ANZAC DAY 2013

I have posted about my wife’s grandfather Petty Officer Percy Kempster DSM previously, but make no apologies for providing this link to his story on ANZAC Day. 

 

http://dalyhistory.wordpress.com/2011/12/20/petty-officer-percy-kempster-dsm/

THE GHOST RIDERS OF ORDEBEC: FRED VARGAS trans SIAN REYNOLDS

It seems a long wait between any new additions to the Commissaire Adamsberg series, but when they do arrive they are always a treat and give the reader a slightly offbeat approach to the crime fiction novel. In the seventh book in the series, The Ghost Riders of Ordebec [L'armee furieuse in the original French edition] Adamsberg and his quirky crew face two cases. 

A rich Parisian industrialist has been torched in his car and a convenient suspect, serial arsonist Momo, is available, but the intuitive Adamsberg believes he is innocent and goes to great lengths to prove it.

Meanwhile a little old lady has come to the capital from a village in Normandy to tell Adamsberg that her daughter Lina Vendermot has had a vision of a ghostly army of riders lead by Lord Hellequin carrying along three terrified victims that she can identify, and one she can’t.

 

When the intrigued Adamsberg learns more about the legend of the Furious Army  which is said to have roamed the countryside  chasing the damned souls of evil people to Hell, he travels to Ordebec discovering that the first of those evil victims has been murdered.

 

“He was at the service of cupidity and deception rather than of justice.” And that is why Landri, Vicomte d’Ordebec, was seized by the Furious Army. To be a corrupt magistrate in those days was a serious as to commit bloodshed . Whereas nowadays, nobody cares. 

 

 

Adamsberg’s investigative team has always been a sandwich short of a picnic, but in this story, the walking encyclopaedia Danglard,  the narcoleptic Mercadet, the Alexandrine quoting poet Veyrenc and the statuesque goddess Retancourt seem almost normal alongside the crazy Vendermot family of Ordebec. But in Ordebec almost everyone has a personal story to tell some of which contain clues and some merely red herrings. 

With Zerk, Adamsberg’s newly discovered son, and Momo looking after Hebbeaud, a tortured pigeon, while on the run from the authorities [Momo not the pigeon]; six fingered hands, crossbows, men made of clay, sugar lumps and the distracting beauty of Lina, this is one of Adamsberg’s most complex, but engaging adventures.

 

‘So what do you make of that, commandant?’ asked Adamsberg as they walked slowly back up the track to Leo’s house.

‘Could be a whole family of killers,’ said Danglard cooly, ‘self-contained, sheltered from the outside world. All of them with a screw loose, they’ve been badly abused, they’re wild, incredibly talented and very engaging.’ 

 

 

The Ghost Riders of Ordebec is original, full of Gallic charm, eccentric, slightly confusing in a nice way, and one of those books that you don’t want to finish because it should be enjoyed slowly like a fine wine. In a genre where sometimes one feels that there is nothing new to interest the reader Fred Vargas always manages to provide intelligent entertainment while dealing with varied human emotions.

 

Fred Vargas is the pen name of Frederique Audoin-Rouzeau, a medieval historian and archaeologist, who has along with translator Sian Reynolds won the CWA International Dagger three times.

The Ghost Riders of Ordebec would in my opinion be a very worthy winner of a fourth award, but this year Fred Vargas, and her French eccentricity, may face strong challenges from Scandinavia and further afield.

 

“No, not really. My guess is the boy who likes torturing pigeons, and the Ordebec  murderer, and whoever burnt Clermont-Brasseur, all of them are going round in his head, without him really seeing much difference between them.

 

The rest of the Commissaire Adamsberg series with my reviews. [English publication date in brackets]:

 

1996 The Chalk Circle Man*** and here [2009]

1999 Seeking Whom He May Devour [2004]

2001 Have Mercy on Us All [2003]

2004 Wash this Blood Clean from My Hand** [2007]

2006 This Night’s Foul Work [2008]

2008 An Uncertain Place [2011]    

Euro Crime Review: Linda, As in the Linda Murder

You can read my review of Linda, As In The Linda Murder by Leif G.W. Persson translated by Neil Smith at Karen’s great resource for crime fiction fans, Euro Crime. 

 

The anti-hero of this book, detective Evert Backstrom featured as a minor character in Leif G.W. Persson’s earlier book [Another Time , Another Life] but he was unique and definitely deserved a whole series all to himself.

 

‘ Hang on a minute,’ Backstrom said. He had suddenly remembered who they were talking about. “Didn’t he get life? Is that fucker already on the loose?

‘First he got life imprisonment in the district court. But the appeal court sentenced him to a secure psychiatric ward with specific probationary requirements, and according to our records he’s still inside, even though it’s now six years since he was sentenced. Must be a new record for a secure psychiatric unit.’ 

Anyone who thinks Swedes have no sense of humour should read this novel and try and work out how much is the author’s invention, and how much is an account of what really goes on among Stockholm’s finest.

Some thoughts on crime fiction in 2012

Well thanks to the appalling weather that kept us indoors I did finally manage to read the  50 crime fiction books this year. I will post a list of my top 5 favourite reads next week, but here are a few meandering thoughts about the year in crime fiction.

2012 was a year of great loss for the online crime fiction community  with the tragic death of Maxine Clarke. Maxine’s intelligent comments, encouragement, book recommendations and above all friendship will be missed by so many in the community of crime fiction fans. 

Reginald Hill, creator of Dalziel and Pascoe, died earlier in the year and this was a big loss to fans of intelligent well written crime fiction. He did not receive as many accolades as less worthy writers, but his books are a fine epitaph. 

This was the year of the “sock puppet scandal” with a well known writer coming clean that he wrote excellent reviews of his own books, and derogatory ones of other authors. I suspect he is not alone, and many of those throwing up their hands in horror are just as guilty. 

One feature I noticed was the continued trend for crime writers to want to add on another couple of hundred pages of narrative to their books. Sometimes it works and sometimes it leads to repetition, padding and sub-plots that go nowhere. The 700 page novel…Middlemarch, Bleak House perhaps….. modern crime fiction no way.

Then there were a few books where the writers decided to both make a very bleak book even darker with a sad miserable ending. It was as if the writers said “hey we are Swedish let us lay on even more trauma on to our characters, and leave our readers really depressed”. In Cell 8 Roslund and Hellstrom decided that they would end the book with a too clever twist. Clever twists have to be believable, and most good twists have already been done by Agatha Christie, who in her later book Endless Night [1967] even succeeded in plagiarising her own twist in Death on the Nile [1937].

It was the end of  the great character Sarah Lund in a finale to series three of The Killing that was entirely satisfactory. I think many people read or watch TV crime fiction because they believe in Justice, and not in the what masquerades as Justice in our societies; the Law. Well done Sarah. 

Rebus is back, and I am reading Ian Rankin’s Standing In Another Man’s Grave at the moment. You have to read Scottish crime fiction on Hogmanay. I read the first Malcolm Fox book, and said to Mrs Crime Scraps as I finished it “Rebus will be back!” Interestingly Arnaldur Indridason with Outrage [featuring Elinborg], and Black Skies [featuring Sigurdur Oli] succeeded in producing two fine books without his main protagonist Erlendur. What will Ian Rankin give us next Rebus or Fox?

Scandinavian crime fiction continues to get published although some books have slipped below the high standard set in the past. But we can look forward to more from the elite writers such as Asa Larsson, Anne Holt, Liza Marklund and Leif G.W. Persson in 2013. On TV as well as The Killing, my viewing included Borgen and The Bridge from Scandinavia along with the superior British police procedural Scott and Bailey, and the Israeli inspiration for Homeland, Hatufim [Abductees].  

This was the year that Italy finally broke the Franco-Swedish grip on the CWA International Dagger. Andrea Camilleri at last won with The Potter’s Field, and BBC4  showed the ten part Montalbano series on television. This was one of the highlights of my TV viewing year. Also from Italy came the first in a series by Maurizio de Giovanni [translated by Anne Milano Appel] set in Naples in the 1930s featuring an anti-Fascist detective Commissario Ricciardi. I Will Have Vengeance [The Winter of Commissario Ricciardi] was subtle and intelligent, and I am looking forward to the next book in the series Blood Curse [The Springtime of Commissario Ricciardi] due to be published in May 2013. Historical crime fiction continued to be among my favourite reads during the year with author Roger Morris leaving his and Dostoevky’s Porfiry Petrovich in late 19th century Imperial Russia and starting a new series in 1914 Edwardian London in company with inspector Silas Quinn of ScotlandYard’s special crimes unit.

The Ellis Peters Historical Crime Fiction was deservedly won by Icelight, the third book in the ever improving Peter Cotton series by Aly Monroe. This evocative novel inspired a late in the year spy fiction reading and viewing bonanza in which I watched Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy in the Gary Oldman version. Old timers like me will always hark back to the BBC TV Alec Guinness portrayal of George Smiley, but I really enjoyed this movie version. I finished off the year reading the brilliant novel Spies of the Balkans** by Alan Furst, and the slightly too long The Nearest Exit by Olen Steinhauer, which introduced me to the “old fat woman” Erika Schwartz of the BND [German foreign intelligence service]. Erika enjoys a daily bottle of Rheinland Riesling and a Snickers bar, and became one of my favourite characters of the year.

Yesterday I finished reading Alibi by Joseph Kanon  which has a short but tempting opening line- “After the war, my mother took a house in Venice.” Both The Nearest Exit and Alibi won the Hammett Prize from the International Association of Crime Writers North American Branch.

I hope to find time in the New Year to review Spies of the Balkans as I particularly enjoyed  the twists and turns, and a plot that almost made you forget real life doesn’t always have happy endings. In January my reading plans include Leighton Gage’s Perfect Hatred, the sixth Mario Silva thriller set in Brazil, Pierced by Thomas Enger, and Spies of Warsaw by Alan Furst. 

Happy New Year, and pleasant reading to everyone.  

Maxine Clarke of Petrona

I had sent our dear Maxine an email card last week, and she hadn’t replied which was so unlike her. I knew her health was very bad but hoped I was wrong and that perhaps she might be on holiday. The dreadful news of her death came yesterday. My computer froze earlier today, it was if it could not or would not accept the terrible news. Other people have spoken movingly of Maxine’s qualities, and as I read through the dozens of emails we had exchanged over the last six years I thought what a kind and very brave lady she was. {We only met in person twice, she was lovely.} 

She tempted so many inexperienced bloggers to dip their toe in the blogging water and then jump in with her helpful comments and encouragement, that we all owe Maxine a great debt of gratitude. Her own blog Petrona was a source of pleasure, excellent writing, valuable opinions, and a constant temptation to plagiarise. 

Maxine was a true friend, I will miss her terribly.

[The photos show Maxine at Crime Fest and with Hakan Nesser, and translator Don Bartlett, one of her favourites.]

Looking back: October 2012

It was really no contest as to my favourite crime fiction read in October as I read only two fiction books. [I also read two excellent non fiction books but more about those later]

Jo Nesbo’s The Bat was by far the superior of the two crime books as the other, Autumn Killing by Mons Kallentoft* was disappointing and not my cup of tea. 

*review to follow soon

Back from holiday

We had a few days away and for once I did very little reading so I have some catching up to do. The photograph might, or might not, be a clue as to where we went.

Reviewing On Beulah Height: A Tribute to Reginald Hill

Celebrating Reginald Hill the tribute co-hosted by those two criminal masterminds Rhian Davies [It's a crime! Or a Mystery...] and Margot Kinberg [Confessions of a Mystery Novelist] has reached my own contribution today. I was very pleased to be asked to participate in this month long tribute to Reg, who sadly died in January, because it has reminded me that he was a great crime writer with a fantastic sense of humour. 

LAST WILL: LIZA MARKLUND trans NEIL SMITH

Last Will by Liza Marklund, and the previous tome I read by Leif G.W. Persson, provide a short answer to the question being asked by the media. Why has Swedish crime fiction become so popular? Simply because the books tell good stories with exciting plots, and have interesting characters. 

This story starts with reporter Annika Bengtzon covering the Nobel banquet for the tabloid Evening Post. During the post dinner dancing a female assassin, known as The Kitten, after stepping on Annika’s foot and making eye contact shoots Israeli Nobel recipient Aaron Wiesel in the leg and then with one shot aimed at the heart kills Caroline von Behring, chair of the Karolinska Institute’s Nobel Committee, before escaping down a service elevator, and out of the building onto a speed boat. Annika is prevented from reporting on the crime because she is a key witness, which gives her boss, Anders Schyman, the opportunity to put her on extended “gardening leave”.

“Chapter twenty-three of the Judicial Procedure Act,’ Annika said, “paragraph ten, final section. The accounts of key witnesses can be protected by the head of an investigation where a serious crime is suspected.”

When an Islamic terrorist group claim responsibility the media become confused as to who was the intended victim. 

Aaron Wiesel and Charles Watson were stem-cell researchers, and vocal advocates of therapeutic cloning. The decision to award them the Nobel Prize for Medicine had been controversial. It had unleashed a wave of protests from Catholic and radical Protestant groups.

As the story moves forward six months it covers a series of themes that make the plot both interesting and stimulating.

On the domestic front Annika received a large reward for finding a bag of Euros which converted came to 128 million kronor. Her ten percent [12.8 million kronor] allows the family to move to a villa in the wealthy suburb of Djursholm. Annika is devoted to her young children, Kalle and Ellen, but her relationship with her uptight husband Thomas has not recovered from the trauma of  his affair with Sophia Grenborg. Annika’s struggle to maintain a career and care for her demanding family are a constant theme, and the situation is not improved by the aggressive antics of a loopy elderly neighbour, Wilhelm Hopkins.

At work Annika returns from her “leave” to find big changes at the newspaper, and one the interesting features of the whole series, and this book in particular are the details of how a media outlet is organized.

The staff glanced at each other, slightly embarrassed. Most of them didn’t work on the dusty old print edition at all, but on the online version, local television, commercial radio, or on some shiny supplement. Many of them didn’t even read the actual newspaper.

Thomas is working on government legislation that involves snooping into private communications, and anti-terror laws based on mere suspicion, and that leads to further conflict  with Annika. 

Following up the criminal investigation, which her old sparring partner Q leads, takes Annika into the world of animal research, scientific rivalry, the Nobel Prize winning process, and the vast amount of money that pharmaceutical companies can make with bio-medical patents. 

The reader is also given some historical background into Alfred Nobel’s life and literary ambitions. 

When more murders occur the story moves to a very tense and exciting climax, but one which still leaves unanswered questions in Annika’s personal life. 

This is an excellent addition to what is becoming a classic crime fiction series, and one which exhibits so many of the key factors that have made Scandinavian crime fiction so popular. Detailed coverage of a subject, social commentary, large doses of cynicism, dollops of humour both light and dark, characters who distrust their superior’s motives and who feel loneliness and despair, and of course the interesting female protagonist. The reader is helped by an excellent seamless translation from Neil Smith and I am definitely looking forward to reading the next one in the series, Lifetime, due out later in the year. 

My review of Red Wolf, the chronological predecessor in the Annika Bengtzon series

My review of Exposed 

The Annika Bengtzon series

Extended Quiz Deadline

My apologies but I blundered [put it down to my age and inability to grasp modern technology] with an incorrect email for replying with answers to the Diamond Jubilee Quiz .

The correct email address, now modified at the quiz, is thbear08@googlemail.com so the deadline for answers is extended to 13 May.