Review: Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell

 With a couple of his recent Sherlock Holmes pastiches, Nicolas Meyer has stepped up his game. Not in terms of plotting or character, at which he has always been the gold standard, or in his channeling of the voice and more importantly the heart of John Watson (for Watson's heart is Sherlock's heart, much as Watson's voice is Sherlock's voice). But the world of Sherlock Holmes is essentially domestic, with criminals who will be dealt with by the courts (once Holmes has revealed then to Scotland Yard). But in The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocols and now his latest, Sherlock Holmes and the Telegraph from Hell, the author moves Holmes onto the world stage, raising the stakes of his investigations enormously.

The plot is simple: what if the outcome of World War I depended upon the contents of a telegram, and Britain were desperate to know the contents of that telegram? Well, it did. The story of the Zimmerman Telegram is historical fact. Meyer's inspired move is to couple that fact to Doyle's (or Watson's) story "His Last Bow," which hints at Holmes's role in the war about to engulf Europe. And thereby hangs a tale that takes Holmes and Watson in their twilight years from London to Washington to Mexico City, dogged by assassins every step of the way.

The truth is, this isn't really a detective story, though it's strewn with Holmes's customary legerdemain. And it's not really a spy story, though Watson can hardly turn around without bumping into a spy. It's a coming of age story for a man in his sixties who has come to realize that his fog-bound streets, hansom cabs, and skills at single-stick are not enough to see him through the dangerous new world of the 20th century. He must confront his own parochialism, the smallness of his lifelong efforts against evil.  

Don't misunderstand me. There's plenty of adventure and derring-do in this novel, but there's an elegiac mood to it, too. And that raises it above Meyer's previous efforts. Which makes it all the more worth the read.

Sherlock Holmes and the Telegram from Hell

[I wouldn't add this in a review for Amazon or Goodreads since I don't think a review should be about the reviewer, but if you're reading it on my blog, you know that I've written some Sherlock Holmes novels myself, and have some idea of the pitfalls involved in this kind of novel. And you've probably heard me mention that Meyer's The Seven Per-cent Solution was the inspiration for my own efforts. So imagine my consternation when, in the middle of editing The Strange Case of the Pharaoh's Heart, I learned that Meyer was about to come out with his own Sherlock Holmes meets the mummy tale, The Return of the Pharaoh, and how relieved I was to learn that the pharaoh in his tale was not Tutankhamun and his story was nothing like mine. Which is preface to say that I came upon the story of the Zimmerman Telegram about a year ago and contemplated writing a Holmes short story based on it. I thank procrastination I didn't go ahead with that one.]

Review: A Noir Story

 

Noir is all about bad ideas executed badly under the influence of uncontrolled passion. Andrew Sherman understands that and has crafted a cautionary tale that veers from lighthearted to deadly serious in a heartbeat. The story starts with a cuckolded husband crafting an explosive missive to his rival with every possible opportunity for things to go wrong. Then it interrupts its regularly scheduled narrative to show us how we got to this point.

There’s a healthy dose of Quentin Tarantino in this story, or I should say these stories, tales of domestic quarrels that spark out of hand and brush up against each other in unexpected ways with violent results. Yes, there are murders, but no perfect murders, and it’s the imperfections that provide the sudden turns that in less expert hands would send this story crashing through the guardrails. But Sherman keeps a steady hand on the wheel, even if none of his characters do. A Noir Story is a fine debut, and I look forward to reading Sherman’s next effort. (A Noir Story available at Amazon.)

Review: The Sorrowful Girl

 There’s a tug of war I’m familiar with in writing historical fiction. The writer
wants to establish historical setting without overwhelming the reader with historical facts—the furniture without the bric-a-brac. And here’s where Keenan Powell excels with The Sorrowful Girl. From the very first page she makes us feel comfortable in small-town Massachusetts at the turn of the last century.

     It's a town mainly populated by poor, hard-working Irish immigrants, at a time when immigrants were hated or looked down on by many Americans. A time of labor unrest and repressive capitalism. Alright, a time perhaps little different from our own. Perhaps the secret to good historical fiction is finding the common denominators between the past and the present.

     Or perhaps it’s in fully realized, breathing characters. A girl has been murdered in the woods outside of town. A girl close to Liam Barret, the local policeman who’s put in charge of bringing her killer to justice. We get to know Liam’s history, his hopes and aspirations, and that of his town as the case places him squarely between the Molly Maguires and the political machinery and machinations controlled by the moneyed mill owner who also seems to own half the state. 

     He’ll have to rely on his wits and his integrity to see him through to the resolution. And even then he may find a compromise is the best he can hope for. 

     This is the first Keenan Powell I’ve read. It won’t be the last.

Review: A Fine Upstanding Citizen

 Get set for a clinic in the unreliable narrator. And the single location narrative, all in
one novella, or is it a novelette? Our protagonist is a well-respected politician with shady secret in his past that has knotted him to a criminal organization. He’s been summoned to an emergency meeting of the organization’s “department” heads. On the agenda: a traitor in their midst has sung to the feds. But who?

    The senator knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men, and sets himself the task of discovering the rat before the big reveal. Can he suss out the squealer? Can you? Another entertaining entry in William Martell’s series of Crime Time mysteries.

Review: Battle Annie

 When Trish MacEnulty writes a historical novel, she’s apt to use a wide-angle lens. So it is with Battle Annie, loosely based on a true character, whose life is fleshed out with great imagination and brio. 

     From the tenements of Hell’s Kitchen to the upper crust of Baltimore and back again, we follow Annie Walsh, the self-styled queen of Hell’s Kitchen’s brawlers fleeing from a murder rap and everything she’s ever known. The writer builds up the slums of New York in 1895 brick by hurled brick, placing us in the middle of rail strikes and gang wars, contrasted with Gilded Age high society, where survival means learning how to use an oyster fork. 

     It’s grit, brains, and most importantly the friendships forged in the lower depths that keep Annie and her ward Cora one step ahead of the law. She provides a wider societal vista by the inclusion of socialist champion Eugene Debs, who sees beyond Annie’s rough façade to the leader she can be.

     This is a picaresque tale with a lot of heart, well worth the read. If you’re like me, you’ll fall in love with Annie and her company of rogues. And you’ll be left hungry for more.

Review: The Law of Falling Bodies

 The Law of Falling Bodies is like cooking a souffle while doing a high wire act.
There’s no way it’s going to work. But what if it does? I’m almost tempted to leave my review it at that, but I’ll go further, at the risk of a few mini-spoilers. It does something I normally despise: it turns a murder story into an espionage story. With Nazis.

But: the author pulls it off, largely through the agency of his main character, a thoroughly grounded, down-to-earth, self-deprecating, modest graduate student in physics who is the only person who could ever solve the many mysteries presented to him, in part because he and his antagonist go together like yin and yang.

It’s a spy novel which may also qualify as a cozy mystery. It includes an alluring local cop and an asshole FBI agent who may be allies or enemies. Through it all, it’s strangely believable. This is an overlooked gem. Pick it up now.

Review: Go Find Daddy

Modern society is a minefield, and was even before Covid-19. But there was a lot of discussion at the height of the pandemic as to how writers should handle such an event. Ignore it?—or plunge into it? Steve Goble elects to skip it, but in doing so he (intentionally) shines a light on the aftermath, and what it means to us going forward. The waning of trust—in institutions, in each other seems to have accelerated to dangerous new levels. A lot of readers were waiting to see how writers would handle Covid and the post-Covid arena. If Go Find Daddy, Steve Goble’s third in his Ed Runyon series is any example, I would say—honestly, straightforwardly, levelly. Which happens to describe his hero, Ed.

Ed has left the force, gotten over (largely) his anger issues, and is trying to make it work as a private detective in small-town Ohio. He’s a no-nonsense kind of guy. As he says, “accountants get head-aches from staring at a screen store clerks get head-aches from dealing with assholes all day, I get shot at. No big deal.”

     But he’s about to go down the rabbit hole. A cop’s been killed. The main suspect—the only suspect as far as the police are concerned—is a right-wing podcaster who’s made his hatred for cops his brand (thus helping to diminish further our faith in authority), and who’s vanished without leaving a clue, even to his wife and child.  Every cop in three states is out for his blood. And now a pro-cop entity online has offered a million dollars for him—dead. No one knows whether the offer is real, whether the organization is real, or a hoax—but it’s drawn every bounty-hunter to the chase.

     All of which would have nothing to do with Ed—until he takes on a mission for the fugitive’s wife—to get a vital message to him. If you know Ed, you’ll know why it’s a job he can’t refuse (involving the fugitive’s little daughter) even though he’s going up against the fugitive’s friends and enemies both, all of whom are trigger-happy, none of whom trust each other or can be trusted. Yes. Ed Runyon gets shot at—a lot.

      But Ed is a person who can be trusted, a person who holds his integrity dear, a person who can be believed, a doggedly decent man—and that’s the key to the job he’s taken on, and it’s what makes him a hero for this post-Covid age. 

      This is the third book in the Ed Runyon series. Jump on the bandwagon.

Review: The Lost Van Gogh

 The Lost Van Gogh is a combination art history lesson and roller coaster. It’s not aspoiler to tell you that it’s about a lost van Gogh that’s found and then lost again and everyone in this tale is trying to find it, each with their own agenda. Nobody is who they pretend to be, and everyone has enough secret baggage to send a 747 plunging to its watery grave. The effect steers awfully close to the comic, but luckily we’re in the hands of a skilled driver.

     A New York girl buys an old painting in a second-hand store upstate. Her boyfriend, an up-and-coming young painter, discovers there’s more to this painting than meets the eye. They make a big mistake: they tell somebody. Just a handful of people, really. But every single person they tell, they shouldn’t have.

     This story is marinated in the New York art world, seasoned with Amsterdam, and served up fittingly enough, in the little French village of Auvers-sur-Oise, where van Gogh drew his last breath—and he’s not the only one to die there for his art.

       Jonathan Santlofer is a rare bird, an author who’s also a painter in his own right, which makes him eminently qualified to pen this tale. (As the author of a mystery title involving van Gogh myself), I was impressed. You will be, too.

Review: Secrets and Spies

Let’s start off the month with a review of Secrets and Spies, the newest installation in Trish MacEnulty’s Delafield&Malloy Historical mystery series:

 

The most entertaining part of the Delafield & Malloy historical mystery series is the sleight-of-hand the author uses to place her sleuths at the center of historical events. Some historical writers use a crowbar; Trish MacEnulty uses a scalpel.

The setting this time is 1915. America has not yet formally entered the war, but it’s hinted that American ships are secretly supplying the British, who are desperate for succor. New York City is full of clandestine agents for both sides, jockeying for position. Society writer Louisa Delafield is contemplating an offer of marriage. Her assistant Ellen Malloy is about to cross the sea to Ireland, where her father is on the edge of death. The ship she’s booked on is called the Lusitania. It’s the fate of that ship which will turn them both into double agents working for both the British and the Germans.

There’s no rah-rah cheering in this book. There are villains and victims on both sides (on all three sides, we’re privy through Ellen to the attempts of the Irish to get out from under the British yoke; they’re not afraid of skullduggery to achieve their aims.). It’s a layered, considered view that we’re presented with, which makes for a rich narrative, allowing MacEnulty to give voice to everyone from Jane Hull to Sir Roger Casement. And these momentous happenings will overturn Louisa and Ellen’s private lives profoundly. Some of the regular characters we’ve come to depend on may not survive; it’s war after all, even if it’s undeclared.

Don’t get me wrong: there’s excitement aplenty, treachery at every turn, and courage in great measure, as we’ve come to expect from Delafield and Malloy. I look forward eagerly to the next installment.

Review: The Orchid Hour

The Orchid Hour reeks, but in the best possible way. It reeks with the smell of lasagna in Little Italy, the smell of cheap gin in a 1920s speakeasy, and most importantly and most delicately with the scent of orchids at midnight. It reeks of sleazy dodges, flimsy aliases, and multiple murders.The Orchid Hour masquerades as a murder mystery, and it’s satisfying at that level, but underneath that layer, there’s another that’s a love story, and when all those layers are peeled away, it’s a coming-of-age story.

But our hero isn’t a child, not even a teen-ager. She's an Italian-American widow and mother who’s nearly thirty, in a time (not so long ago) when a woman was supposed to have no desires of her own, but only the family’s. When a girl had no girlhood, and a woman was defined only by her place in the family.
That’s where we find Zia de Luca at the opening of the novel, working at her day job at the library, her hair done up in a bun, wearing sensible shoes, going home to do the books for her father-in-law’s cheese shop and looking after her eight-year-old son.
But the first murder puts paid to that, and the second murder sets Zia on the path of vengeance, a path to New York’s nascent criminal under-world, and a path to self-discovery and self-transformation. To a time which will only last as long as the vagrant scent of the orchid, but a time which will change her life forever.

Told not only through Zia’s eyes, but that of the NYPD officer who tries his best to help her and a gangster who sees murder as a simple career opportunity, this novel encompasses New York, 1923 in all its glory and grime, from City Hall to Little Italy, from Greenwich Village to the Great White Way. Thanks to Bilyeu’s masterful hand, we step out into the wilds of New York with Zia. Maybe we’ll find love. Maybe we’ll find ourselves, by being taken out of ourselves.

This is Nancy Bilyeau’s eighth book, her best by far, and she’d already set a high bar. What are you waiting for? Pick it up now.

Review: Blue Skies

 

I've decided to add a few book reviews to the blog, especially for new books, including books which may not yet have hit the stands yet (through the good graces of Netgalley. For my inaugural review, I've selected T.C. Boyle's eco-black comedy, Blue Skies.

 Of Blue Skies I am two minds, as perhaps was T.C. Boyle when he set down to write this book. A simple family tale or a polemic on climate change? Are the characters agents of their own actions, or has climate change replaced fate as the controller of lives? Are we doomed by our past actions, or do we simply make do?

 It’s a plodding plot, not so much a plot as a situation—situation dystopia. The world is seen alternately through the eyes of earnest mother Ottile (the wife of a doctor, comfortably middle-class) and her grown children, the somewhat superficial daughter Cat, and son Cooper, an entomologist and the Cassandra figure of the tale. Cat lives with fiancé Todd in Florida, while he other two are in California. One coast in perpetual drought and the other perpetually water-logged. Whole neighborhoods go up in flames on one coast while whole neighborhoods are reclaimed by the sea on the others.

The setting is not some future dystopia, but the dystopia of today and perhaps the next eight or so years in the future. The story captures the mundanity of experience at the end of the world. Sundowners and king tides (two weather phenomena I’m not familiar with, but apparently soon will be) intrude on the rituals which mark our lives, marriages and births and deaths. There are moments of joy and tragedy, as in any lives, and whether those tragedies are caused by a collapsing planet or human inertia and hubris is rather fuzzy.

 This was by no means a slog to read. The story is underpinned by diamond-hard prose which is a pleasure to read. Characters are fully realized and complex. Perhaps it’s the author’s ambivalence, whether our world is truly at an end, or whether we can survive on cricket cookbooks and drones for pollinating our crops, that leaves me scratching my head. We’ll all muddle through somehow.

Review: The House of Silk

 The House of Silk is a bright red herring. It’s misdirection. If you’ve read Anthony
Horowitz (and I’ve only dipped a toe in that deep lake), you know that misdirection is his specialty. What’s safe to tell you? It’s a Sherlock Holmes tale, pre-Reichenbach Falls, and it starts out with a simple little mystery that snowballs (thanks to a murder that wounds Holmes to the core) into a giant conspiracy which lands Holmes in the mulligatawny so badly that even God (for God, read: Mycroft Holmes) cannot help him. Watson and Lestrade can’t help him. It’s so bad that even his mortal enemy tries to help him. 

   He gets out of the frying pan (through a fine bit of misdirection—and goes right back into the fire. We rarely see Holmes take such foolhardy risks as he does in this tale, but we have seen it when his dander is truly up, and it often places him on the wrong side of the law. And we rarely see him place Watson in such peril, but Watson is always faithful, even in the teeth of a trap.

     It's not a perfect tale. Giant conspiracies have a way of living another day. And there’s a wholly unnecessary cameo by a favorite villain (I have a feeling it’s a setup for a sequel.) But when the giant herring is finally landed, there’s an extremely satisfying ending to the minnow mystery we began with. The hand is quicker than the eye. An indispensable addition to your Holmes collection. 

     (Did I give away a shred of the plot? No? Good.)

Review: The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocols

 Before we are very far into The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocols we learn that
the protocols in question are the infamous Protocols of the Elders of Zion. And if you know that name, you’ll know from the outset that this is the tale of one of Holmes’s failures. You’ll know that Holmes could not possibly have won this fight. You’ll perhaps question whether it’s a completely Quixotic mission that he and Watson are embarked on. But you won’t question their desperate need to attempt the impossible.

     The story begins rather Jason Bourne-like. A British secret agent is found drowned, with a terrible document in her possession, which purports to be a plot by a cabal of Jews to take over the world. Holmes is tasked by brother Mycroft to find out whether it’s truth or fiction. Needless to say, they’re soon satisfied on that score. But Holmes wants to take things further, to trace the lie back to its source, to expose the perpetrators, to remove its potency forever. 

    This will involve our heroes in a dangerous journey to the heart of tsarist Russia, to the site of a deadly pogrom, dogged at every step by Russian secret police who will stop at nothing to protect the source of the protocols from exposure. And the journey back will prove eve more dangerous than the journey there. Journey with Holmes and Watson (and a lovely femme fatale) across Europe on the fabulous Orient Express, by milk train and hayrick and in coffins, tilting with windmills all the way. 

     If you’re familiar with the Protocols, you’ll want to read this. If you’re not, you must read this one.

Review: Unnatural Creatures

 Unnatural Creatures begs to be compared with Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, because there’s a huge hole in both: the main character. The mover of events. And focusing instead on peripheral characters,  in both points up the artificial nature of a plot’s unraveling.  The main characters (in this case Victor Frankenstein’s mother Caroline, his future bride Elizabeth, and her malformed maid, Justine) are  largely cut off from knowledge of what causes the mayhem which claims them all. This isn’t merely a shifting of perspective: Victor Frankenstein and his creation are rarely on stage, or even in the same geographic location as our three heroines. The sources of his genius and his madness are obscured. The monster himself is only glimpsed at first, and he and his creator never share the stage.

All this would seem to be insurmountable obstacles to the story development. But Waldherr has created (or extrapolated) such complex, breathing characters that the hole at the center of her story becomes a whirling maelstrom which seeks to drown its main characters. Her secret is in placing the blame for the horrifying events which occur on Caroline, Elizabeth, and Justine in turn—in their own minds. Which leads them to struggle with their fates—fates laid down two centuries ago by Mary Shelley. The struggle is fascinating, not least because Waldherr coaxes forth a wholly original story which cheats the original. 

Does the monster have his revenge on his creator? Or is he tracked down and destroyed? Like I’m going to tell you. Unnatural Creatures is at its heart a magic show. I’d never reveal the magician’s secrets. What are you waiting for? Read it.

Review: Wayward Son

 As Chekhov once said, “If you hang a bowling ball on the wall in act one, you should fire it by act three.” Or maybe those aren’t his exact words. But it certainly applies to Steve Gobles’ Ed Runyon mysteries. Ed is a former NYC cop and a former small town Ohio cop who’s now set up as a private investigator in a town too small to support a P.I., and he’s got some anger issues which have a lot to do with his downward (or outward) mobility. 

He’s also got a tiny trailer in the middle of nowhere, girlfriend problems, and the enmity of a lot of local cops. He’s not the most together guy in the world. But by god he’s got a case. And a bowling ball.

The case is a missing teen-age boy, which is exactly the kind of case he was put on earth for. It may seem simple, but this case will throw everything but the kitchen sink at Ed, and he’ll have to fight tooth and nail to get this kid back home safe. 

That’s what sets Ed Runyon stories apart. It’s the reality of them. I don’t want to use the word “gritty” about them because it’s a word that’s been devalued by over-use, nor does it really apply. There are no mean streets in Mifflin County, Ohio, though there’s mean sleet. But Ed has true grit, and from the moment he takes the case the action roars along without taking a breath. 

And along the way, Ed the avowed loner develops a nascent support group as real as he is. This book is number two in a series. I look forward avidly to number three.

Review: Idolmaker

In Tokyo, an earthquake can put a crimp in your wedding plans. But only a murder
can put the kibosh on them. That's right, we're back with detective Kenji Nakamura, the love of his life Yumi (who's about to say I do to someone else) judo sensei Sgt. Oki, and the most important character in this series, Tokyo itself. 

And this time we're in the mad world of Japanese teen music idols. Now I'm guessing that the world of teen music idols is probably crazy worldwide, but nowhere near as crazy as in Tokyo, where they seem to squeeze them out like sausage. Is there murder? Of course. A couple ok 'em. And perversion? A soupcon. And a manhunt (or rather a woman-hunt which becomes...oh, never mind). 

What you need to know is that there are more satisfying twists and turns than ever, against a backdrop which mixes ancient customs with cutting-edge culture by an author who knows and loves Japan down to her toes.

Review: Revenge of the Killer Flamingos

 What is the dys-brain? Well, it's a melange of dyscalculia, ADHD, and a few other
disorders. Maisie Jo, the hero of the tale, has it (and so does the author). And while I'm sure this makes life difficult for both character and creator, it makes M.J. one of the most delightful characters I've ever come across (and Pooks one of the most delightful authors). 

     Imagine a murder mystery. Our detective is trained like a laser on the clues to the killer, right? No, our temp who thinks she's in an episode from Murder She Wrote, is trained on bright shiny objects. And the arrangements for the murder victim's funeral. The victim is by the way, killed with a--well, I guess I shouldn't say, but the title might tip you off. M.J. is supported by a killer cast of characters, including a stuffy lawyer who hires her, a chihuahua and a killer cat. 

     What else do you need to know? She solves the case, just in time to become--wait. Just go buy the book. Get in on the first adventure in a series.

Review: Flint and Mirror

 True fantasy is hopeless. As the hero nears faery, faery recedes. Magic is always a
double-edged sword, and the price of using it is often to give it up. No one knows these tragic lineaments better than John Crowley, who has spent the greater part of his career on the border of faery, always showing us glimpses, never surrendering the key.

     So it is with Flint and Stone, Crowley’s latest, a palimpsest of ancient magic on historical fact. It’s familiar territory for Crowley, Elizabethan England, the England of Elizabeth’s magician, John Dee, the age of magic diminishing and disappearing. But this tale is set mainly in Ireland, where they’ve always been closest to faery, and always closest to tragedy, and never more so than in the tale of Hugh, the earl of Tyrone, torn between his Irish heritage and English upbringing, and Red Hugh of Donegal, the prince who could unite the warring Irish under him—but never has the chance.

     And here’s the fact of tragedy—we always know the outcome from the very beginning. We know (everyone knows this truth of Ireland—it has never been united to this day) that it ends in disappointment and death. This is what lifts the story of the earl of Tyrone, as indecisive as Hamlet, to catharsis. England loses as surely as Ireland does. England loses Elizabeth, and Ireland loses the magic that inhabits the hollow hills. 

     This is a special tale—in its simplicity, in its solidity, and in its intangibility. If you’ve never read any John Crowley, this is a good place to start. Highly recommended.

Review: King Maybe

 I always like a rogue, so the Junior Bender mysteries are catnip tp me. He's a burglar
who constantly finds himself burgling for other crooks, the incentive being that they won't kill him. And those are the ones he's friendly with. And unfortunately for him, their motives for hiring him are not always apparent. So he always has to keep one step ahead of ...well, everybody.

     In this installment, we start right in the middle of a burglary. Which is a setup. Which results in his being chased by pro killers. And leads to another burglary--which is also a setup. And leads to another...well, a Junior Bender mystery usually winds up miles from where it started, with Junior up against the clock to wrap up all the subplots by the last page.

    Luckily, Junior has accumulated a wonderful cast of supporting characters by now, from Lost Louie to Stinky the fence to his teen-age daughter to his mysterious main squeeze. They give Tim Hallinan lots of room for witty banter and ethical musings.

     I will say that this one was a little bloodier than I like, but that shouldn't ruin your reading. It certainly won't ruin mine. I'm queuing up Junior's next adventure.

Review: Bombay Monsoon

 The ugly American is always an innocent. It’s innocence that makes him ugly.
Danny Jacobs is not only an innocent, he’s polite. He doesn’t ask personal questions. He takes everyone at their word, at the surface. It’s not that he has no experience; he’s a foreign correspondent for a young and rising news service. He’s been dangerous places. He even has a shrapnel scar on his butt from Vietnam. What he lacks is suspicion, and it’s a nearly fatal flaw in Bombay in 1975. 

     (The action takes place during the Emergency which Indira Ghandi imposed to keep power, a time when democracy and truth were suspended, a time in which a young new correspondent was discouraged from asking personal questions.)

     But his neighbors are friendly. Everyone he meets is friendly, including a wealthy upstairs neighbor who’s in “import-export” and his stunningly beautiful girlfriend whom Danny falls hard for--even some people he’d rather not be friends with, including even an uglier American than himself who keeps turning up in his path. But all these people DO ask personal questions. They all know everything there is to know about Danny, including some dangerous secrets he’s certain ARE secret.

   Bombay Monsoon is like skating on thin ice. No one is who they present themselves as. Even as the truth is slowly peeled away, the reader has to ask: have we finally reached the truth? It’s a tale of constant betrayal with more twists and turns than the hair-raising mountain roads Danny must navigate. And he’s never in the driver’s seat. 

    To tell you more would spoil the surprises. Head out to the bookstore now.