Pick of the Month - November 2017

Crime Fiction Pick of the Month 2017

Many crime fiction bloggers write a summary post at the end of each month listing what they've read, and some, like me, even go as far as naming their pick of the month.

This meme is an attempt to aggregate those summary posts.
It is an invitation to you to write your own summary post for November 2017, identify your crime fiction best read of the month, and add your post's URL to the Mr Linky below.
If Mr Linky does not appear for you, leave the URL in a comment and I will add it myself.

You can list all the books you've read in the past month on your post, even if some of them are not crime fiction, but I'd like you to nominate your crime fiction pick of the month.

That will be what you will list in Mr Linky too -
e.g.
ROSEANNA, Maj Sjowall & Per Wahloo - MiP (or Kerrie)

You are welcome to use the image on your post and it would be great if you could link your post back to this post on MYSTERIES in PARADISE.

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Review: OCTOBER IS THE COLDEST MONTH, Christopher Carlsson

• this edition a review copy from Scribe Publications 2016
• translated from Swedish by Rachel Willson-Aroyles
• ISBN 978-1-925322-21-7
• 181 pages

Synopsis (Publisher)

Vega Gillberg is 16 years old when the police come knocking on the door looking for her older brother, Jakob.

Vega hasn’t heard from him in days, but she has to find him before the police do. Jakob was involved in a terrible crime. What no one knows is that Vega was there, too.

In the rural Swedish community where the Gillbergs live, life is tough, the people are even tougher, and old feuds never die. As Vega sets out to find her brother, she must survive a series of threatening encounters in a deadly landscape. As if that wasn’t enough, she’s dealing with the longing she feels for a boy that she has sworn to forget, and the mixed-up feelings she has for her brother’s best friend.

During a damp, raw week in October, the door to the adult world swings open, and Vega realises that once she has crossed the threshold there is no turning back.

My take

Several incidents in this novel ensure that the innocence of Vega's childhood has gone forever. She has had a tough childhood anyway but the going from now one threatens to be even tougher. She lives with her mother who works in a bar at night, her uncle Dan sells moonshine, assisted by her brother Jakob who has left home.

Her brother becomes an accessory to a crime that puts the police on his trail, and Vega needs to know what actually happened and why.

I found this a complex and rather bleak novel. In the end I kept thinking that the future for Vega cannot be good. The book blurb says it is the author's first for young adult readers, and there are certainly some provoking "coming of age" elements.

My rating: 4.4

About the author
Christoffer Carlsson was born in 1986 and raised in Halmstad, on the west coast of Sweden. He has a PhD in criminology, and is a university lecturer in the subject. He began writing at a very young age and has, since his debut at twenty-three, written five novels in the crime genre. October is the Coldest Month is his first book for young adults. In 2013, he became the youngest author ever to have won the award for Best Swedish Crime Novel of the Year, which he was awarded for the first book in the celebrated Leo Junker series, The Invisible Man from Salem .

Review: AN IRON ROSE, Peter Temple

• format: Kindle (Amazon)
• File Size: 641 KB
• Print Length: 304 pages
• Publisher: Text Publishing (April 26, 2012)
• Publication Date: April 26, 2012
• first published 1998
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
• Language: English
• ASIN: B007CAJX2C

Synopsis  (Amazon)

The classic thriller by the five-time winner of the Ned Kelly Award. Introduction by Les Carlyon.

When Mac Faraday's best friend is found hanging, the assumption is suicide. But Mac is far from convinced, and he's a man who knows not to accept things at face value.

A regular at the local pub, a mainstay of the footy team, Mac is living the quiet life of a country blacksmith - a life connected to a place, connected to its people.

But Mac carries a burden of fear and vigilance from his old life.
And as this past of secrets, corruption, abuse and murder begins to close in, he must turn to long-forgotten resources to hang on to everything he holds dear, including his own life.

'When men in police uniforms came to execute me on the roadside, beside dark fields, it was a definite sign that my new life was over.' A regular at the local pub, a mainstay of the footy team, Mac Faraday is a man with a past living the quiet life of a country blacksmith. But when his best friend Ned Lowey is found hanged, Mac - who has learned the hard way never to accept things at face value - isn't convinced he committed suicide and starts asking questions. Why did Ned keep press cuttings about the skeleton of a girl found in an old mine shaft? What was he doing at Kinross Hall, the local detention centre for juvenile girls? Who was the beaten girl found naked beside a lonely road? As Mac's search for answers pushes deeper into the past, it resurrects the terrifying spectre of what he calls his 'old life', forcing him to turn to long-discarded skills not only to discover why his best friend died, but also to save his own life.

My Take

AN IRON ROSE was Peter Temple's second novel, a stand alone that followed BAD DEBTS which was his first in the Jack Irish series. I thought that there were many similarities between Jack Irish and Mac Faraday.

Faraday is a former Federal policeman who was forced to resign and start a new life after a drugs job went horribly wrong. He never understood how things went so badly and always blamed himself, his own lack of concentration and intuition. Since leaving the police force he has managed to lead a private life, but when his neighbour and friend Ned dies he decides to call in some favours. He is not satisfied with the verdict of suicide for Ned's death. His actions alert those who believe he knows too much to where he is and sets the ball rolling.

This was a very good read and made me very aware of the fact that there are a number of Peter Temple novels that I have not caught up with.

My rating: 4.7

I've also read
TRUTH

More about Peter Temple
In 2007 Australian crime fiction writer Peter Temple was the first Australian author to win the UK Crime Writer's Association Duncan Lawrie Dagger award - popularly known as the Gold Dagger - for his novel THE BROKEN SHORE, published 2005.

Mini Reviews (written before I began this blog)
I began 2006 and 2007 in a similar fashion when I gave Temple's THE BROKEN SHORE a rating of 5 at the beginning of each year. Here are my mini reviews:

2006:
Joe Cashin was different once. He moved easily then; was surer and less thoughtful. But there are consequences when you've come so close to dying. For Cashin, they included a posting away from the world of Homicide to the quiet place on the coast where he grew up. Now all he has to do is play the country cop and walk the dogs. And sometimes think about how he was before. Then prominent local Charles Bourgoyne is bashed and left for dead. Everything seems to point to three boys from the nearby Aboriginal community; everyone seems to want it to. But Cashin is unconvinced. And as tragedy unfolds relentlessly into tragedy, he finds himself holding onto something that might be better let go.

2007:
(re-read) Joe Cashin was once a hot shot homicide detective in Melbourne. But he went with his gut feeling once too often and a young policeman ended up dead and Joe himself was left in critical condition. Now he has been sent to his home town, where nothing ever happens, to be in charge of a small police station, so that he can work while recuperating. A prominent local is bashed and left for dead in what appears to be a burglary gone wrong. All the signs point to local aboriginal youths and the town is only too ready to assume they are responsible. Bringing them in results in tragedy and Joe is suspended, but that doesn't mean he stops working. 2005 Ned Kelly Award winner.

Peter Temple books

Jack Irish
1. Bad Debts (1996)
2. Black Tide (2000)
3. Dead Point (2000)
4. White Dog (2003)

Broken Shore
1. The Broken Shore (2005)
2. Truth (2008)

Novels

An Iron Rose (1998)
Shooting Star (1999)
In the Evil Day (2002) 

Review: A MAN'S HEAD, Georges Simenon - audio book

• source: audible.com
• Maigret #5
• translated by , Frank Wynne
• Narrated by: Gareth Armstrong
• Length: 3 hrs and 43 mins
• Unabridged
• Release date: 07-25-14
• Language: English 
• originally published 1931

Synopsis (audible.com)


Slowly the Czech was becoming animated, but in a muted way, so typical of the man. Maigret now noticed his hands, which were long, surprisingly white, and dotted with freckles. They seemed to reach out and take part in the conversation. 'Let's be clear that it's not your professionalism which I question. If you understand nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, it's because from the very start you've been working with facts which had been falsified.'
 
Set in the in the atmospheric and squalid streets of Paris, Maigret sets out to prove the innocence of a man condemned to death for a brutal murder. In another one of Maigret's unconventional and audacious plans, he arranges the escape of the condemned man in an attempt to prove his theory. The presumed murderer goes on the run across Paris and its suburbs, dropping misleading clues along the way and leading Maigret into the labyrinthine twists of the mystery. Maigret is in for more than he bargained for, as he encounters rich American expatriates, dangerous foreigners and their hidden motives. 

My Take

Maigret puts his career on the line when he arranges the escape from prison of a convicted murderer on the night before his execution. The prisoner has been not able to tell the authorities anything other than protest his innocence. Maigret is hoping he will lead them to the real murderer.

But it is one thing finding the possible murderer and quite another to get him to confess, or to discover why the murder was committed.

My rating: 4.2


I've also reviewed
4.4, MAIGRET & the MAN on the BOULEVARD
4.5, MAIGRET & THE HEADLESS CORPSE
4.3, PIETR THE LATVIAN
THE LATE MONSIEUR GALLET
4.4, THE RULES OF THE GAME
4.2, THE MAN WHO WATCHED THE TRAINS GO BY
4.3, THE CARTER OF LA PROVIDENCE
4.3, LOCK NO 1. Maigret #18
4.0, MAIGRET IN NEW YORK

Review: WIMMERA, Mark Brandi

• this edition published 2017 by Hachette Australia
• ISBN 978-0-7336-3845-9
• 262 pages
• source: my local library
• winner of a variety of awards including 2016 CWA Debut Dagger (UK)

Synopsis (publisher)

In the long, hot summer of 1989, Ben and Fab are best friends.

Growing up in a small country town, they spend their days playing cricket, yabbying in local dams, wanting a pair of Nike Air Maxes and not talking about how Fab's dad hits him or how the sudden death of Ben's next-door neighbour unsettled him. Almost teenagers, they already know some things are better left unsaid.

Then a newcomer arrived in the Wimmera. Fab reckoned he was a secret agent and he and Ben staked him out. Up close, the man's shoulders were wide and the veins in his arms stuck out, blue and green. His hands were enormous, red and knotty. He looked strong. Maybe even stronger than Fab's dad. Neither realised the shadow this man would cast over both their lives.

Twenty years later, Fab is still stuck in town, going nowhere but hoping for somewhere better. Then a body is found in the river, and Fab can't ignore the past any more.

My take

This novel depicts life in a small town in Victoria at the end of the 1980s very well. Ben and Fab are at primary school, best mates, and then a man moves into the house next door to Ben's family. He seems to monopolise such a lot of Ben's time and he makes Fab uncomfortable.

And then primary school finishes and Ben goes off to secondary school in a different town and the boys hardly see each other. Twenty years later Fab still lives with his mother and his life generally seems to have reached an all time low.

Part One of the novel is told in Ben's young voice while Part Two is told by the adult Fab.  It is a clever technique. The reader wonders what it was that estranged the boys from each other. In Part Three we put together the secret they have been keeping for twenty years.

My rating: 4.6

About the author
Mark Brandi has been published, broadcast and shortlisted in journals and competitions both locally and overseas. Originally from Marche, growing up Italian in a rural Victorian town influences much of his work. Mark graduated from a criminal justice degree and his career includes roles as a policy advisor and project officer in the Department of Justice, before changing direction and deciding to write. Mark's writing has appeared in THE GUARDIAN, THE AGE, the BIG ISSUE, and is often broadcast on Radio National. He is the winner of the 2016 UK Crime Writers' Association Debut Dagger for his first novel, WIMMERA, which he developed during two residential fellowships at Varuna.

Review: DYING TO LIVE, Michael Stanley

• format: Kindle (Amazon)
• File Size: 794 KB
• Print Length: 300 pages
• Publisher: ORENDA BOOKS (May 2, 2017)
• Publication Date: May 2, 2017
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services LLC
• Language: English
• ASIN: B06ZYLGV42
• #6 in the Inspector Kubu series

Synopsis (Amazon)

When the body of a Bushman is discovered near the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, the death is written off as an accident. But all is not as it seems. An autopsy reveals that, although he's clearly very old, his internal organs are puzzlingly young. What's more, an old bullet is lodged in one of his muscles ... but where is the entry wound? When the body is stolen from the morgue and a local witch doctor is reported missing, Detective 'Kubu' Bengu gets involved. But did the witch doctor take the body to use as part of a ritual? Or was it the American anthropologist who'd befriended the old Bushman?

As Kubu and his brilliant young colleague, Detective Samantha Khama, follow the twisting trail through a confusion of rhino-horn smugglers, foreign gangsters and drugs manufacturers, the wider and more dangerous the case seems to grow. A fresh, new slice of 'Sunshine Noir', Dying to Live is a classic tale of greed, corruption and ruthless thuggery, set in one of the world's most beautiful landscapes, and featuring one of crime fiction's most endearing and humane detectives.

My take

As you can see from the list below, I have followed the development of thise series from the very beginning, and enjoyed Kubu's growth as a detective.

As the average life span in the Western world increases, and our financial advisers carefully measure our pension plans against our life expectancy, it is interesting to note that there are some ethnic groups such as the Bushmen of the Kalahari where lifestyle and bush medicines ensure longevity. The body of the Bushman found in the Kalahari Game Reserve presents a puzzle: an unmistakeably old body containing surprisingly youthful looking organs. Nor has he, it seems, died of natural causes.

Kubu finds that there are others missing too, and investigation shows that perhaps all the cases are related.

If you are a follower of Precious Ramotswe you will have seen one side of the justice system in Botswana. It is interesting that in the Kubu novels the setting is also Botswana, and the two series often share locations. It is like having a coin with two different sides. However the Kubu novels are definitely not cozies, and yet both sets of novels refer to the current problems of this small African nation. And I enjoy both!

My rating: 4.6

I've also read
5.0, A CARRION DEATH
4.8, THE SECOND DEATH OF GOODLUCK TINUBU
5.0, DEATH OF THE MANTIS
5.0, DEADLY HARVEST
4.5, DETECTIVE KUBU INVESTIGATES: a collection of short stories
4.7, A DEATH IN THE FAMILY

Review: A NECESSARY EVIL, Abir Mukherjee

• format: kindle (Amazon)
  
• File Size: 2122 KB
• Print Length: 380 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1911215132
• Publisher: Vintage Digital (June 1, 2017)
• Publication Date: June 1, 2017
• Sold by: PRH UK
• Language: English
• ASIN: B01K6RP0MO

Synopsis (Amazon)

India, 1920. Captain Wyndham and Sergeant Banerjee of the Calcutta Police Force investigate the dramatic assassination of a Maharajah's son.

The fabulously wealthy kingdom of Sambalpore is home to tigers, elephants, diamond mines and the beautiful Palace of the Sun. But when the heir to the throne is assassinated in the presence of Captain Sam Wyndham and Sergeant 'Surrender-Not' Banerjee, they discover a kingdom riven with suppressed conflict. Prince Adhir was a moderniser whose attitudes - and romantic relationship - may have upset the more religious elements of his country, while his brother – now in line to the throne – appears to be a feckless playboy.

As Wyndham and Banerjee desperately try to unravel the mystery behind the assassination, they become entangled in a dangerous world where those in power live by their own rules and those who cross their paths pay with their lives. They must find a murderer, before the murderer finds them…

My Take

Not much time has elapsed since the first book of this series. In the background is the unrest generated by the Indian independence movement. To assuage the growing clamour for Home Rule, the British government in India has come up with the idea of an Indian House of Lords called the Chamber of Princes. All the native princes are being invited to join, and it is important that the wealthiest did so. The Maharajah of Sambalpore, even though the state is amongst the smallest, is billed as among the wealthiest princes. His eldest son Crown Prince Adhir went to school with Sergeant Banerjee and has requested a meeting with him in Calcutta. Adhir is against joining the Chamber of Princes. He has also received some threatening letters, which ironically he can't read as they are in local script. On their way back to their hotel the prince is assassinated.

Having set the scene in Calcutta in 1920, the novel really makes very little use of the political turmoil of the time. Instead Wyndham and Banerjee become embroiled in local politics in Sambalpore, chasing down the person behind the prince's assassination.

The novel provides an interesting depiction of the contrast between the old way of life and the new. The Maharajah and his court behave as if there is no threat to their way of life or their social status. In some ways the novel is a police procedural but Wyndham and Banerjee tread a fine line between what the British Raj wants to do, and what it can achieve without upseting local protocols.

My rating: 4.5

I've also read 4.4, A RISING MAN