English Lessons by J.M. Hayes

Published by Poisoned Pen Press on July 5, 2011

Despite Sewa Tribal Officer Heather English's disdain for the politics of Arizona's new governor-elect, she isn't pleased to have her Christmas Day shift disturbed by her discovery of his skin nailed to a wall near an abandoned mine on the Sewa reservation.  Nor is she happy to find her name printed on an envelope that has been left at the crime scene.  The enclosed letter warns of an impending war on a drug lord named Rabiso.  At about the same time, a package containing a severed hand is delivered to Heather's uncle, Mad Dog.  We soon learn that two drug dealers named Mouse and Cowboy have hired a hit man known only as "the professional" to take out Rabiso.  For reasons that eventually become clear, Cowboy's people mistakenly believe that Rabiso and Mad Dog are the same person.  The confusion of identity leaves Mad Dog fending off thugs as well as the amorous advances of a beautiful lawyer who has been hired to protect Rabiso.  Meanwhile, "the professional" has an agenda of his own.

Given the lighthearted tone of this mix-up, it's clear that J.M. Hayes wrote this novel with his tongue pressed forcefully into his cheek.  In fact, Hayes couldn't resist the puns to which an unattached hand lends itself.  If that doesn't provide enough humor for one mystery novel, Heather's dad, the sheriff of Benteen County, Kansas, begins Christmas Day by trying to figure out who urinated a message into the snow near a crèche displayed on a resident's lawn, and later confronts an informal militia that tries to occupy the courthouse without missing Christmas dinner.  Then there's Heather's love life -- she's trying to keep a date to meet her boyfriend's parents for a Christmas gathering but dead bodies keep getting in the way -- and the fact that Mad Dog is a shaman with a spiritual connection to a wolf that's smarter than Lassie.

The storyline involving Heather is essentially a spoof of a thriller while the one involving her father is closer to a farcical send-up of the extremely gullible who believe every loony idea they hear on talk radio.  Some of the humor has a political component -- Hayes pokes fun at conspiracy theorists who believe the Obama administration intends to confiscate their weapons -- that some readers might find less amusing than I did.  Readers who want their fiction to remain divorced from politics (and those who think government agents in black helicopters are waiting to swoop down and collect their shotguns) might want to give this novel a pass.

Nearly all the characters in English Lessons are likable.  Heather's father is an older, limping version of Andy Griffith.  The whackos and bad guys are too bumbling to dislike (except "the professional" who is, of course, a professional).  Even Hayes' minor characters have engaging personalities, from Sheriff English's elderly office manager (who becomes vicious when she's playing online computer games) to the gruff doctor who points out that the militia members who insist they want to "save the country" are flying a secessionist flag.

Both storylines are a bit over-the-top by the novel's end but since they aren't meant to be taken seriously, I didn't mind.  The novel is relatively short, the right length to prevent the joke from growing stale.  English Lessons is the sixth novel in the "Mad Dog & Englishman" series but the first I've read.  If they are all this goofy, I'll have to find the time to read more of them.

RECOMMENDED

The Good Muslim by Tahmima Anam

Published by Harper on August 2, 2011

The Good Muslim is the second novel of a trilogy -- something I probably should have known before I began reading this one. Although the novel stands on its own, it makes frequent references to characters and events that would have been more familiar to me had I read A Golden Age first.

The novel takes place in Bangladesh in the 1980s, with frequent flashbacks to the early 1970s. To some extent, two stories from the two different times are told in parallel: Maya's recent return to her home in Dhaka after years of providing medical services to village women -- including abortions for those who were sexually assaulted -- in other parts of the country; and her brother Sohail's earlier arrival home after fighting in the country's war for independence. Maya is nonetheless the novel's focal point. She left Dhaka after Sohail's return, when Sohail made a public display of burning his books. She comes back at about the time her mother becomes ill.

After the war ends, Sohail begins to study the Quran that his mother gave him. For reasons the reader does not learn until the last chapters, Sohail takes the holy book to heart. When Maya, weary of listening to Sohail proclaim the book's greatness, tells her mother that Sohail is going to turn her house into a mosque, Rehana replies: "Don't be so frightened of it. It's only religion." A question The Good Muslim asks, I think, is whether we should be frightened of religion, or only of the dangerous zealots who pervert its teachings. Maya is clearly skeptical of religion itself; she resists its power to change people at their core.

Sohail begins to deliver sermons from his rooftop. Initially Sohail preaches about "the many faces of God," suggesting his openness to all religions (even to the gods of the ancient Greeks), but as time passes his words become less inclusive: "There was only one. One message. One Book. The world narrowed. Curtains between men and women. Lines drawn in the sand." As he continues to preach and gains a following, Sohail loses touch with his mother and neglects his son's welfare before sending his son, Zaid, to a madrasa on the other side of the country. Sohail has become too righteous and self-involved to deal with the mundane demands of parenthood. It eventually falls to Maya to look out for Zaid, particularly after Zaid runs away from (and is sent back to) the madrasa.

Some aspects of the novel are more effective than others. I found it difficult to muster interest in Maya's budding romance with Sohail's friend Joy (a recent returnee to Bangladesh who drove a cab and provided home care in New York) or in her relationship with Sohail's bright, talented (but larcenous) son. Given his importance to the story, Zaid should be a more fully developed character; we see snippets of his life but he lacks fullness. The same could be said of Joy who, while imprisoned during the war, loses a finger to prison guards after an experience that has an almost mystical quality. Perhaps Tahmima Anam was trying to create a moment of light in a dark time but Joy's experience just doesn't ring true. There's also a mystical (perhaps miraculous is a better word) element to the story involving Maya's mother that I found difficult to accept. In what I think is the novel's weakest moment, Sohail's religious fervor and Maya's faith in medicine intersect over their mother's illness, leaving Maya to question her well-formed beliefs.

In addition to the mother's illness, other aspects of the story struck me as artificial. The reason that Sohail becomes a "good Muslim," revealed near the novel's end, and the events that ensnare Maya and Zaid in the closing pages, are unconvincing. The last chapter and the epilog come close to melodrama. I was left with the feeling that I'd read a carefully constructed story, a story designed to pull emotions from me that I just didn't feel.

Despite these weaknesses, The Good Muslim has much to recommend it. There are some electrifying moments in this novel, often centered on the hardships that Bangladeshi women endure. Anam's prose is mesmerizing. Parts of the novel are captivating and its cautionary tale of religious zeal has value. I think sometimes Anam tries too hard to make a point and obscures it in the process, but the novel is worth reading for its shining moments.

RECOMMENDED

One Man, One Murder by Jakob Arjouni

Frist published in Germany in 1991; published in English by Melville House on June 7, 2011

Wikipedia tells me that Jakob Arjouni is a German writer and that One Man, One Murder (originally published in 1991 as Ein Mann, ein Mord) is the third of four novels featuring the Frankfurt detective Kemal Kayankaya. I haven't read the first two but I don't think my lack of familiarity with the series hindered my enjoyment of this one.

The story takes place in 1989. In the tradition of noir private eyes, Kayankaya is wondering how to pay the rent on his ratty office when a client walks through the door. Manuel Weidenbusch has fallen in love with a Thai woman, has paid her debt to release her from the "club" that employs her, and has paid an additional sum for a forged passport to keep her in the country after her visa expires. The phony passport purveyor has apparently kidnapped Sri Dao Rakdee; hence Weidenbusch's need for Kayankaya's services.

Kayankaya's investigation takes him to the brothel where Sri Dao Rakdee was working off her debt, to unhelpful immigration authorities, to a refugee organization, to a cabaret, to jail, and to a dead body. Before bringing the investigation to a satisfying conclusion, Kayankaya encounters, and makes fun of, a number of racial purists who view the good old days of German nationalism with nostalgia. Although he's a German citizen, Kayankaya's parents are Turks and he's viewed with suspicion by many of his fellow Germans. Kayankaya has a cheeky, anti-authoritarian attitude that shines when he confronts police officers, immigration officials, and paper-pushers in the civil service.

The novel delivers an intelligent take on illegal immigration in Germany without being preachy. Some readers object to political discussions in novels; those readers might want to give this one a pass. Politics is overshadowed by plot, however, and although he's an advocate for the underdog and takes care of his friends, Kayankaya isn't what you'd call a liberal do-gooder. He fits the mold of the anti-hero: he's irreverent and hard-headed and doesn't have any great belief in justice (at least, not of the law-and-order variety), yet he has his own kind of honor, a dogged determination to dig up the unpleasant truths that corrupt officials and illicit businessmen would prefer to keep buried.

Lesser writers should take lessons from Arjouni. His prose is efficient; no words are wasted in this brief novel. He avoids clichés and his dialog is both realistic and acid-tinged. Still, Arjouni isn't so minimalist that he forgets the necessities of good fiction: he creates atmosphere by painting colorful images of a drab city, and he gives his characters personality without resorting to stereotypes. He keeps his intelligent plot moving at a brisk pace. Arjouni reminds me of Joe Gores, an American writer of detective fiction whose work exhibits the same admirable qualities. Arjouni adds a bit of social realism to the mix, giving One Man, One Murder an added dimension that I appreciated. Fans of hard-boiled detective fiction should enjoy this novel as much as I did.

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The Samaritan by Stephen Besecker

Published by Bancroft Press on June 24, 2011

The Samaritan begins with an assassination.  As in many similar thrillers, the reader is given a lovingly detailed description of the assassin’s weapon and accessories, clothing, preparation, surroundings, breathing, patience, and discipline.  It is too familiar to constitute a promising start.

The assassination -- of a crime family boss -- takes place in the prologue.  The novel’s first section takes place before the assassination.  The set-up occurs in chapter two with the deaths of two upscale sisters who are drinking in a downscale bar in the Bronx.  When two young mobsters try to shake down the bartender, one of the women (a Broadway director) rather improbably starts the carnage by grabbing the mobster’s gun.  Her soon-to-be-dead sister turns out to be married to Kevin “Hatch” Easter, a CIA field operative the reader meets in chapter one.  Most of part one is about Hatch grieving his wife’s death and bonding with CIA hit man Gray Taylor.

Part two takes place after the assassination.  Predictably enough, more killings follow as a character identified only as “the hunter” orchestrates an unlikely plan to have all the bad guys in New York (mobsters and gang bangers and crooked cops) wage war against each other as part of a vendetta arising out of the sisters’ deaths.  The growing body count disturbs Hatch’s CIA boss who thinks Hatch might be behind it.  He asks Taylor to get involved.  The novel’s hook is the mystery of “the hunter’s” identity:  is it Hatch, or Hatch’s brother, or someone acting on Hatch’s behalf, or someone else entirely?  Stephen Besecker engages in the misdirection one would expect in a mystery/thriller, but doesn’t plant the kind of clues that would allow an astute reader to identify “the hunter.”  The mystery’s resolution is too nonsensical to be shocking, too contrived to have the impact that Besecker intended. 

Entirely too much of The Samaritan goes unexplained, probably because no plausible explanation could be concocted.  Besecker’s characters apparently have the ability to walk through walls; they enter secure areas undetected but we never see how they do it.  Nor do we learn how they are able to eavesdrop on both sides of encrypted conversations.  The CIA’s involvement in this mess is ludicrous, as is its supposed cooperation with another federal agency -- it just wouldn’t happen as Besecker describes it.  In fact, the novel begins with Hatch assigned to a mission that might be of interest to the Justice Department but not to the CIA.  The story circles back around to that mission in the last chapter without ever offering a credible explanation of the CIA’s involvement in it.  That’s just one of many instances in which the novel requires the reader to put common sense on hold and to ignore gaping plot holes.

The characters are equally difficult to believe.  Nearly every character in the novel is the TV version of the real thing.  The organized crime characters, from their nicknames to their speech and mannerisms, seem like second-string mobsters from The Sopranos.  Particularly fanciful is the CIA assassin who gets hit on by Mick Jagger’s girlfriend at Yoko Ono’s parties.  Some of this could be forgiven if the writing were of a higher quality, but this isn’t a novel you’ll want to seek out for its scintillating prose.  Besecker’s dialog is weak; except for the aforementioned mobsters, every character -- from cops to spies to hookers to dealers to Howie Long -- speaks in the same voice.  It’s never a believable voice.

The only positive I can cite is the novel’s pace.  It’s a quick, easy read.  For that reason, some readers will probably like it.  I didn’t and I can’t recommend it.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Next to Love by Ellen Feldman

Published by Spiegel & Grau on July 26, 2011

War stories cover familiar ground. Men go to war; some don't return. Those who don't die come back changed. Next to Love tells that story with a twist: its focus is not on the men who go to war but on the wives and lovers left behind. They furnish the novel's perspective on war's casualties: we see their reactions to husbands' deaths and to the erosion of the souls they once knew. The women in the novel are hard hit by war; dozens of the men in their town storm the beaches on D-Day and many die. As the book continues into the 1950s, the novel reflects postwar America in microcosm: the nascent civil rights movement, the baby boom, the displacement of women from the workforce and the blossoming of -- if not feminism -- a growing feeling of discontent on the part of women who are expected to make babies and martinis and leave everything else to men.

Babe Huggins grew up on the wrong side of a small town, about ninety miles from Boston. The nation has gone to war and women (including Babe's friends Grace and Millie) are marrying (and getting pregnant by) men who will soon return to battle. Babe is not married to Claude when she discovers the longstanding relationship between sex and war but she loves him and lives in fear of his death. Babe is an independent, unconventional thinker but she worries about how other women regard her. Knowing them to be hypocrites, she nonetheless judges herself by their standards and (rather unfairly) finds herself wanting. Her story --as it develops over the course of many years -- is one of pain that induces growth.

Millie and Grace have their own stories, yet as important as they are to the novel, the book belongs to Babe. Millie and Grace focus their lives on being good wives and mothers. They are not untouched by the exterior world (one experiences the indirect effects of religious prejudice, the other begins to question her new husband's true nature) but they are content to usher in the 1950s with its illusion of perfect families, stay-at-home moms, and devoted husbands. Only Babe seems to recognize that the national promise of equality for all Americans remains unfulfilled. Only Babe misses the role she played during the war, small though it was, when she held a job and believed in a cause. By the mid-1950s, Babe is "grieving for her own life ... she is, in some way she does not understand, broken."

The novel's biggest flaw, I think, is that Ellen Feldman tries to cover too much ground in too few pages. Millie's story seems artificial, as if Feldman felt the need to dream up a problem for her so that she'd fit in with the other characters. Relatively late in the novel, Feldman gives stories to the children of Grace and Millie. Those stories feel unfinished, probably because the kids' lives are just beginning while the novel is nearing its end. The story surrounding Millie's son Jack contributes to the novel's themes while the one involving Grace's daughter Amy adds little.

To some extent, the novel is populated with stereotypes, or at least with characters we've seen many times before: the small town gossips; the man who resents every soldier who came home from the war in which his son died; the girl whose thoughts are elsewhere as she loses her virginity to a boy who is clearly using her. Occasional scenes are a bit overdone or clichéd (a discharged soldier hiding under a bed at the sound of celebratory gunfire was one) but those are rare. There are also times when the story lacks subtlety, as if Feldman felt the need to make a social evil as obvious as she could so it wouldn't escape the notice of dim readers.

Despite its flaws, this is a strong novel. Feldman writes movingly of grief. She writes perceptively of social change. Her prose is fluid and evocative. She tells an important story that is well worth reading.

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