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Thursday 28 March 2013

The Hunt for "New" Authors

Last year, the Global Reading Challenge at Mysteries in Paradise lit the spark to make me seek out more authors from around the world. Because my favourite genre is mysteries, that can narrow my choices.

I hesitate to say “new authors” as they are only new to me. Many have been writing in their own country for years: Unity Dow (Botswana), Kwei Quartey (Ghana), Batya Gur (Israel) and Eduardo Sacheri (Argentina), to name a few.
Even in my own country of 10 provinces and 3 territories, there are many less well-known authors I am just discovering, Michael Van Rooy being my favourite to date.
 
The only problem with reading challenges is….once I find these new-to-me authors, I need to move on to another one, even when I want to read more of one author! In Kerrie’s Global challenge, to achieve the Expert level, you need to read authors from 21 countries. This being my second year in the challenge, I’m pushing myself to pick 21 countries that are different from last year’s and finding authors from some places can be difficult, especially countries in Africa and Central/South America. And what’s with Norway and Sweden??? Enough already, way too many good authors for a girl to keep up on.

I have found some helpful sites, such as Bill Selnes' Mysteries and More from Saskatchewan for Canadian authors.  I’ve provided the links on the right side of this blog under “Finding Books from Different Countries". I would love to be able to add to this list so please let me know how you find authors.
 
Do you have a great source for different countries? Who are your favourite authors in your own country?

Sunday 24 March 2013

Review: Crooked Lake, Nelson Brunanski (Canada: Saskatchewan)

Title: Crooked Lake
Author: Nelson Brunanski
Publication: 2006/Caronel Publishing, Canada
ISBN #: 0-9739121-0-3
# of pages: 254
Discovered at http://mysteriesandmore.blogspot.ca/2011/02/crooked-lake-by-nelson-brunanski.html
Read in paper format
Link to author’s website: nelsonbrunanski.com

 

What could possibly happen in the quiet little prairie town of Crooked Lake, population 1,000? Big enough to have a post office, and a regional park and golf course…and now a murder. When his lifelong friend Nick Taylor is accused of the murder and no other suspects are even considered, John “Bart” Bartowski figures he’ll nose around a bit. His wife Rosie figures he has enough to worry about at home, what with their fly-in fishing lodge at risk of losing its government lease. Bart quietly persists, even when events start to spin out of control, threatening the safety of Bart and his family.

 Although this is a first book, it did not run into too many obvious first book issues. The setting is nicely drawn, with a good portrayal of Saskatchewan, including the decades-old ethnic mix, the lifestyles. You feel the quiet rural life, with the gossiping and longstanding feuds, but without sinking to an unrealistic nasty undercurrent.  This story could happen anywhere. Bart’s life goes on, while he’s doing his snooping. He’s still weeding his garden, worrying about his children, getting his summer bookings lined up. Even the bad guys could be your own neighbours. This was an enjoyable book.        Rating: (°_°)

The author grew up in Wakaw, Saskatchewan, the inspiration for the town of Crooked Lake. He has also written two more in the Bartowski series: “Frost Bite” and “Burnt Out”, as well as two non-series mysteries, “Southern Exposure” and “Victoria Day”. I look forward to reading these.

 

Saturday 23 March 2013

2013 Bingo Reading Challenge

                   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 



As of March 16, I have completed these squares:

Read 1 book from your TBR pile:
The Moonstone, by Wilkie Collins
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/03/review-moonstone-wilkie-collins-england.html

Read 1 book that is part of a series:
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Criminal, by Michael Van Rooy
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/01/review-your-friendly-neighbourhood.html

Re-read 1 book:
Love Lies Bleeding, by Edmund Crispin
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/02/review-love-lies-bleeding-edmund.html

Read 2 books that are part of a series:
Death in Breslau, by Marek Krajewski
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/01/review-death-in-breslau-marek-krajewski.html

Unwanted, by Kristina Ohlsson
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/03/review-unwanted-kristina-ohlsson-sweden.html

Read 3 books that are part of a series:
A Beautiful Place to Die, by Malla Nunn
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/03/review-beautiful-place-to-die-malla.html

An Expert in Murder, by Nicola Upson
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/02/review-expert-in-murder-nicola-upson.html

The Gigolo Murder, by Mehmet Murat Somer
http://mysteriesinthewoods.blogspot.ca/2013/03/review-gigolo-murder-mehmet-murat-somer.html

Wednesday 20 March 2013

Review: The Gigolo Murder, Mehmet Murat Somer (Turkey)

Title: The Gigolo Murder
Author: Mehmet Murat Somer
Translator: Kenneth Dakan
Publication: 2009/Penguin Books Ltd, England
Original Publication: 2003/Turkey (“Jigolo Cinayeti”)
ISBN #: 978-0-14-311629-5
# of pages: 255
Discovered at www.goodreads.com
Read in paper format
Also available in e-book format

When the cast of characters includes an unnamed transvestite who idolizes actor Audrey Hepburn, his wheelchair bound computer hacker rival, his friend the police bureau chief, a gay poet, and club girls named Dump Truck Beyza and Blackbrow Lulu, you know this will be a different type of mystery book.

This is a story of two worlds: transvestites and computer hackers, set in Istanbul. The protagonist is a hacker by day, a transvestite club owner by night and an amateur detective when an interesting mystery comes along. He is still recovering from a major heartbreak and has now fallen head over heels for handsome lawyer Haluk Pekerdem. He is not the least deterred by the man’s wife Canan, sitting right beside him in the club. While at the club, they learn that Canan’s stepbrother Faruk has been arrested for the murder of a minibus driver.
Hoping to get closer to Haluk, the hero decides to find out everything he can about the Pekerdems and the crime. He quickly learns from the club girls that the victim Volkan Sarıdoğan was a professional bisexual gigolo. This is only the beginning of a convoluted case.

The story is an interesting quirky look at the Turkish transvestite scene. There was a bit too much of this aspect and a bit too little of the mystery to make it a book that grabs the reader’s undivided attention. It is more of a summer beach book. Be sure to read the acknowledgements at the end! They run to four pages and are hilarious. The author admits to being inspired by awards ceremony winners and “Presented with the opportunity to compile my own list (of those who contributed), I have decided to milk it for all it’s worth”.  As quirky as the book, the list includes his late great-grandmother on his father’s side, authors such as Gore Vidal, composers as diverse as Handel and Cole Porter, Barbra Streisand pre-1980s and numerous actors for interesting reasons.
This book is part of a series, known in English as the Turkish Delight series. In Turkish, the author named it the Hop-Çiki-Yaya series. “Hop-Çiki-Yaya was a cheerleading chant from Turkish colleges in the early 1960s, and it came to be used in comedy shows to mean gays. If somebody was queenish, then they'd say 'Oh, he's Hop-Çiki-Yaya'. By the 70s, it wasn't being used anymore - so I brought it back." (from Wikipedia). Of the six other books, only two have been translated into English so far: The Prophet Murders, and The Kiss Murder.

 

 

 

Saturday 16 March 2013

Reading Challenges



Heard about yet another interesting challenge through Bev Hankin's "My Reader's Block" site. It's called The Bingo Reading Challenge and was set up by Anne and Kristilyn at their blog http://readinginwinter.com/2012/12/08/challenge-anne-kristilyns-2013-book-bingo-reading-challenge/

The challenge encourages you to read from your TBR pile, from a series, from 2013 releases, to pick up a book everyone but you has read, and you even get to re-read books.

Check it out at their blog. I'll be setting up a special page just to track this one. Is this a challenge in which you participate?

Thursday 14 March 2013

Review: The Moonstone, Wilkie Collins (England)

Title: The Moonstone
Author: Wilkie Collins
Publication: 2006/Project Gutenberg
Original Publication: 1868/Tinsley Brothers, UK
ISBN #: not available
Number of pages:  528
Read in e-book format
Also available in paper format
Discovered many years ago and on the To Be Read list ever since

The action begins with the Storming of Seringapatam, a battle in southern India between the British East India company and the Kingdom of Mysore in 1799. The unnamed narrator is horrified to see his cousin John Herncastle murdering three Indians and he suspects he has stolen the Moonstone, a magnificent yellow diamond, set in the forehead of the Indian god of the moon.

The stone has been around for centuries. After one attempted theft, Vishnu the Preserver appeared to three Brahmins in a dream, cursed anyone who stole it and instructed them to guard it forever. They were successful until the eighteenth century when the Mogul Emperor stole it during a war. The stone then passed through many hands until Herncastle got it, always with three Brahmins hovering in the background, waiting for an opportunity to get it back.

When Herncastle died after a life on the run, the instructions in his will were for his nephew Franklin Blake to give the stone to his niece (Blake’s cousin) Rachel Verinder on her birthday. Three Indian conjurers show up at the English estate around the same time. Blake gives her the stone at her eighteenth birthday party then during the night, it mysteriously vanishes. Since the Indians are still in the area, it is apparent they do not have it but who does? Rachel will not discuss the matter with her family or Sergeant Cuff, the police detective hired by her family to find the thief and the stone.

From here, the mystery is continued through the sequential narratives of several intriguing characters. Gabriel Betteredge, the rather misogynistic house steward to Lady Verinder (Rachel’s mother and Herncastle’s sister) is guided through life by passages from "Robinson Crusoe". He narrates a large part of the story. His narrative is followed by that of Drusilla Clack, Lady Verinder’s god-fearing spinster niece, who pushes her religious tracts on people at every opportunity. The remaining narratives are by family lawyer Mathew Bruff, Franklin Blake himself, Ezra Jennings doctor’s assistant, Mr. Candy the doctor, Sergeant Cliff’s man, a ship’s captain and finally Mr. Murthwaite, a character who keeps popping out throughout the story.

As a mystery buff, I have wanted to read this book for years. It is considered the first English language mystery novel (as opposed to Edgar Allan Poe’s earlier mystery short stories). It was originally serialized in Charles Dickens’ magazine “All the Year Round”.  I am glad I read it, especially since it is the first example of many elements of the modern detective story: bungling local cop, red herrings, false suspects, crime reconstruction and a plot twist, to name a few. But it is a long long book (much like this review). I very much agreed with Gabriel Betteredge at the end of Chapter XXII when he said “if you are as tired of reading this narrative as I am of writing it…” At that point, I was only 35% of the way through the book! Due to the book’s historical significance, it is worth reading and the plot is quite good. I may read Collins’ other best seller “The Woman in White”….but not for awhile.

Have you read any mysteries from the late 1800s or early 1900s? Did they stand the test of time?

Friday 8 March 2013

Review: Unwanted, Kristina Ohlsson (Sweden)

Title:                           Unwanted
Author:                       Kristina Ohlsson
Translator:                 not acknowledged
Publication:               2012/Simon & Schuster, Inc
Original Publication: 2009/Piratförlaget, Sweden (“Askungar”)
ISBN #                       978-1-4391-9891-9
# pages:                    353
Discovered at my local independent bookstore
Read in paper format
Also available in e-book format

The third Tuesday in July will remain frozen in Henry Lindgren’s memory for the rest of his life. He was the train conductor in the coach from which the little girl Lilian went missing. A few minor incidents with passengers, an annoying train delay, and then…life changed forever.

The police team called in to work the case is not necessarily the most cohesive. DCI Alex Recht has been on the force for more than 25 years and is considered a legend but his skills will be challenged as the case unfolds.  He is used to working with Peder Rydh, an eager young officer with plans for promotion. However, their newest colleague Fredrika Bergman is a puzzle to both these career officers. One of the new civilian recruits brought on board for their specialized skills, she is in her probationary period but has been placed right into an investigative role, skipping the usual patrol car entry position. Her expertise is in crimes against women and children and she sees policing as a temporary position to gain experience.

Despite their internal conflicts, they will be forced to work together to find the little girl and track down her abductor. The suspect is obvious but the clues don’t always lead where expected.

 Although the reader follows both the police investigation and the perpetrator’s activities, the answer to “who dunnit” keeps shifting.  The back stories for the three detectives are nicely woven into the plot. All three are flawed but their prickly sides are nicely balanced with a softer side, making them quite human and real. A page turner that makes you stay up late to finish the book.

Kristina Ohlsson has written several more books in this series: “Silenced”, “Guardian Angels”, “Hostage” and “Star of David” (due for release in April 2013). She has also begun a trilogy of children’s fiction. Interestingly, her background is as a political scientist, most recently holding the position of Counter-Terrorism Officer at OSCE (the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe).

Sunday 3 March 2013

Review: A Beautiful Place to Die, Malla Nunn (Swaziland)

TITLE:              A Beautiful Place to Die
AUTHOR:         Malla Nunn
PUBLICATION: 2009/Atria Books (Simon & Schuster Inc), New York
ISBN #             978-1-4165-8620-3
# PAGES:        373
Discovered in a review by Mysteries in Paradise
Read in paper format
Also available in e-book format
 
The book opens in 1952 in South Africa, a time when new apartheid laws were being introduced yearly. Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper was in deep country, in the northwestern part of South Africa, near the Mozambique border, working on a murder case which was quickly resolved. Before he could head back to Johannesburg, his boss told him to check on another possible homicide near Jacob’s Rest. What he discovers is a white police captain, Willem Pretorius, face down in the river, shot in the head and the back. The dead man’s three huge Afrikaner sons are not happy to see one lone officer there to investigate. Cooper is not happy to be that one lone officer.


Cooper has no colour prejudices and respectfully interacts into each different local group, his command of the Zulu language a definite benefit. The local force consists of only three other officers: two white officers Constable Hansie Hepple the ineffective teenager and Lieutenant Sarel Uys, current on vacation, and the quietly competent Zulu-Shangaan tracker Constable Samuel Shabalala.

As Cooper tries to build a rapport with Shabalala, he struggles to keep his World War II nightmares at bay. When the infamous Security Branch takes over the case, determined to beat a confession out of whomever they need to pin this on, Cooper is relegated to investigating a local unsolved peeping tom case which he hopes will let him keep one foot into the murder investigation.

This was an excellent book, with interesting historical nuances running through it. The remaining effects on Cooper so recently involved in a foreign war, the separateness and connectedness of racial groups long divided physically, plus the tightening restrictions and horrific penalties of apartheid are the backdrop to a well-paced murder mystery.

Given the apparent proximity of fictional Jacob’s Rest to Lorenzo Marques (now Maputo) in Mozambique, the setting of this story appears to be very close to the border of Swaziland. This is the first novel written by Malla Nunn. She was born in Swaziland and later moved to Australia with her family. Given the setting and her background, I have chosen to list her as a Swaziland author in the Global Reading Challenge. She has since written three more books:

. Let the Dead Lie
. Blessed are the Dead (alternate title: Silent Valley)
. Present Darkness