Here are the February Killer Books from the Independent Mystery Booksellers.
Edited by Maryelizabeth Hart, Mysterious Galaxy, San Diego, CA www.mystgalaxy.com
CURSE OF THE POGO STICK, by Colin Cotterill. (Soho trade paperback, $13.00) recommended by Barbara Tom, Murder by the Book, Portland, OR, www.mbtb.com : This is the fifth book in the Dr. Siri Paiboun series set in 1970s Laos. Dr. Siri is a reluctant coroner, placed in his current position by an imperious Communist government. In his 70s, Dr. Siri still has all his wits about him - plus the wits that should have been allocated to his superior, Judge Haeng - and the energy of a much younger man. He also has a spiritual advisor, the normally dormant Yeh Ming, a long-deceased village shaman. Late in life, besides his association with Yeh Ming, Dr. Siri has developed the ability to see spirits from The Otherworld. They lead him into and out of danger, with unpredictability as their hallmark.
Within the purview of entertainment, not academic disquisition, Colin Cotterill does a good job of representing the Hmong culture, which has survived turmoil, war, and displacement throughout the years. Dr. Siri comes face to face with the hidden and disenfranchised Hmong when his vehicle is attacked and he is taken hostage. His captors are generous, kind, and need his spiritual help. This is in stark contrast to the obligatory party mission he was on when he was captured. It was, ironically, to show how safe travel in Laos had become under the new regime, and it was in the company of sullen and disagreeable Party members.
While Dr. Siri is attempting to restore spiritual balance to the war-reduced population of one Hmong community, his loyal friends and assistants (Nurse Dtui, fiancée Daeng, policeman Phossy, retired Party power player Civilai, and morgue worker Geung) are fighting a terrorist plot in Vientiane. Cotterill writes with humor and respect for the culture that was, and with insight about the unsettled politics of the time. Despite the slightly fantastical terrorist plot (as if seeing spirits weren't fantastical!) in this book, I have found that time has not diminished Cotterill's ability to entrance and illuminate. This is still one of the best mystery series, and one I love to recommend.
WHO KILLED THE PINUP QUEEN by Toni L.P. Kelner. (Berkley pbo, $6.99) Second in the Where Are They Now? series. Recommended by Maggie Mason, Lookin' for Books, San Diego, CA, [email protected] : Tilda Harper is a freelance entertainment writer based in Boston. She has a good friend who works at Entertain Me, a magazine where celebrities are revered. Tilda is happy to accept assignments for the magazine, but she also enjoys the freedom of freelancing. She's able to make a living, but doesn't have a lot of spare money. She's been interviewing a former pinup, Sandra Sechrest. Her friend Cooper, a fan boy, tags along. When Tilda realizes she's left her camera at Sandra's home, she returns and finds Sandra's body. What is worse is the realization she could be a suspect.
When the stars of an old western TV show start planning a theme park based on their show, Cowtown, Tilda is hired to help with the planning. This is right up her alley. Part of her job is to interview the stars of the show, and many guest actors, at least those that are still alive. The show had a code of conduct, and it seems someone is no longer living by the code. Strangely, the two assignments seem to be connected. Pinups and Cowboys aren't usually found together, but Tilda is smart enough to make the connection; when she does, she brings the Cowtown Code back to life, and saves the day. When I began reading this book, I had thought I was reading the first in the series, and when I realized my mistake, I was too hooked to stop. Kelner does a great job creating a historical TV show. She also has used her research on pin ups to great advantage. This series is a must for anyone with a love of popular culture, especially of days gone by. The only thing I'd change is have Tilda get rid of her roommate.
EYE OF THE RAVEN, by Eliot Pattison. (Counterpoint hc, $26.00) recommended by Beth Kanell, Kingdom Books, Waterford, Vermont, kingdombks.blogspot.com : His Edgar Award-winning Skull Mantra, set in Chinese-occupied Tibet, made instant fans for Eliot Pattison. Admirers of these tightly plotted thrillers with their undercurrent of spiritual danger and search may need a twist of the arm to jump across to Pattison's other series, set in pre-Colonial America and definitely "historical." But the same isolation and despair that drive Inspector Chan in Tibet propel Scottish exile Duncan McCallum into friendship with a Native shaman. One side of the Atlantic or the other, it's necessary to take a stand against the oppression and cruelty of the English forces. McCallum's medical studies back in Edinburgh equip him to investigate causes of unnatural deaths, and give him the kind of thinking that also tracks down killers.
In Eye of the Raven, Pattison's newly released sequel to Bone Rattler, the year is 1760 -- and the most powerful art within the colonies is that of the surveyor, whose pins and lines mark off wealth for landholders and claimants. Although Duncan McCallum is following, studying with, and attempting to protect his friend Conawago (a shaman caught in the New World equivalent of a clan war), his ignorance of the powers and histories around him make him helpless. At first his investigation is part survival strategy, part desperate effort to free his friend. It soon tangles in ritualistic murders that seem obviously connected to the shamanistic beliefs of the Iroquois natives. The darkness and despair that ensue turn this tale into pre-Colonial "noir." McCallum's detective work will stumble against many big issues: Is it right to "save" the Natives through Christianity, or does this simply transplant Hell from the Old World to the New? What is the price of wealth? How can McCallum investigate the results when his own exiled and anti-establishment nature has already made him a target?
Pattison provides a compelling tale worth reading slowly. If you're not a fan of historical mysteries in general, this may be the one that walks you across the gap of time and pattern. It's both a fast-paced detection thriller and a wildly promising exploration of what a lonely man can become, if he chooses his few friends wisely.
DEAD AIR: A SAMMY GREENE THRILLER by Deborah Shlian and Linda Reid. (Oceanview Publishing hc, $25.95) recommended by Stephanie Saxon Levine, Murder on the Beach, Delray Beach, FL, www.murderonthebeach.com : What do you get when you place an outspoken native New Yorker on a staid New England college campus, and give her the job of talk-radio host on the campus radio station? When you throw in the suspicious death of a professor, a suicide, and several student disappearances, you have a tension-filled page-turner. That is exactly what Deborah Shlian and Linda Reid have given us in Dead Air.
Protagonist Sammy Greene, curious and audacious by nature, with a journalist's drive to uncover the truth, delves deep to find the answers to the mysterious deaths and disappearances. In addition, she has her own demons and concerns, past and present, impelling her forward, along an increasingly dangerous path. The closer she comes to solving the mysteries, the greater her personal peril. All this makes for a suspenseful read. While the college campus isn't normally my "beat" as a reader of detective fiction, I found the characters, setting, and plot of Dead Air made it intriguing reading. It was good to be back in college again, although the campus of Ellsford College appears to be a very dangerous place indeed.
CITY OF DRAGONS by Kelli Stanley. (Minotaur Books hc, $24.95) Recommended by Fran Fuller, Seattle Mystery Bookshop, Seattle, WA, www.seattlemystery.com : "Miranda didn't hear the sound he made when his face hit the sidewalk." From the first sentence, Kelli Stanley grabs your attention and after that she will skillfully transport you to 1940's San Francisco with an assurance and style you'd expect from a long-established writer. In City of Dragons we meet Miranda Corbie, former escort turned PI. No one cares about one dead Japanese kid in Chinatown, but he died at Miranda's feet, and from that moment on, she makes it her mission to discover why he was killed.
Stanley's a fan of Hammett and Chandler, and it shows. Her prose is as sharp and staccato as Miranda's high heels on the pavement. While some readers may find the short, terse sentences and free-flowing imagery difficult at first, Stanley's style and talent will pull you into Miranda's search for truth, filled with hard cops and duplicitous dames, double crosses and betrayal, and just a glimpse of love and hope. With the music of the day weaving a poignant counterpoint through Miranda's investigation, I certainly found myself drawn completely into her world.
Miranda Corbie drinks hard, smokes constantly, and refuses to be put into her place by anyone. Kelli Stanley has created a strong, memorable protagonist, and I think that Sam Spade would have had her back when the chips were down.
