Mysteries in Manila

AUTHOR: P.D. James

2010-12-11T08:03:00.000-08:00

I'm posting this just to have something for the year 2010. It's ironic, since this is the year I really got into the work of P.D. James, one of the heavyweights of modern mystery writing. I've been reading her books for years, but only when I couldn't find books by authors I preferred. I don't remember exactly when I began to seek out the Baroness James's work for its own sake, but one of her newer novels, The Private Patient (2008), which I read this year, was a turning point. Of her earlier novels, one of my favorites is A Mind to Murder (1963).

James's main detective, Commander Adam Dalgliesh of the Metropolitan Police Service at New Scotland Yard, is something of a towering figure, being not only a gentleman detective but also a poet. That's probably one reason it took me so long to warm to James; Dalgliesh is simply the opposite of warm. James has a secondary detective, Cordelia Gray. I've read some of the Cordelia Gray novels but can't remember a thing about them right now. I'll revisit this author one of these days. I just wanted to get this in before the year ends.

Non-mystery reading

2009-09-13T23:37:00.000-07:00

I've been busy reading lately, but I haven't been reading mysteries. I recently discovered, at long last, the rightly well-loved work of P.G. Wodehouse, and I've been working my way through his best-known series, the Jeeves and Wooster books. I got started on Wodehouse when The New Yorker posted a link to this random Wodehouse quote generator. A few years ago, I almost bought a book from Wodehouse's Blandings Castle series at the Fully Booked store at Powerplant, but I decided against it because I didn't know any of the characters and I wasn't sure I would enjoy it. The quote generator convinced me, though, and I went back to Powerplant and bought Lord Emsworth Acts for the Best, a collection of all the Blandings Castle short stories. I enjoyed it very much but didn't want to get started on another expensive book-collecting campaign, so I tried to find what Wodehouse stories I could online.

I found these sites and read as much as I could of what they had, but Wodehouse is a writer best read in bed, not at a desk hunched over a laptop, and so I ended up launching yet another expensive book-collecting campaign anyway. The first book I bought was Right Ho, Jeeves, which I had first read for free on one of the sites I linked to above. I had to own it because it gave me the biggest laugh I've had in years. Of course it couldn't end there. Next I acquired Joy in the Morning. Then it was Jeeves in the Offing. Then Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit. And yesterday, in one fell swoop, Very Good, Jeeves; The Code of the Woosters; and Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves. I've already ordered The Mating Season and Much Obliged, Jeeves, both of which I will pick up later this week. Life is good.

I know now that Wodehouse is the spiritual ancestor of all the witty British writers I love, especially John Mortimer, who is as quotation-happy as Wodehouse himself, and Sarah Caudwell, with her wicked turns of phrase. So while Wodehouse was not a mystery writer, his work gives me the same delicious feeling I get when reading my favorite British mysteries. He did write at least one mystery, though, this short story, "Death at the Excelsior."

NOVEL: Pelagia and the Red Rooster

2009-06-01T18:42:00.000-07:00

This is the third and final novel in Boris Akunin's Sister Pelagia series. I don't know how to describe it. It took me more effort to finish than the first two books did, but when I got to the end, I was gobsmacked. Reviewers on Amazon.co.uk say the book ends as though Akunin had lost interest in what he was writing, but I thought it was a breathtaking ending. I wonder whether this is what Akunin intended all along. The first book, Pelagia and the White Bulldog, is a sort of Christie and Chesterton hybrid; I think I enjoyed it mildly. The second book, Pelagia and the Black Monk, is much better, both as a mystery and as a novel. Pelagia and the Red Rooster is completely unlike the first two. It's the first Akunin novel in which I thought I got a hint of what (or how) the author really believes. I feel moved to recommend the entire series. Getting to the end of Pelagia and the Red Rooster is quite an experience.

NOVEL: They Came to Baghdad

2009-04-27T09:08:00.000-07:00

It drives me nuts that I can't find my copy of this Agatha Christie thriller. I got it about a year ago at Book Sale, and I just realized a few weeks ago that it's missing. I keep it lying around because I like to pick it up every now and then and reread it. It's a lot of fun, not the most impressive of plots, but plenty of atmosphere, and an engaging protagonist in Victoria Jones. She's the sort of girl who, broke and jobless in Baghdad, remembers that nuts are nutritious and stuffs herself with the free pistachios at her hotel.

LINKS: Father Brown

2009-03-14T00:32:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to review the Father Brown stories for years. I have not yet succeeded. For now I'm posting two links to some interesting stuff about Father Brown: a New York Times review of The Innocence of Father Brown dated December 17, 1911 (!), and G.K. Chesterton's essay "A Defence of Detective Stories," which I've mentioned (and linked to) before.

NOVEL: The Coronation

2009-03-01T22:45:00.000-08:00

The Coronation is the latest Erast Fandorin novel to be translated into English. I haven't read it yet; I've been so busy with work that I actually forgot about its release. But I ordered it at Fully Booked a few weeks ago (Amazon is too much for my budget these days). Amazon's main (US) site always lags behind its UK site in getting hold of Boris Akunin's novels; The Coronation isn't available on Amazon.com yet, but there's already one (very helpful) review on Amazon.co.uk. I can't wait!

SERIES: Isabel Dalhousie

2008-08-20T00:39:00.000-07:00

The Isabel Dalhousie novels by Alexander McCall Smith started out as a mystery series. The first book, The Sunday Philosophy Club, is billed as "An Isabel Dalhousie mystery." By the third book, The Right Attitude to Rain, the cover says "An Isabel Dalhousie novel," which is more accurate. Each book features a problem with which Isabel concerns herself but is really about Isabel’s life and world.

Alexander McCall Smith is best known for writing the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, set in Botswana and featuring the lady detective Precious Ramotswe, and many readers who loved the first series are disappointed by how different the Isabel Dalhousie novels are. These novels are set in Edinburgh, which in my view is enough reason for them to be completely unlike the Botswana series. The Precious Ramotswe novels are spare and graceful; the Isabel Dalhousie novels are busy, gossipy, and packed with interesting details about people fictional and real. The Los Angeles Times points out that the city of Edinburgh is itself a character in these novels, and it's a very interesting character, portrayed by Mr. Smith with great affection.

The first book, The Sunday Philosophy Club (2004), is very weak as a mystery. But Mr. Smith does an excellent job of creating a world that one would love to revisit over and over, and it only gets better with each succeeding book. We meet Isabel Dalhousie, moral philosopher, an independently wealthy woman in her early forties. She lives in Edinburgh and works as the editor of the Review of Applied Ethics. The cast of characters also includes Cat, Isabel's niece, who owns a delicatessen; the bassoon player Jamie, Cat's ex-boyfriend, who has become Isabel's friend; Grace, Isabel's housekeeper; and Eddie, who works at Cat's delicatessen. As the story opens, Isabel is attending a performance of the visiting Reykjavik Symphony at Edinburgh’s Royal Usher Hall. After the performance, a young man falls from the upper balcony, and Isabel decides that she must investigate the circumstances of the young man’s death.

I like this book because of the little things: Isabel's memory of walking along an Edinburgh street with her father and running into two of Scotland's great poets; a performance of the Really Terrible Orchestra (to which Mr. Smith belongs in real life); and the way Edinburgh is described, as "a city of dark nights and candlelight, and intellect."

In the second book, Friends, Lovers, Chocolate (2005), Cat asks Isabel to run the delicatessen for her while she attends a friend’s wedding in Italy. While filling in for Cat, Isabel gets to know Ian, one of the regular customers, who claims to have had some strange visions since receiving a heart transplant. Ian doesn’t know who the donor was or what the visions might mean, and Isabel tries to find out. All the novels are rich with images and (very, very dry) humor, but this one, it seems to me, is the richest. I love the little throwaway joke about philosophers in Edinburgh delicatessens, the anecdote about German professors, and the beautiful final scene. One thing this series does have in common with the Botswana series is its gentleness; like the world of Precious Ramotswe, the world of Isabel Dalhousie is filled with friendship, love, and the enjoyment of simple things.

In the third book, The Right Attitude to Rain (2006), Isabel pokes her nose into the relationship between a wealthy man from Texas and his younger fiancée. Almost as a parallel, Isabel’s half-acknowledged feelings for Jamie finally come to something, and she begins a relationship with the much younger man. Mr. Smith likes to quote W.H. Auden in this series; as a sort of running theme, in all of the books he alludes to the poem "Heavy Date." In this book Isabel reflects on a line from "The More Loving One," another Auden poem: "Let the more loving one be me. And it is."

By the fourth book, The Careful Use of Compliments (2007), Isabel has become a mother. In between feedings, baths, and diaper changes, she investigates a possible art fraud. I love the anecdote about a well-mannered Scottish minister; the quote from a Norman MacCaig poem about sleeper trains; and the joke, so dry that I missed it the first time, about a very small square of cheese. And I love what Mr. Smith says about moral crusaders: "it was one thing to think such things, another thing to tell people what one thought." On a more somber note, Mr. Smith offers thoughts on the morality of boundary controls and on the feelings of men about to go off to war.

Many readers dislike Isabel Dalhousie, probably because she can be shortsighted, unreasonable, and judgmental. I know that Mr. Smith believes people should be judgmental, as a character in his 44 Scotland Street series says, "when there is something to be judged." Isabel takes it too far, though, constantly jumping to conclusions about people and often ending up seriously mistaken. And I suppose it's hard to buy the reason she involves herself in these investigations to begin with. Sometimes she insinuates herself into other people's affairs because she feels morally bound to help them; most of the time she’s just curious. She's a lot of fun to follow around, though, and in the end she always means well. Besides, even when she's being terribly flawed, she creates some satisfying moments, as in Friends, Lovers, Chocolate, when by asking an extremely gauche question, she puts a condescending woman in her place.

A fifth book, The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday, is coming out this year. I’ve already pre-ordered it on Amazon; I can’t wait!

NOVEL: Gaudy Night

2008-05-23T22:02:00.000-07:00

I spent the past week rereading Dorothy L. Sayers's Gaudy Night. I acquired it a few months ago with no real expectation of liking it; it was described on the (sadly) now-defunct Mysteryguide.com as "a minor didactic novel in the tradition of Vita Sackville-West." I found it at Books For Less at the same time as Busman's Honeymoon. I bought both and read Busman's Honeymoon first, thinking it would be more fun; to my surprise, I enjoyed Gaudy Night more, and not only comparatively but absolutely. Its effect on me was similar to that of Josephine Tey's To Love and Be Wise, also a novel that I didn't expect to enjoy overmuch but which pulled me into its world and kept me reading and reading.

Like most of Sayers's novels, Gaudy Night is even better on rereading. I won't put a synopsis here; there's a very good one on Wikipedia (it reveals the solution, however). I just want to say that it's an extraordinary read, especially for women concerned with questions of love and identity. I'll need time to write about it in greater detail. Until then, I'll just keep rereading.

SERIES: Erast Fandorin

2008-05-13T19:08:00.000-07:00

I discovered the Erast Fandorin novels by Boris Akunin in the best possible way—in a bookstore. The fiction section at Fully Booked is arranged alphabetically according to the authors’ last names, and as I walked into the SM North Edsa branch last December, my eye fell on a novel called Pelagia and the Black Monk by Boris Akunin, "bestselling author of the Erast Fandorin novels." I wondered what the Erast Fandorin novels were. I like to think I'm well-informed about what’s going on in the world, but I’d never heard of Erast Fandorin.

Fortunately there were two Erast Fandorin books on the same shelf—The Death of Achilles and Special Assignments. On the cover of each was a portrait of a handsome young man. The blurbs described Erast Fandorin as a detective in pre-revolutionary Russia, a period and a country that I've always considered insanely glamorous. I bought both books and hoped I wouldn't be disappointed. Well, I wasn't. Today I have all six of the books that have been translated to English. Five others have yet to be translated from the original Russian, and I hear Akunin is working on more. I had to order the sixth book, The State Counsellor, from Amazon UK; it's not available in the US yet.

I recently reread The Winter Queen, the first novel, and I understood ever more powerfully why the Erast Fandorin books are such a hit. I recommend reading them in order, by the way; because I read The Death of Achilles first, it was jarring to read about the young Erast in The Winter Queen—sentimental, naïve, desperately eager to prove himself. Still, Akunin has a winner in his sleuth. Even as a young man, Erast Fandorin is intelligent, self-aware, and extremely entertaining. It helps that all the book covers are adorned with his portrait. I read somewhere that the portrait is of an actual pre-revolutionary Russian nobleman and that Akunin found it in a flea market. It was a serendipitous find: the portrait helps establish the character of Fandorin as a sensitive, introspective person.

In The Winter Queen (published in English in 2003), we meet Erast Fandorin at the start of his career with the Moscow police. His father, an inveterate gambler, died a year ago, leaving Erast impoverished. Forced to discontinue his studies and find work, Erast applies himself to his job as a police clerk with considerable enthusiasm. His zeal is rewarded when a young man shoots himself to death in the park and Fandorin gets himself involved in the investigation. The trail leads to a sinister group whose members utter the name "Azazel" whenever they kill. Published as Azazel in Russia, The Winter Queen has it all: action, romance, humor, and a protagonist who promises to be one of the new stars of mystery fiction.

Turkish Gambit (2005) is the second of the novels but the third to be translated into English. Of all the novels, it took me the longest to finish, and I was heartily bored at certain points in the narrative, but I’ve reread it a few times and enjoyed it immensely. It is set during one of the many Russo-Turkish Wars and told from the point of view of a young woman named Varvara Andreevna Suvorova, called Varya, who has come to the front to be with her fiancé, one of the cryptographers.

Like many young people who consider themselves progressive, Varya has good intentions but is often very silly and tiresome. Still, I enjoyed the story and even the sensation of not understanding everything going on. Numerous characters are introduced: generals, generals' aides, even war correspondents all have different and important parts. Of course, the most interesting character of all is Erast Fandorin, here more somber and less naïve than in The Winter Queen.

The details are my favorite part of Turkish Gambit—references to "emerald-green early grapes" and the "dense, sensual scent" of scarlet roses combine to form a pleasantly hazy picture of a very foreign place and time.

Murder on the Leviathan (2004), the third novel, was translated into English after The Winter Queen. I’ve never reread it, probably because it’s very much like an Agatha Christie novel and I rarely reread an Agatha Christie; once you know whodunit, there’s little left to revisit. Murder on the Leviathan opens with a newspaper account of a chilling crime: the entire Paris household of an English nobleman is found in various poses around a dinner table, all dead without knowing what hit them. Police have reason to believe the murderer is aboard the new cruise ship Leviathan, about to leave France on its maiden voyage.

In itself the novel is interesting, but I was almost bored because Erast Fandorin doesn’t make an appearance until nearly halfway into the narrative and because I like Fandorin best in his natural habitat, that is, in Russia, surrounded by Russians. I do love the way one of Fandorin’s many fantastical traits—his extreme good luck in games of chance—is illustrated here. The solution to the central mystery, by the way, is quite satisfying, one worthy of Dame Agatha herself.

The Death of Achilles (2006) is one of the best in the series and one of my favorite novels. Back in Moscow after six years in Japan, Fandorin has learned some new skills, although he is still recognizable as the Erast of The Winter Queen—he blushes when he encounters an insolent coachman and loses his bearings when interrogating a powerfully attractive woman. But he has gained a lot of confidence along with his new skills, as well as a Japanese sidekick called Masa. (An accomplished Japanologist, Akunin has simply followed the old exhortation to "write what you know," and his expertise is clear here.) The Death of Achilles moves into James Bond territory as we see how much more competent Fandorin has become—and then takes an even more interesting turn.

Reading Special Assignments (2005) is like reading The Winter Queen for the first time all over again. It opens with the many miseries of young Anisii Tulipov, who hates his name, is poor and ugly, and has a mentally retarded sister to care for. Suddenly State Counsellor Erast Petrovich Fandorin sweeps into his world and changes everything, just as State Counsellor Ivan Franzevich Brilling plucked Erast out of obscurity in The Winter Queen and gave him a glamorous new life. Tulipov's situation is more poignant, though, because while Fandorin is handsome, brilliant, and unencumbered by relations, Tulipov has to do the best he can with what he has. But Erast does his protégé proud, and through the two novellas that make up Special Assignments we have the pleasure of reading about a young man who finally gets to live a life he has only dreamed of.

Fandorin’s first special assignment: catch the Jack of Spades, a daring con artist who has embarrassed the Governor of Moscow and is out to swindle the city’s people of their hard-earned money. This light episode contrasts sharply with the second novella, in which Erast and Anisii pursue a serial killer. I'm not a fan of serial-killer stories, plus Akunin gets pretty gory here and I don’t like gore, so this book is not one of my favorites.

The State Counsellor (2008) opens with the murder of a general by a man disguised as Erast Fandorin. Once cleared, Erast works on finding the actual murderer, with the help of a big poobah sent over from St. Petersburg. For the first time since falling in love in The Winter Queen, Erast has a major love interest in the person of Esfir Litvinova. Akunin seems to have a thing for progressive women; Esfir is loudly and annoyingly radical, even more so than Varya from Turkish Gambit. Unfortunately, it looks as though Esfir will be around for a while.

The State Counsellor is similar to The Winter Queen and The Death of Achilles, but this time there is a lot of talk about revolution, hinting that the world as Fandorin knows it may be coming to an end. Certainly life as Fandorin knows it changes at the end of the novel, giving special resonance to the title, which happens to be Fandorin's own title in the Table of Ranks.

I look forward to the next installment of Fandorin's adventures; it's called The Coronation and has Erast investigating the kidnapping of a young member of the imperial family. I wish Akunin’s translator, Andrew Bromfield, would hurry up and finish all the novels already, but I'm also very happy that Akunin chose him. Until I learn Russian (and learn it well), I'll have no way of knowing how much of the light tone and graceful language of the series are attributable to Akunin himself and how much Bromfield is responsible for, but there's no denying that Bromfield has done an excellent job.

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

2007-10-03T09:28:00.000-07:00

The frabjous day is not today, but will come soon: I've ordered John Mortimer's Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders and Rumpole and the Reign of Terror from Amazon. I expect to receive them before the end of the month. This order costs less than others I've placed with Amazon because I'm having the books delivered to a friend's house in California, whom a friend from Manila is visiting; when the friend returns to Manila, I'll have the books.

In more frabjous news, Mortimer has a new book: Rumpole Misbehaves, coming out in November. I can't wait to find out what it's like. My Rumpole collection is almost complete.

REVISITING: Murder Must Advertise

2007-10-03T08:47:00.001-07:00

Dorothy L. Sayers really does improve on rereading. About six months since first reading Murder Must Advertise, I now count it as one of my all-time favorite books. I've learned to skip the seedy-underbelly subplot I dislike and focus on the parts I love, which are the parts about Death Bredon's work and colleagues. I've even learned to love the cricket scene. In fact, I started to consider studying cricket (studying the rules, that is; not learning to play) when I realized that two of my all-time favorite books feature pivotal cricket games. (The other book is Sarah Caudwell's The Shortest Way to Hades.) The sport is such a part of British life, and I love British mysteries so dearly, that I constantly find myself muddling through descriptions of batting, bowling, and "leg before wicket."

As Sayers was writing about (and from) a very different time, many of her allusions range from obscure to incomprehensible. Two online resources that have been very helpful to me are Bill Peschel's Wimsey annotations and Kate Nepveu's Outside of a Dog. Speaking of online resources, I am sad to report that Mystery Guide, which I've written about before, doesn't seem to exist any longer.

STORE: Fully Booked High Street

2007-10-03T08:08:00.000-07:00

I love the new Fully Booked flagship store on Bonifacio High Street. To a long-starved, Manila-stranded reader like me, it's having my cake and eating it too: five floors of books and the freedom to open everything, sit down, and read. There's even a Starbucks in the store (though I prefer to walk to the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf nearby). I've found plenty of mysteries at Fully Booked High Street, as well as a lot of non-mystery books I had despaired of finding in the Philippines, such as Alain de Botton's How Proust Can Change Your Life and E.B. White's Writings from the New Yorker 1927-1976. It's clear that someone high up on the Fully Booked totem pole really loves books and understands what readers want. I'm so sick of bookstores whose offerings revolve around The Da Vinci Code and Rich Dad, Poor Dad.

On my first visit to the store, I found Dorothy L. Sayers's The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club and Strong Poison. My having ordered those titles at the SM North Edsa branch nearly half a year ago may have had something to do with their being in stock, but still, they were there! I've mentioned before that I already have a copy of The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club; I ordered a new copy because I'm a great believer in acquiring multiple copies of books I love.

On a later visit, I found G.K. Chesterton's The Complete Father Brown. Now that I have the entire collection, I'm working on a more exhaustive review of the stories.

And of course there are shelves and more shelves of Agatha Christie books. But Dame Agatha was so prolific that completing my Christie collection will have to wait until my budget can stand the strain.

I don't have anything bad to say about Fully Booked High Street. Okay, I guess I have one complaint: they don't let people bring drinks in (unless they buy them at the Starbucks inside the store), so I was forced to stand outside and gulp down my chai tea latte much more quickly than I would have liked.

NOVEL: Have His Carcase

2007-03-31T08:00:00.000-07:00

This is the first Lord Peter Wimsey novel I've read with Harriet Vane in it. I still prefer the novels with only Lord Peter in them; that said, this is a good read, especially as far as the mystery is concerned. In fact, it's a magnificent mystery: the solution is jawdropping. I rank it as one of the best solutions of all time, alongside my favorite Agatha Christie dazzler, The Mirror Crack'd.

Unfortunately, it's also a "mystery" mystery, which the earlier books weren't, and which made the earlier books so enjoyable. In this book a lot of attention is given to times and alibis, one reason I can't bring myself to read The Five Red Herrings, which I hear is all about railroad schedules. As Harriet Vane is a mystery writer, she is able to approach the crime scientifically and from a very "mystery novel" point of view; this is a departure from the much more chatty and amusing style of Clouds of Witness and The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club. It is often said that Lord Peter behaves as a "silly ass" in the earlier novels; that makes me a "silly ass" fan.

The book opens with Harriet Vane taking a walk on the beach. She comes upon a dead body in the sand and has the sensible idea of taking a few pictures (she happens to have a camera with her) before leaving to summon help. By the time police arrive, the tide has washed the body away. The rest of the book is occupied with finding the body and, of course, finding out whodunit.

Lord Peter swoops in from London to help with the case. He has already fallen in love with Harriet in Strong Poison; here he is still trying to get her to marry him, and she doesn't say yes yet. (That has to wait until Gaudy Night.) The interactions of the two are moderately enjoyable, but I much prefer Lord Peter in The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club: I love his scenes with Marjorie Phelps. Peter is sweet to Marjorie in an oblique way, but he's not head over heels. While he doesn't make a fool of himself in Have His Carcase, I still enjoy him more when he's not in love and is interested chiefly in the crimes he is investigating.

NOVEL: Murder Must Advertise

2007-03-29T07:52:00.000-07:00

When reading about a mystery author one likes, one runs the risk of getting spoiled, sooner or later. This happened to me while looking up "Lord Peter Wimsey" on Google Book Search: a book discussing the Seven Deadly Sins in the work of Dorothy L. Sayers (an unlikely premise, but surprisingly effective) examined the motives of the murderers in Strong Poison and Murder Must Advertise (and needless to say, mentioned them by name). I decided to get Murder Must Advertise anyway after reading so many favorable reviews on Amazon. One reviewer listed it as one of his three favorites in the series along with Clouds of Witness and The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, both of which I'd read and enjoyed immensely; I took that as a sign and ordered Murder Must Advertise at Fully Booked in January. It arrived early this month.

It didn't blow me away on my first reading, although I was glad to see that the identity of the murderer was fairly well-hidden; I felt sure I wouldn't have guessed if I hadn't been spoiled. (But then, I never guess.) I did pick up the book again from time to time to reread some parts, and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed rereading it. The book opens shortly after the death of an advertising executive, Victor Dean, from a fall down the spiral staircase at his workplace, called Pym's Publicity. A new man has come to take his place, with the suspiciously familiar name of Death Bredon. Of course, it's our gentlemanly sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey, calling himself by his two middle names and playing at earning a living while investigating Dean's death.

The book is very uneven: there is a rather ridiculous (but vital) subplot about London's seedy underbelly and its dazed denizens. There is also a blow-by-blow account of a cricket match that almost put me to sleep. On the plus side: the cricket scene builds up to an exciting finish (and, needless as it may be to say this of a Sayers story, advances the plot considerably), and the book ends on a shockingly dark note. Best of all are the descriptions of life at Pym's: Lord Peter is in fine form and in his element among the chatty and witty "Pymmites." Murder Must Advertise proves again what a master Sayers is of what Elizabeth George calls the "tapestry novel," a novel with satisfyingly complex characters and a setting richer and larger than the requirements of the plot. It's only whetted my appetite for more and more Lord Peter Wimsey novels. I recently ordered Strong Poison; I can't wait for it to arrive!

NOVEL: The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club

2007-01-13T01:36:00.000-08:00

Nearly twenty years ago, I read a short story by Dorothy L. Sayers in a Christmas issue of Reader's Digest. There was something about it I really liked, but I couldn't put my finger on what it was. The story was "The Necklace of Pearls," in which a valuable pearl necklace goes missing during a parlor game at a Christmas party, at which Lord Peter Wimsey is one of the guests.

A few years ago, I bought The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club at Book Sale, more because I knew Sayers was a widely admired author than because I was really interested in her work. I read it and forgot about it. A few weeks ago, I picked it up again and reread it, and I was astonished at how good it is. It has the same ineffable quality I recognized as a child reading "The Necklace of Pearls."

A few days ago I realized what that quality was. I've read a number of reviews citing Sayers's ear for dialogue, and of course that's it. Sayers isn't immediately, gobsmackingly impressive like, say, Sarah Caudwell, because her style is far more oblique. But her brilliance becomes clear when one rereads her books. Unlike Caudwell's characters, Sayers's characters speak much as real people do (or did, in early-to-middle 20th-century England); like Caudwell's characters, Sayers's characters are funny. Lord Peter is especially wonderful: witty, kind, generous, honest, and self-aware.

The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club opens with the discovery of the dead body of old General Fentiman in a chair in the smoking-room of the exclusive Bellona Club, to which Lord Peter belongs. It appears that the general has been dead for some time, but because he was usually to be found in that chair at that time of day, no one noticed at first. It soon transpires that the precise time of the general's death is a matter of some importance; his wealthy sister, Lady Dormer, died on the same day, and according to her will, the disposition of her vast fortune depends on whether she or her brother died first.

The general's death is soon found to have been hastened. The natural suspects are the three persons who stand to gain from the deaths of the general and his sister: the general's grandsons, Robert and George Fentiman, and Lady Dormer's relative and longtime companion, Ann Dorland. The mystery is satisfying, and Lord Peter is a good detective, but as a character he's even better. On the face of it, he should be one of those characters who don't seem real: intelligent, sophisticated, wealthy, and of noble birth. But he deals with people (especially his manservant Bunter) in a realistic manner, he's honest about his biases, he loves to eat and drink, and he's always teasing people. It's an irresistible combination.

The other characters are enjoyable as well, especially little old Mr. Murbles, the solicitor, who is extremely proper and refined but, despite himself, is quite susceptible to excitement. When I learned that he is also in the novel Unnatural Death, I ordered it immediately.

I can't wait to read the rest of the Lord Peter books, especially the first three. (The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club is the fourth.) I'm not eager, however, to read the later novels, which feature Harriet Vane, the great love of Lord Peter's life. I prefer to think of him as single, almost asexual. When a person with a dry sense of humor falls head over heels in love, it usually isn't pretty.

Mystery resources online

2006-11-15T05:25:00.000-08:00

My favorite website for mystery books is Mystery Guide. It has hundreds of book reviews categorized according to mystery type (cozy, forensic, legal, etc.). I consider it the most authoritative mystery site on the web.

I also like Page by Page Books, where you can read books by Agatha Christie and G.K. Chesterton, that is, authors whose works are old enough to have passed into the public domain.

User reviews on Amazon and Barnes and Noble are another valuable online resource for readers. I read these reviews before I buy a book or after I've finished a book. I've also written reviews of my favorite (and unfavorite) books on Amazon.

AUTHOR: Ellis Peters

2006-11-14T23:45:00.000-08:00

I'm always pleased to find a Brother Cadfael novel. Peters wrote numerous mysteries before her death in 1995, but it's her Brother Cadfael series I like best. Brother Cadfael spent most of his life as a man of the world and fought in the Crusades; he is now part of a Benedictine monastery in medieval England. He is in charge of the monastery's herb garden and is therefore in an excellent position to treat persons who have been injured and to investigate accidents and murders. His friend Hugh Beringar, the local sheriff, makes sure that Brother Cadfael is informed of everything that happens outside the monastery's walls.

The novels are meticulously written (Peters was English) and sound extremely authentic to me. Brother Cadfael is an attractive character, a spiritual man but sophisticated from his travels, intelligent, and thoughtful. Sometimes he has difficulty with the obedience part of his vows (which also include poverty and chastity), but he is always a model monk.

Reviews on Amazon have pointed out that Peters presents a highly sanitized view of the Middle Ages, but at least it gives me something to think about other than lives that were "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."

Ellis Peters novels are available at Book Sale and online.

AUTHOR: Nancy Atherton

2006-11-14T23:27:00.000-08:00

I like Nancy Atherton's novels in a vague sort of way. I don't love them to pieces the way Atherton's fans do, but I find them pleasant enough. The protagonist Lori Shepherd, like Atherton herself, is American. As the result of events in the first book, Aunt Dimity's Death (1992), Lori inherits a fortune, marries a wealthy lawyer, and moves into a honey-colored cottage in an old-fashioned English village. The secret weapon of Atherton's highly popular series is Aunt Dimity, who is dead but talks to Lori through a pale-blue journal. The stuffed animals talk, too. The premise is magical, but the execution is sometimes shoddy. It's great that Atherton is attempting to update the English-village whodunit, but I'm not sure she has the chops to pull it off.

One important point brought up in reviews of Atherton's novels on Amazon is Lori's notorious roving eye. In all the books in which Lori is the main character (ten out of the eleven Aunt Dimity books), a different male character squires Lori around on her quests; her husband, a successful lawyer, is hardly ever around. In almost every instance, Lori falls for the guy but manages not to betray her marriage vows. Amazon reviewers regard the potentially adulterous sexual tension between Lori and her male friends as an extremely tiresome plot point, and I agree. It's especially tiresome in Aunt Dimity Beats the Devil (2000), in which Lori practically drools over the beautiful body of her new friend Adam Chase. I do hear that in the last two or three books (which I haven't read yet), Atherton finally turns down the heat.

The novels are available at Book Sale, at Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and at Nancy Atherton's website.

Britannia rules

2006-11-14T23:26:00.000-08:00

Generally I prefer British authors to American. In fact, none of the authors I really, really like are American. The British are simply better at wielding the language they invented. Their prose is cleaner, clearer, and more precise. And their plots are in a class by themselves. Even the Harry Potter books, which many people think of as children's books, are better-plotted than the average American mystery, which is no surprise, since J.K. Rowling is an Agatha Christie fan. British authors practice a certain graceful economy: they don't put anything in their stories that isn't completely vital to the plot. Their stories are so well-written that often you don't notice how neatly everything ties together, but it takes a lot of work to plot that neatly. I've read a lot of sloppy plots by Americans, as well as sloppy grammar and style. You won't find any of that in a British mystery.

AUTHOR: Dick Francis

2006-10-17T21:34:00.000-07:00

Dick Francis was a champion steeplechase jockey in Britain before he retired and started a successful second career as a novelist. You can tell that he once lived and breathed horses because there is something about horses in all of his novels. Many of his protagonists work in or around horse racing, as jockeys, horse trainers, horse owners, even horse-van drivers.

In every novel, Francis introduces not only horse racing but also a second, often highly specialized subject. His novels have featured photography, meteorology, glasswork, jewels, wine, and drugs (as in pharmacology, not trafficking). The amount of research involved in writing a single Dick Francis novel must be staggering. Upon his beloved wife and research partner Mary's death in 2000, Dick Francis announced that he would not write any more novels, but this year he is back with Under Orders, featuring his most famous protagonist, Sid Halley. Halley is a former jockey who lost one hand in a riding accident that ended his career. In the first Sid Halley novel, Odds Against (1965), Halley starts a second career as a private investigator.

My favorite Dick Francis novel is Proof (1984), about Tony Beach, a wine merchant who discovers strengths he never thought he had. I also like the Sid Halley novel Whip Hand (1979). I haven't read Under Orders yet, but of the earlier Sid Halley novels, Whip Hand is the most riveting and intense.

Most of Francis's protagonists are decent men who get in a lot of physical trouble because they don't go running to the police when they're threatened or oppressed. I guess you could call them "man" novels. I'm not a man, but I like Francis because his prose is graceful and precise.

Dick Francis novels are available at Book Sale and Books For Less. Under Orders is available at Fully Booked.

AUTHOR: G.K. Chesterton

2006-10-17T21:08:00.000-07:00

Students of theology and philosophy will recognize the name G.K. Chesterton. Chesterton was a theologian and philosopher, yes, but he also wrote mystery stories (as well as an excellent essay, "A Defence of Detective Stories," at a time when intellectuals were turning their noses up at mysteries). Chesterton's detective is Father Brown, a small, plump, vacuous-looking Catholic priest from a poor parish in England.

The stories can get pretty gruesome, in a grim late-19th-century sort of way. But with Father Brown leading me through them, somehow I always feel safe. The Father Brown stories illustrate how reason, as well as a knowledge of the darkness within man (as can only be acquired from the other side of the confessional), can shed light on human mysteries.

The Father Brown books are:

The Innocence of Father Brown (1911)
The Wisdom of Father Brown (1914)
The Incredulity of Father Brown (1926)
The Secret of Father Brown (1927)
The Scandal of Father Brown (1935)

All five books are brought together in The Father Brown Omnibus.

I've never seen a Father Brown book in a bookstore, although they are available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I read The Father Brown Omnibus when I was in college, at the university library. You can also read the Father Brown books online here.

In "A Defence of Detective Stories" (1901), Chesterton writes: "The first essential value of the detective story lies in this, that it is the earliest and only form of popular literature in which is expressed some sense of the poetry of modern life." You can read the entire essay here. Browse the rest of the site, maintained by the American Chesterton Society, to read other Chesterton essays on mystery writing.

AUTHOR: Agatha Christie

2006-10-17T21:04:00.000-07:00

Of course I'm an Agatha Christie fan! To this day, her name is still synonymous with "mystery," and with good reason. Dame Agatha wrote just over 80 mystery novels and short-story collections, of which I've read at least 70. As I am not a big guesser (I read mysteries as novels, not as puzzles to be solved), she has surprised me every time.

My favorite Agatha Christie novels are Crooked House, Endless Night, and The Mirror Crack'd (published in Britain as The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side). The first two are probably the most chilling books I've ever read. The Mirror Crack'd is something more along her usual lines, except that her wily lady detective Miss Marple is getting old and is not as central to the investigation as in earlier novels. The Mirror Crack'd features the most dazzling murder motive I've ever encountered in a mystery novel.

I also recommend two other Miss Marple novels, A Caribbean Mystery, in which Miss Marple meets the wealthy and eccentric Jason Rafiel, and Nemesis, in which the departed Mr. Rafiel's will sends Miss Marple on a quest towards a horrifying truth.

Newcomers to Christie's work shouldn't skip her masterpieces, Murder on the Orient Express and And Then There Were None (also published as Ten Little Indians). Murder on the Orient Express features Christie's best-known sleuth, the finicky Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. I'm also fond of two lesser-known Christie characters, the philanthropic Parker Pyne and the supernatural Harley Quin. Parker Pyne Investigates (also published as Mr. Parker Pyne, Detective) and The Mysterious Mr. Quin are two of my favorite short-story collections by Agatha Christie.

Christie's books hardly ever turn up at Book Sale, but when they do, they're all snapped up within days. A more reliable source is Fully Booked, where you'll find row upon tempting row of Agatha Christies. I've also seen copies at Books for Less, but as at Book Sale, the selections vary widely from day to day and between stores.

AUTHOR: Sarah Caudwell

2006-10-17T08:46:00.000-07:00

I have every book Sarah Caudwell ever wrote: a grand total of four. Yes, Caudwell's passing is a tragedy mystery lovers mourn to this day. I wish she had lived to write at least two more books. But the four books she did write are the most wonderful, graceful, delightful things. I've spent many happy evenings just reading them over and over, and over and over. There's no author whose books I'd rather have with me in a blackout (with a candle, of course) or on a desert island.

Caudwell's sleuth is Professor Hilary Tamar, an Oxford fellow whose sex is never revealed. Hilary is a professor of law who never seems to do much teaching. All four books feature him (I'll refer to Hilary as "him" not only for conciseness but also because I think he's a man) visiting his barrister friends in London: Selena Jardine, Julia Larwood, Michael Cantrip, Desmond Ragwort, and Timothy Shepherd. Timothy is the oldest of the five and was Hilary's pupil at Oxford.

Selena is something of a superwoman, competent in law, love, and everything else. Hilary (who narrates the novels) describes Selena as resembling "a Persian cat which has just completed a successful cross-examination." Selena has "an amiable arrangement" with Sebastian Verity, a colleague of Hilary's.

Julia is Selena's opposite. She manages to make a mess of everything she touches. At one point, Timothy describes Julia as resembling "one of Priam's daughters after a more than usually trying rape." There is one thing at which Julia excels, and that is tax law. According to Hilary, however, Julia does not really believe in income tax. "It was a subject which she had studied for examinations and on which she had thereafter advised a number of clients; she naturally did not suppose, in these circumstances, that it had anything to with real life." As a result, Julia has a long history of trouble with the Inland Revenue.

Michael went to Cambridge, an educational deficiency, Hilary says, "for which he is to be pitied rather than censured." As a Cambridge man would, he ends his sentences with prepositions, confuses "aspersions" with "aspidistras," and generally has a more tenuous grip on language and logic than his Oxford-educated friends have. Michael has "eyes and hair of a witchlike blackness" and resembles "an invitation card for a rather frivolous wake."

Desmond is my favorite character. He has extremely high standards of morality (and equally high standards of housekeeping) but is so beautiful (with "demure autumnal colouring" and what Julia reverently refers to as "a profile") that he is a temptation to numerous men and women. Julia, for one, has made countless proposals (both of marriage and of a less honorable nature) to Desmond, all of which he has declined.

Timothy, being senior to the others, does not figure prominently in the books; he is usually off on one case or another. Hilary describes him as having "that long-boned, angular, straw-coloured look which is widely regarded as characteristic of the Englishman."

Caudwell's books are:

Thus Was Adonis Murdered (1981)
The Shortest Way to Hades (1984)
The Sirens Sang of Murder (1989)
The Sibyl in Her Grave (2000)

Some of the passages in Caudwell's books are so beautiful that I turn them over and over in my mind. My favorites:

"A town…in every sense provincial; but with the faded, rather sluttish elegance of a provincial beauty who a long time ago spent a season in the capital."

"I would rather have lived in a world of absolute illusion than one from which irony and elegance had so utterly perished."

Other passages are enjoyable in their precision.

"So fearful was I of incurring yet further disapproval…that while getting into the boat I somehow missed my footing. My entry into the vessel was accordingly at an angle rather obtuse than perpendicular to the quayside and at a speed rather rapid than graceful. In short, I fell in head first."

"Immediately below there [are]…shops which include a good bakery, a passable delicatessen, and a disgracefully overpriced greengrocer, as well as two pleasant cafés and a slightly disreputable bar."

And many passages are just plain funny.

I love Caudwell's novels because they depict a world in which everyone is accepted as they are and people do as they please. Beautiful young men fall in love with elderly vicars. Women exert themselves to show an interest in men's souls and intellects ("One is not to be discouraged by the fact…that they may have neither") to get them into bed. The world of Caudwell's novels is a utopia of sensuousness and tolerance.

Caudwell uses letters to narrate much of the action in her novels. It is pointed out in numerous reviews on Amazon that no one would write such long or detailed letters in reality, but that didn't even occur to me. All that matters to me is that the characters are lovely, the plots are byzantine, and the ride is magnificent fun.

I bought the first three Sarah Caudwell novels at Book Sale branches: Thus Was Adonis Murdered and The Sirens Sang of Murder for P20 each, The Shortest Way to Hades for P50. The Sibyl in Her Grave is relatively new; you won't find it at Book Sale. It's available at Fully Booked for a little less than P300.

AUTHOR: John Mortimer

2006-10-17T08:34:00.000-07:00

Two years ago, I picked up Rumpole for the Defence in a Book Sale at SM North Edsa and started reading. Two pages in, I was laughing out loud, and I didn't stop laughing until I finished. The book cost P60. It was the best P60 I ever spent in my life.

John Mortimer's detective is Horace Rumpole, a short, fat, aging lawyer who specializes in defending persons accused of crimes. If you read a lot of British mysteries, you probably know that in England, there are two kinds of lawyers: barristers, who argue cases in court, and solicitors, who mediate between barristers and the public. (It is considered improper for barristers to deal directly with members of the public.) Rumpole is a barrister.

Rumpole loves his work and barely tolerates almost everything else in his life. Two other things that he does love are small cigars and cheap claret. Two of the things he barely tolerates are his marriage to Hilda Rumpole (whom he calls "She Who Must Be Obeyed," or "She Who Must" for short) and the company of his fellow barristers, who include the sanctimonious Sam Ballard and the ineffectual Claude Erskine-Brown. Rumpole's nemesis is Judge Roger Bullingham, who doesn't seem to believe in the presumption of innocence.

There are fourteen Rumpole books, only three of which are novels. The rest are short-story collections. The Rumpole books are:

Rumpole of the Bailey (1978)
The Trials of Rumpole (1979)
Rumpole's Return (1981)
Rumpole for the Defence (1983)
Rumpole and the Golden Thread (1987)
Rumpole's Last Case (1988)
Rumpole and the Age of Miracles (1990)
Rumpole à la Carte (1992)
Rumpole on Trial (1995)
Rumpole and the Angel of Death (1996)
Rumpole Rests His Case (2001)
Rumpole and the Primrose Path (2002)
Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders (2004)
Rumpole and the Reign of Terror (2006)

The novels in the list are Rumpole's Return, Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders, and Rumpole and the Reign of Terror. The Rumpole books are also available in three Rumpole omnibuses. Books 1 to 3 on the list are available as The First Rumpole Omnibus. Books 4 to 6 constitute The Second Rumpole Omnibus. Books 7, 8, and 10 make up The Third Rumpole Omnibus, inexplicably skipping Rumpole on Trial.

The three omnibuses are readily available online, not only at Amazon and Barnes and Noble but also directly from the publisher, Penguin. Rumpole on Trial, however, is impossible to find. Used copies are available on Amazon, but the sellers of the used copies (outside vendors, not Amazon itself) don't deliver to the Philippines. I've almost resigned myself to not being able to read it for years. Almost.

Because they're easy to find, I haven't felt the same pressure to acquire the other three books I haven't read: Rumpole of the Bailey, Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders, and Rumpole and the Reign of Terror. Of course, I intend to complete my Rumpole collection eventually. I'm especially excited about reading Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders, in which Rumpole finally tells the story of a long-ago legal triumph, which he has been reminiscing about since Rumpole of the Bailey.

Also, I was overjoyed when Mortimer published Rumpole and the Reign of Terror. I had thought for sure that he would stop at Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders.

The earlier Rumpole books are available at Book Sale, but for the later books and the omnibuses, I've had to rely on friends taking trips abroad or ordering from Amazon. Fully Booked does have The Best of Rumpole, a collection of seven stories from Rumpole of the Bailey, The Trials of Rumpole, Rumpole and the Age of Miracles, Rumpole à la Carte, and Rumpole on Trial. Fully Booked has branches in SM North Edsa, SM Mall of Asia, Gateway Mall, Powerplant Mall, and the Promenade.

More bang for your buck

2006-10-17T08:20:00.000-07:00

I read fast, about a hundred pages an hour. And I don't put a book down until I've finished it. If I were to indulge my reading appetite without scruple, I'd be constantly broke. So I get creative.

My primary source of cheap books is the aptly (and austerely) named Book Sale, where used books of all kinds are to be found. Despite the non-customer-friendly arrangement of books and the non-customer-friendly salespersons, I frequent Book Sale stores because they have books even the big bookstores (Fully Booked, National Bookstore, and Powerbooks) don't stock. You can get books at Book Sale for as little as P15.

Best of all, Book Sale is a mystery lover's nirvana. I discovered my all-time favorite mystery authors (Sarah Caudwell, John Mortimer, and Dorothy L. Sayers) in the bins of Book Sale stores at SM North Edsa. Of course, you'll also find a lot of duds, especially if you don't know which authors to choose and which to ignore, but that's part of the fun.

The downside of Book Sale is the way the stores discourage people from lingering. I'd love to be able to examine their offerings at my leisure, but the books are stacked on top of one another, with stacks hidden behind stacks. And they pile many of the books on really low shelves. To see everything, you have to sit on your haunches for long periods. Adding insult to injury, the salespersons give you dirty looks if you dig too deeply into the stacks. And the stores are not air-conditioned. In hot, humid Manila, you can't spend a lot of time in a non-air-conditioned environment without starting to stink.

Books For Less is a slightly more expensive version of Book Sale. I haven't been able to visit a lot of Books For Less branches because most of them are out of my way. But the first time I visited a Books For Less store, I was pleased because they were doing just what I've always wished Book Sale would do: they put all the books within easy reach, they provide a table and chairs so you can sit and read their books, and the stores are air-conditioned.

Prices at Books For Less are a little higher than at Book Sale, but I've always said I would pay extra if Book Sale offered better service. What they do at Books For Less is just what I had in mind.

My impression is that the selection at Books For Less is not as wide as that at Book Sale, but Books For Less does offer a book-ordering service. I'm not sure whether you can order brand-new books, though. If you want your books new, try the book-ordering services at Fully Booked and Powerbooks.

If you have a generous budget for books and a credit card, you can order almost any book you want online. If you love books as much as I do, you'll cough up for the cost of shipping (which is considerable). I don't have a credit card myself, but last year a friend ordered two books from Amazon for me as a present. Amazon has most of the books I want, with one glaring exception. But more on that later.