Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers

This light novel from Jesse Q. Sutanto carries a number of important ideas. Raised in southeast Asia, Jesse got her creative writing degree from Oxford (yes, the one in England) and so has the bona fides to bring these cultures together in her books. You'll notice that even the characters in the book come from different cultures with unique foods and customs, but all seem to share the fear of and respect for the formidable "aunties" whether or not they are actually related. 

Here is a plot summary from the publisher, which is pretty accurate. " Vera Wong is a lonely little old lady-ah, lady of a certain age-who lives above her forgotten tea shop in the middle of San Francisco's Chinatown. Despite living alone, Vera is not needy, oh no. She likes nothing more than sipping on a good cup of Wulong and doing some healthy detective work on the Internet about what her college-aged son is up to. Then one morning, Vera trudges downstairs to find a curious thing--a dead man in the middle of her tea shop. In his outstretched hand, a flash drive. Vera doesn't know what comes over her, but after calling the cops like any good citizen would, she sort of . . . swipes the flash drive from the body and tucks it safely into the pocket of her apron. Why? Because Vera is sure she would do a better job than the police possibly could, because nobody sniffs out a wrongdoing quite like a suspicious Chinese mother with time on her hands. Vera knows the killer will be back for the flash drive; all she has to do is watch the increasing number of customers at her shop and figure out which one among them is the killer. What Vera does not expect is to form friendships with her customers and start to care for each and every one of them. As a protective mother hen, will she end up having to give one of her newfound chicks to the police?"--"

Library Journal praises, " Sutanto excels at creating lovably flawed characters, the mystery has plenty of twists to keep readers guessing, and Vera's case notes at the end of some chapters add humor to the deductive process.... A mystery with warmth, humor, and many descriptions of delicious teas and foods." Publishers Weekly calls it a "stellar mystery" and concludes their review by saying, "The engrossing plot, which is full of laugh out loud humor and heartfelt moments, builds to a satisfying conclusion that will leave readers eager for more Vera. Sutanto has outdone herself with this cozy with substance." Booklist opens their review with this assertion, "Death shouldn't be funny or sweet or heartwarming, except maybe in a new cozy series starring Vera Wong, the widowed owner of San Francisco Chinatown's rather decrepit Vera Wang's World-Famous Teahouse." They go on to add some details of the plot: "when she discovers a corpse on the floor. The police arrive, refuse her amazing tea, barely investigate, and leave. Vera knows she's looking at foul play, no matter what the authorities insist. Of course, she'll solve the case by gathering (and feeding) the most likely suspects--an alleged reporter, a supposed podcaster, the dead man's wife, and his twin brother. Vera's next deadly installment hasn't yet been officially announced, but the success of Sutanto's best-selling Aunties series certainly points to more tales of murder."

It took me a while to warm up to Vera, but I stuck with it because my friend Anne Z. had given me the book. I am glad I did as it is both a good mystery and a warm-hearted story of unexpected friendships.

 

Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone

Benjamin Stevenson has set out to create a very twisty murder mystery that would adhere to Ronald Knox's "10 Commandments of Detective Fiction"(1929) written in the Golden Age of mystery writers. 

The criminal must be someone mentioned in the early part of the story, but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader has been allowed to follow.

All supernatural or preternatural agencies are ruled out as a matter of course.

Not more than one secret room or passage is allowable.

No hitherto undiscovered poisons may be used, nor any appliance which will need a long scientific explanation at the end.

No Chinaman must figure in the story.

No accident must ever help the detective, nor must he ever have an unaccountable intuition which proves to be right.

The detective must not himself commit the crime.

The detective must not light on any clues which are not instantly produced for the inspection of the reader.

The stupid friend of the detective, the Watson, must not conceal any thoughts which pass through his mind; his intelligence must be slightly, but very slightly, below that of the average reader.

Twin brothers, and doubles generally, must not appear unless we have been duly prepared for them.

 

Our narrator, Ernest Cunningham ("call me Ern"), is an author of "how to" books for aspiring writers and is also trying to solve the murder while explaining his writing process which endeavors to stick to the rules. Ern's Aunt Katherine has arranged a family reunion in an Australian ski resort for this very dysfunctional family: mother Audrey, step-father Marcelo, step-sister Sophia, brother Michael, brother Jeremy (deceased?), Katherine's husband Andy, Michael's wife Lucy, Ern's wife Erin. When an unidentified man turns up dead in very bizarre fashion, Ern begins his search for the killer. Along the way, he reveals how his family members have caused the deaths of other people. Three years ago, Michael "asked Ernie to dispose of a corpse that turned out not to be quite dead yet" (Publishers Weekly). Ern subsequenly testified against his brother who went to jail. but is now being released--hence one of the major rifts in the family dynamics. 

Reviews have been largely positive with Publishers Weekly calling the book "exceptionally clever and amusing " and concluding "Stevenson carries off this tour de force with all the aplomb of a master magician who conducts his tricks in plain view." The Washington Post's Maureen Corrigan praises "Stevenson not only “plays fair,” he plays the mystery game very, very well." Kirkus delivers a more modest review closing with "This book and its author are cleverer than you and want you to know it."

City of Thieves

This novel by David Benioff (co-creator of HBO's Game of Thrones series) commences with a conversation between author and grandfather as Benioff beseeches his grandfather for recollections of living through the Nazi siege of Leningrad. There seems to be some debate about whether his grandfather was actually there (see review from NYT). Following that prologue, however, we jump into the life of 17 year-old Lev Beniov, who is yet too young to join the army but helps man a fire brigade from the roof of his old apartment building. One night, he and his pals see a parachute coming down and when it lands in the street, they find a dead German pilot, whose corpse they promptly strip for weapons and clothes. Keep in mind that, at this point, they are lucky to get one piece of paper-filled bread or an eighth of an onion to eat on any given day. But when the cops show up, Lev nobly helps a fallen friend, a girl he secretly longs for, to escape and is caught in the process. Awaiting execution overnight, he is joined in his cell by his exact opposite. Whereas Lev is dark and slight and inexperienced with women, Kolya is a descendant of Cossacks with blonde-haired, blue-eyed good looks and charm that women of all ages find irresistible. Kolya swears he did not desert his unit but just missed his ride; nevertheless, they will both be hanged or shot. But fate intervenes and they are taken before a secret police general who wants them to find a dozen eggs for his daughter's upcoming wedding cake. If they succeed--against all odds--they get their lives back. They start by following every rumor and searching all the black market sources in the city and nearly get killed by cannibals. Eventually they go behind enemy lines into the countryside seeking chickens. What they find instead are girls held hostage for pleasuring Nazi officers and a band of partisan fighters. They are captured, but then Kolya hatches a plan to get the eggs from their captors by wagering Lev's chess playing skills against those of the 

Sturmbannführer. Benioff provides well-researched and compelling descriptions of the hardships and violence faced by the Russian common folk during the siege. An additional review from Kirkus.

Committal

This was a relatively quick and interesting read by Irene Cooper, set in a not too distant future when AI had developed to the point of being able to respond to just about your every need--certainly all your information needs. Luci Sykes is at the heart of the story, born to a beautiful and intelligent mother, Maggie Sykes, and an ambitious and uncaring father. She was deprived of oxygen by an incompetent nurse at birth and consequently suffered emotional and neurological problems as a child, but was nevertheless a savant of sorts. When her father tired of her tantrums, he sent her to a clinic that promised a cure; there she underwent a lobotomy. She came out even smarter and certainly more in control. But the underlying rage that fueled Luci never left; it just went underground. She has a constant companion at the clinic and in her current life, Jasper. He was abandoned at the clinic when a former patient ran away. Luci runs Olympia Navigation and is the creator of a ubiquitous and highly successful intuitive navigation system called Beacon. BEACON is also a character in the story. Luci has created a new, even more advanced GPS, Searchlight, to replace BEACON, but it is also secretly programmed to do something that will end the human race. One of the things Luci didn't realize was that, in transferring programming code from BEACON to Searchlight, the two AI's developed their own relationship.

Another surprise comes in the form of another major player in the story,  Luci's fraternal twin brother, Tokker. She never knew anything about him, nor he about her until Mr. Lamb shows up on Tokker's little farmstead in Oklahoma and informs him he was sent away at birth to protect Tokker from the twins' father. Mr. Lamb wants Tokker to find Luci and stop her from releasing the program. Tokker is aided in a seemingly senseless and futile quest by BEACON who takes him all over the country to gather clues. Luci has created a complex puzzle that will lead to her location. Along the way, Tokker meets and is assisted by Viggo Mortenson, Tilda Swinton, Daniel Day Lewis, and Steve Buscemi. Offbeat sci fi/fantasy is how I might describe it, similar in some ways to Tyler Hayes' Imaginary Corpse. We also learn in the end that everybody seems to be related to everybody else.

I would agree with Publishers' Weekly that Luci's character is underdeveloped and that the frequent flashbacks and gimmicks detract somewhat from a clever storyline.

Never Coming Back

Author Tim Weaver has had several previous books published in Great Britain but this--his fourth--is the first to be released here in the United States. They all feature David Raker, former journalist, who now specializes in helping to find missing persons. Apparently in a previous book, he was grievously wounded and in fact died for a few short minutes before being resuscitated. He has now left London and taken up residence in his parents' old cottage in Devon while he recovers physically and mentally. He has brought a roommate with him, former police officer with the Met in London, Colm Healy, recently fired and at loose ends. He doesn't stay in the picture long, just enough to get his teeth into the case of an unidentified corpse found washed up on the local beach.
The story line flips back and forth from a time about 15 months ago to present day. It also changes locales from the Devon coast, populated largely by fishermen and farmers, to the Las Vegas of big spenders and shady behavior. The missing persons in this story are an entire family--Paul and Carrie and daughters Annabelle and Olivia--who just disappeared, leaving behind the family dog, dinner still cooking on the stove, computers still turned on. No sign of struggle, unless you count the spilled milk carton. Cars are still in the driveway. Wallets and laptops still in the house. No credit card use and no contact in the last year. Emily is Carrie's sister and asks David to find them. He plunges into a thoroughly convoluted cover-up at multiple levels and in many directions, all designed to protect one man and his descendants. That man ran Sobibor and got away from the Nazi hunters by hiding in Las Vegas. His son and grandson apparently carry on the family tradition of unhesitatingly murdering anyone who proves inconvenient or potentially threatening.
Although this book is, according to the author, only 2/3 the length of the original draft, it still feels at times like it goes on too long. And it also seemed over-wrought in some of the details--he discusses the dark, lightless eyes of the killer about 30 times too often. Nevertheless, Raker finds out what happened to the family and I won't spoil that outcome here. Locales are convincingly portrayed and Raker is an interesting character. I might be tempted to read one of the earlier books or the one that came after this one, Fall from Grace.

Hidden Moon

Second in the "Inspector O" series by pseudonymous author James Church, we are once again immersed in the Kafka-esque unreality of life in North Korea. A bank robbery--perhaps the first ever in the city of Pyongyang--leaves both O and his new boss Min guessing whether anyone really wants it solved. Everytime O pursues a clue, bodies disappear from the morgue, doors of ministries are shut in his face, suspects turn up dead or disappear. Then he starts disappearing. For days at a time he is taken and questioned in a dark room and beaten when the interrogators don't like the answers. Is this supposed to dissuade him from solving the robbery or "encourage" him to speed up his investigation. As with the first book, there is rampant mistrust and suspicion between government agencies and between representatives of government agencies and the rest of the populace. This book continues the amazing insights into a very secretive country that began with A Corpse in the Koryo. And Inspector O picks up where he left off in educating the reader about the particular qualities of wood--"there's a certain smugness to walnut that you can feel," whereas "acacia knew how to mind its own business and let a person think," chestnut is "very self-possessed wood," while persimmon is "very complicated. Difficult to understand." Who knew?! Thanks Anne for the loan!

Bamboo and Blood

James Church (pseudonym) is, according to the Christian Science Monitor, "one of the most respected analysts of North Korea in the Western intelligence community, with extensive experience both inside and outside that country." It is the little details of daily life in one of the most isolated and secretive countries in the world that bring his stories such richness.
Inspector O, James Church's North Korean protagonist, has gone back in time -- making this a prequel of sorts to his other novels in this series (Corpse in the Koryo and Hidden Moon). All the essential elements are there: clues that aren't supposed to be followed, cases that aren't supposed to be solved, intricate maneuvers and manipulations aplenty. Set during the famine years of the 90's in North Korea, people talk about loved ones starving to death with seeming resignation. There simply is no food--and that is the driver behind what turns out to be intricate attempts to buy, bribe or blackmail other countries into giving North Korea food. It strains credulity to someone raised in an ostensibly democratic society like the United States that Inspector O does not seriously consider defecting when he is given ample motive and opportunity. He is the most dogged of investigators following each thread until he can weave them into whole cloth, in spite of people kidnapping and even trying to kill him. As a reader, I am drawn in with him, never giving up on trying to figure out how everything is connected, even though the odds are against a solution.
Reviews from Publishers Weekly,  Christian Science Monitor, and Kirkus are all uniformly laudatory.

The Lost Man

As with Jane Harper's previous 2 books, The Dry and Force of Nature, I found myself drawn in to this book, both intrigued and repelled by the setting in the Australian outback, which plays an enormous role in this story. I'm so far behind on posting my reading, that I will shamelessly allow one of the book's reviewers, Publishers Weekly, to do the plot legwork for me.

"Australia's outback, with its brutal climate and equally bruising isolation, looms as large as any character in this stark standalone ... For years, the three Bright brothers-divorced dad Nathan, the eldest; family man and everybody's favorite, middle child Cameron; and the mentally challenged youngest, Bub-have maintained an uneasy equilibrium on adjacent cattle ranches. That flies out the window the week before Christmas when Cameron goes missing; his desiccated corpse is subsequently discovered a few miles from his perfectly operational truck in the shadow of the eerie headstone known as the stockman's grave. Absent any clear indications of foul play, the local authorities undertake a perfunctory investigation, leaving a troubled Nathan to start asking questions that no one wants to answer. In the grim journey that follows, the surviving members of the Bright family must confront some devastating secrets. Harper's sinewy prose and flinty characters compel, but the dreary story line may cause some readers to give up before the jaw-dropping denouement."

Kirkus calls the book "A twisty slow burner by an author at the top of her game." The Guardian says of her characters that they provide a "small but fully realised cast." Booklist concludes their review: "The atmosphere is so thick you can taste the red-clay dust, and the folklore surrounding the mysterious stockman adds an additional edge to an already dark and intense narrative... a surprising ending that reveals how far someone will go to preserve a life worth living in a place at once loathed and loved." Library Journal favorably notes, "the Australian landscape looms large, and it's difficult to imagine the events in this novel playing out the same way anywhere else. Even if readers guess why Cam died, they're likely to be kept guessing the how and the who until the end."

Corpse in the Koryo

North Korean police Inspector O is in the unlovely position of being asked to investigate events that no one really wants the answers to. Much like Sonchai Jitpleecheep in Jon Burdett's books, or Shan Tao Yun in Eliot Pattison's series, there is danger is looking too closely when other government agencies want to keep things hidden. The book moves us back and forth between the interview room where Inspector O is being interrogated by an  intelligence agent from the West and the portrayal of the events he is recalling. In the cat and mouse game, it is never entirely clear who is on his side and who is manipulating him for their own benefit. We learn relatively early that his boss has died as has another government official of interest to his interrogator, so Inspector O seems freed to reveal what he knows. But he has been cagey so long, it's hard to stop. He has also not given up altogether on his country, in spite of the terrible abuses of power and rampant corruption. Although orthodox religion is never mentioned as a means of coping as it is with Buddhist protagonist Jitpleecheep, Inspector O does seem to rely on a connection with nature--specifically wood--instilled by his grandfather, to ground him when all else falls apart. I plan on reading the sequels, especially if I can entice my friend Anne--who turned me on to this book--to loan me her copies :-)

The Imaginary Corpse

First off, a catchy title for this inaugural novel by Tyler Hayes. Add to that a narrator who is a plush yellow stuffed triceratops named Tippy the Detective. How could anyone resist?! The Stillreal is a world inhabited by Ideas, Nightmares and imaginary Friends that are too big to die once their creators can no longer make use of them. As Tippy describes it to Stillreal initiates, "Here are the two things you absolutely need to know. First: in case you didn't know, you're an idea. Im' not sure if youre an imaginary friend or a novel's protagonist or a mascot or what. But if you're here, you"re an idea. Second: You were loved. You were loved enduringly and unequivocally, and that made you capital-R Real. Not an idea; an Idea. A Friend."
 There are multiple communities in Stillreal and Tippy happens to be a well-known and respective detective familiar with many of them, although his home is in Playtime Town, where he shares an apartment with Spiderhand, who loves tea parties and plays a mean piano. Tippy himself is very PC, always asking what pronouns to use when first meeting a new arrival; he shuns all curse words (his creator was an 8-year girl), and slugs rootbeer from a flask like the best hard-boiled detective.
In the Stillreal, no one ever dies, even if they get killed in a fight; they just renew themselves. Until the day the Man in the Coat comes to the Stillreal and starts killing the inhabitants permanently. When Tippy witnesses one such "murder" up close and personal, he makes it his mission to find out who this newest Nightmare is and put a stop to his activities. Friends are dying and that just isn't allowed to happen! Publishers Weekly calls this fantasy tale of tracking a serial killer "an affectionate, lightly mocking homage to noir tales." It is also a sweet tale of finding courage in the face of fear and standing by your friends through thick and thin...a timely tale in our world at war with a viral pandemic. Imaginative world building and interesting variety of characters you will cheer for.