's almost given up on its vulnerable members.

Although Poke is highly motivated to fight the criminals battering his life, he's truly an "amateur sleuth" in the sense of the genre definition: no martial arts skills, no amazing weapons, not even a trained sniper on his side. But there are those old men from the Expat Bar ... a police officer who's a friend, even if a disgraced one ... and some women and "ladyboys" who recognize that Poke himself is worth saving.

The people who come through for Poke do so because he's earned their loyalty. Most of all, this time, the heroes include his own daughter, who's been through a lot herself. Astute readers will notice Miaow's steady progress toward taking responsibility for resisting evil and asserting her own amazing future -- so the book's ending is especially satisfying, as well as surprising in the best of ways.

I do hope this isn't the "final" Poke Rafferty book, because this stretch of intense and suspenseful thrillers set in a wickedly complex and dangerous Thai city has given me a really good ride! Keep them rolling, Tim Hallinan and Soho Crime ... please.

[PS - if you're a reader who stays WAY away from thrillers that include sexual abuse, you have my sympathy ... and my assurance that even though that's a major crime in the Poke Rafferty series, it's portrayed as a justice issue, not as porn. Safe to read these, truly.]

FOR THE DEAD: Timothy Hallinan's 6th Poke Rafferty "Thriller"

As the mysteries world has gone global, it's also broadened in types of plots and subgenres. The newest book from Timothy Hallinan, FOR THE DEAD, is the sixth one featuring Poke Rafferty, an American living in Bangkok, probably forever by now. And certainly for good. I'd call it a traditional action-suspense crime novel, where groups of criminals struggle fiercely to silence people who are taking a stand against them. Poke, in his roles as dad and husband and writer-with-a-mission, steps up over and over, through increasing exhaustion, to figure out the source of maximum corruption in Bangkok's city government and police.

Soho Crime uses the cover to call the book a "thriller," and this time, I think the term isn't a good fit. To me, "thriller" usually means that feel you get on a really, really big roller-coaster -- the OMG of "I'm going to die here!" (even though there's a rational whisper of "not really, or this company couldn't keep selling tickets) and the racing plunge downhill that tortures your stomach and prevents you from putting the book down. I also think thrillers in general offer terror.

In FOR THE DEAD, the focus is on Poke and Rose's adopted daughter Miaow, once a street waif and now a successful schoolgirl going through those normal mood shifts of adolescence (body changes! a heavy crush! a play to try out for, and if the audition fails, so will her life!). To protect her one real friend Andrew from trouble over losing a cellphone, Miaow digs into her street smarts and helps him buy a used, probably stolen, replacement phone.

But the images on the phone turn out to relate to a pair of recent murders, and suddenly Miaow and Andrew are targets of the killing team.

At the same time, Poke is entering a family crisis -- I won't say what kind, because it's a wonderful surprise when it appears -- and a damaged young girl he'd known during her years of abuse comes back into his life with major needs for assistance and his attention. Last but not least, Miaow and Poke's wife Rose are having portentous dreams. You can feel the river of heat and history that wraps around Bangkok and and through Poke's struggles.

"My daughter," Rafferty says, "is not boneheaded enough to play amateur detective."

Arthit says, "Boneheaded?"

"I do not play amateur detective." [Rafferty] realizes he has leaned forward and uses his feet to push the chair back a few inches. "Or if I do, it's because I have to because the professional detetcives are either not disposed to help or are, umm, constrained --"

"That's a nice way to put it. Constrained, as opposed to corrupt or scared of running up against someone bigger than they are who might sympathize with -- or be on the payroll of -- the other side."

"It's hard to be a cop here," Rafferty says. "An honest one, anyway."

The two men look at each other across a few years of shared history, and the moment makes Rafferty ache.

There is indeed a "ticking clock" for the plot: The people who team up with Poke can't shelter him and his threatened family for long, and the criminals know where they are, where they've been, and way too much about Poke's own vulnerabilities. Things have to resolve within 48 hours or so ... including what to do about the dangerous street waif, Treasure.

But far more important -- and, I think, the reason the Poke Rafferty mysteries are so compelling -- is the struggle for Poke to figure out what he's doing in terms of the people he loves, and especially, how to loosen his protective grasp of his daughter Miaow far enough to let her grow up. Like the rest of us, he wrestles with that major issue while also coping with his own life, including his friendships and alliances in Bangkok.

I think FOR THE DEAD is way more than a thriller -- it's international crime fiction, and it's heartache. And the author, in an Afterword, promises us more of the same, at least until Miaow grows up. Assuming, that is, that Poke can keep enough criminals and hot-blooded classmates away so that she has the chance.

Poke Rafferty #5: THE FEAR ARTIST by Timothy Hallinan

Ever since he introduced Poke Rafferty in 2007, Timothy Hallinan has been winning fans for his alter ego, a travel writer in Bangkok. In 2010, the fourth in the suspense series, The Queen of Patpong, raked in an Edgar Award nomination. And now we have the fifth -- and maybe the best yet -- THE FEAR ARTIST.

Things start out simply enough: A man being chased falls on top of him, on the sidewalk, and is shot and killed as he collapses. Rafferty hears three words from the dying man, and is abruptly surrounded by a phalanx of police officers and at least one "spook" -- government spy. Although he gets released from the scene, his troubles have barely started.

It's a good thing his wife Rose and daughter Miaow are out of the city, even though he misses them viscerally. Even his best friend Arthit is out of reach right now, caught up in heartbreak. Rafferty's actually afraid to feel his aloneness -- or not aloneness, if you count the people who seem to be following him,

He feels a bit of the old tingle, the little carbonated fizz of anticipation he'd felt all those years ago, when he first arrived, when Bangkok was just one jaw-dropper after another. When he spoke none of the language, when he might as well have been blind for all the sense the signs made to him. When he felt that the odds were fifty-fifty, each time he went down a new street, that it would be dedicated to holiness -- temple carvers, amulet makers, gold-leaf hammerers -- or hedonism -- bars, restaurants, flamboyant neon signifying the fall-off edge of his middle-class map of life.

Except now the fifty-fifty seems to apply to him: On the one hand, he might be safe until the next block, even though he's being followed. On the other, he might be shot himself or, at least as chilling, tossed into jail as an American spy. And the idea of his family being threatened makes him even more vulnerable -- and more determined to get to the bottom of the stranger's death and its ramifications.

Soon Rafferty is leaning on Arthit after all, and on a Russian, and to his utter astonishment, on a family member he didn't realize could or would walk back into his life. Even the weather becomes threatening -- and what Rafferty learns only increases the danger he's in, moment by moment.

Soho Crime released this one yesterday, so if you're headed into summer vacation -- or trying to distract yourself from not being there! -- it's time to get a copy. You won't need to read the preceding four books -- A Nail Through the Heart, The Fourth Watcher, Breathing Water, and The Queen of Patpong -- but you'll probably want to. Why not? This is what summer is made for.

PS - Do visit Hallinan's website. Lots to enjoy: http://www.timothyhallinan.com/poke.html