The Traveller and Other Stories by Stuart Neville

I read the first of Stuart Neville's  Belfast novels, The Ghosts of Belfast (The Twelve in the UK) in 2016 and was stunned at how good it was. No doubt it still is. It was also Neville's first novel. I immediately read book 2, Collusion, but didn't keep up with the author after that, something for which I have no logical explanation. Jump ahead to 2021 and I see a mention of The Traveller in a 2020 Crime column of the NY Times Books section and I thought we should get reacquainted. 

This collection of twelve short stories and one novella show that Neville is as skilled with short form fiction as he is writing novels. There aren't any happy stories here and I'd say they run from light gray to deepest black in the mood they instill.

The book has two parts. Part I is called New Monsters. The first story, "Coming in on Time" sets the tone with a young boy watching for the ferry and it pretty much leaves the reader gutted. Following that story is the mildest of the seven in part one, "The Green Lady" which is a reworking of an Irish ghost legend. Story three, "Echo", has a young boy in a house that is trying to cope with a tragedy.I'm overusing this word but it is another that leaves the reader gutted. The other four are dark crime stories, practically noir.

Part II is called Old Friends and is a return to Northern Ireland during and after The Troubles which is when The Ghosts of Belfast and Collusion are set. Several of the stories and the novella feature paramilitary killer, Gerry Fegan who we first meet in The Ghosts of Belfast. In fact, the story "Followers" was expanded into The Ghosts of Belfast. Fegan is haunted by people he killed. The novella, The Traveller, is particularly important for wrapping up some loose ends. The stories can be read as stand-alone but if you've read books one and two of the Belfast novels you'll recognize names and events. What these stories have done is to inspire me to go back and reread the first two books of the Belfast novels. There are six of these but I've only read the first two. I need to fix that. Okay, I'm going to go ahead and say it; if you haven't already done so, go read The Ghosts of Belfast and Collusion. If you read them first, you'll see where the stories fit in. If you read these stories first, then the novels will explain the context. Either way, you won't regret it.

The Truants by Kate Weinberg

I wasn't thinking about writing a review as I read until, at the end, I realized what an odd (for me) reading experience it had been. You see, I forgot I was reading. When I began the book, I was slightly puzzled why I selected it. Then, when nearly finished, I remembered that I had read about The Truants in the NY Times crime books column— a crime book, my favorite genre. Part of this I attribute to me being an oblivious reader but really I applaud Weinberg for a wonderfully, subtly, creatively put together crime story.

Jess Walker (the first person narrator) comes to an East Anglia university to study under Professor Lorna Clay, an expert on Agatha Christie and author of The Truants, a book that changed Jess' life. Jess becomes friends with two other students: Georgie, outgoing, no respecter of rules, from an aristocratic family, and a serious substance abuser; Nick handsome and as solid as the geology he studies. 

Bracketing the three friends are Prof. Clay is brilliant with a mesmerizing personality that makes everyone fall in love with her and hang on her every word. She is also doesn't respect teacher/student boundaries and encourages breaking rules. On the other side is Alec Van Zanten, a South African journalist, handsome and charismatic, who becomes a part of the group.

I got so caught up in the relationships between the characters that I forgot that there was a crime story in it. Jess, Georgie, and Nick are not very experienced in life and are easily influenced by Lorna and Alec. We have lies, deceit, disappearances, obsession, love, and betrayal playing out with Alec taking the trio off on alcohol fueled adventures in the hearse he uses as his personal automobile. 

Each chapter Lorna's book, The Truants, is

...a short biography of a debauched but brilliant life, mingled with some incisive analysis linking their foulest behavior with their most sublime output

These are people who lived life dangerously and left collateral damage in their wake, who broke rules and played truant from their lives. Influenced by Lorna and Alec, Jess, Georgie, and Nick become truants themselves though less extreme versions of the truants in Lorna's book.

Clues are found throughout the narrative, subtly woven in for the reader to put together. The most obvious alert is Agatha Christie, Lorna's speciality. Bits about her life and works are worked in mainly in the context of Jess' dissertation for her degree. Adding to the Christie element, the author drops more clues that add up to a shattering conclusion. Really, very neatly done. 

I've seen the book referred to as a thriller but I wouldn't use use that term to describe it; thrillers are more action oriented which isn't the case here. The reader is pulled along in the story which is why I read it in a day and a half. 

This is the author's debut novel and was first published in the UK in 2019. The US edition appeared in 2020. She's on my "what will she write next" watch list.

Kill Me in Yoshiwara (Burns Bannion #4) by Earl Norman

Kill Me in Tokyo was my first Burns Bannion and thus will always hold a high place in my affection for this series but Kill Me in Yoshiwara is my favorite so far. Where Kill Me in Yokohama didn't measure up for me, number 4 in the series more than makes up for that.

Kill Me in Yoshiwara follows the usual pattern (so far) for the Bannion books with the exception that Burns doesn't meet his client in a bar. You won't be disappointed to lean that: a seemingly simple case quickly becomes more complicated and wider in scope; Bannion will have to bring his karate skills into play to stay alive; and a beautiful woman is involved. 

The story starts with Burns bouncing along a road in rural Japan on a rented motor scooter. He is traveling to Katsu village to meet his client, Mrs. Aoba, who contacted him via postal box 113. Her daughter has gone missing. He spots the ruins of a castle and decides to take a detour and investigate. Just Bannions's luck, he finds the nude body of a still warm dead woman on an upper floor, her luxurious garments spread out around her. She has died from an expert karate chop. He catches a glimpse of furtive movement but the person is nowhere to be found.

Not surprising, the dead woman is the missing daughter, Kazuko, and Bannion's assignment now become to find the killer. While his client thinks he has an honest face, the other daughter, Hiroko, isn't convinced; Kazuko was killed by a karate blow and Bannion is a karate man. Bannion learns that, years earlier, Kazuko had been sold into prostitution to a gang is Yoshiwra by her mother to finance a new husband. Bannion is a suspect due to footprints found at the scene but is allowed to return to Tokyo with the requirement that he check in with Inspector Ezawa who we met previously in earlier books. Armed only with the name of the gang that owned Kazuko's contract, Burns begins his investigation.

So what appealed to me about this book:

I like the way that the author describes Japan through the eyes of an American who appreciates the country. In just the first several chapters, we read about a Japanese castle, a rich description of the garments of the dead woman, the rural village, a hotel room, and the handling of the dead woman's body. These details are presented the way an outsider would register, consider them.

Norman works in a brief history of prostitution in Japan without making it an info dump. Bannion pumps Inspector Ezawa for information about the Yoshiwara district. Apparently it wasn't unusual for a daughter to be sold into prostitution and Yoshiwara was a major red light district back when prostitution was legal. Though prostitution in now illegal, Yoshiwara's reputation as a center for sin continues. Inspector Ezawa's opinions on legal vs illegal prostitution are interesting. I looked this up on wikipedia and the author fairly summarized the subject

. 

Kill Me in Yoshiwara gives us a strong female character. Hiroko is determined to find who murdered her sister and kill them herself. Hiroko is a good character and I hope she has a place in the next book in the series. Up to now, main female characters disappear between books.

As in the previous books, Inspector Ezawa seems set on getting Bannion deported but still gives him space to bang on things and see what comes out of the woodwork. Hie's a useful idiot to the authorities, as it were. Not much gets past Ezawa.

Some of the author's most skillful descriptions are the karate fights. He works in the moves and techniques Bannion is executing and that are being used against him. Bannion of course survives but it is never a sure thing and Norman continues to make karate a main feature of the stories without making is boringly repetitive.

In don't want to give away the entire plot but I found it plausible and satisfying. Here's a hint: Chinese agitators and a hidden cache of gold coins and all the plot elements starting in chapter one tie together by the end.

Understudy for Death by Charles Willeford

At the first, I want to say that I enjoyed this book, a lot. Willeford was a wonderful writer and this is a good example of his abilities. Very satisfying. The book was published 1961 and I grew up in the 60s. I related to some of the descriptions of homelife described by Willeford.

I didn't know what I was getting with this book. Like a lot of you, I know Willeford's work from his crime novels, the Hoke Mosely series, for example. If you look at the title and cover, you would be justified to think you'd be getting a crime story. Not so. On the cover, the only element that directly relates to the story is the typewriter. The woman in a bikini with a gun, not so much.

In the small South Florida city of Lake Springs, a woman kills her son and daughter then herself. The Managing Editor of the Lake Springs Morning News and Evening Press assigns reporter Richard Hudson to find out what drove the woman, Marion Huneker, to commit murder and suicide. Hudson thinks it is worthless assignment, but, with the suggestion that perhaps he doesn't want his job anymore, reluctantly agrees.  You know he doesn't plan to put much effort into it.

Hudson, who sees himself as a playwright first, is lazy, cynical, rude, and abrasive, doing a job beneath him while he works on his play. He becomes emotionally and verbally abusive toward his wife if she dares ask him to do anything around the house; a man's a loser to make his own breakfast. For Hudson, nothing is more important than work on his play which, despite years of effort, hasn't progressed beyond the first act. 

Really, this is a snapshot of life in South Florida, the daily routine of a reporter on a minor newspaper, and  an examination of marriage. Marriage is always a presence in the story even if it isn't at the forefront. This is more like the marriages in Mad Men than those of Father Knows Best or Leave it to Beaver. Along the way we begin to see inside the soul of Richard Hudson as he talks to people who knew the deceased woman and react to his own marriage.

With Hudson driving around town doing his reporter interviews, Willeford is able to write in several interesting passages that, while not directly related to Hudson's reporting, work toward the atmosphere, sense of place, state of mind. 

The heat of Southern Florida in the summer is every bit as oppressive as Willeford describes. I have personal experience here and I can't imagine what it was like before everything was air conditioned. 

In one scene Hudson is approaching the residence of someone he wants to interview. He pauses and muses about Florida home construction and how there isn't much difference between a $10,000 house and one that costs $20,000. This may seen boring and out-of-place but is interesting and contributes the snapshot of Florida life I mentioned earlier. It also reminded me a little of John D. Macdonald who frequently inserted discussion about development and ecology into his novels.

Willeford also works in observations about the life of the freelance pulp writer. I expect it was a subject that Willeford knew more than a little about and meant a lot to him. It also has an affect on Hudson and allows an uncharacteristic bit of emotion toward a fellow human.

The story doesn't really resolve the "why" of the suicide. The note left Marion left behind gives the feeling that Marion slipped into an existential despair, the feeling that she and her children didn't belong in the world anymore. Being very devout, Marion felt she was sending her children to a better place and she was willing to sacrifice he place in eternity to ensure theirs.  She wrote that Television is more important than we are. Everything is nothing. If you do read this book — and I hope you do — note that television comes up more than once. But this doesn't really solve the riddle, what was missing in her existence.

I don't want to give a lot of detail about the ending bit I will say that the title, Understudy for Death has allegorical underpinnings. Actually, so would the original title, Understudy for Love. I wonder if the change was made to make it seem more like a crime novel.

The Lady Upstairs by Halley Sutton

This is Sutton's debut work and she has she come out strong with this female centered, noir, crime thriller. She's an author I'm going to be watching.

It calls itself The Lady Upstairs Staffing Agency. All nice and legal and they even pay taxes. What they really do are run badger games, set up honeypots to seduce marks who can afford to pay for the images that caught them in flagrante delicto. The employees of the "agency" get an envelope with the name of the mark from The Lady herself who is never seen. I couldn't help but think of Charlie's Angels with The Lady as Charlie and Lou as The Lady's Bosley.

Jo was recruited to be one of the one of the Lady's girls by Lou who recognized someone who knows men are assholes and wouldn't have a problem taking them down. Jo has worked her way up to become a recruiter herself as well as training the girls and planning and executing cases, as they refer to their blackmailing operations. Working with Lou and Jo is Jackal, Jo's sometimes lover, who takes care of the technical side, wiring hotel rooms, recording the action.

Jo owes The Lady a lot of money for getting her out of a jam and the latest case should see the debt resolved. Unfortunately, the case doesn't go well, setting up a chain of events that will take the reader on a noir thrillfest.

Sutton has captured the essence of a noir character in Jo's first person narrative. The reader needs to be willing to accept the bleakness of noir; there are no good people in the story. Well, maybe one or two are less worse than the others. You might root for Jo but it isn't because there is anything redeeming about her. She is desperate to salvage the case, settle her debt, and, at the same time, keep her screw-ups from The Lady who has suggested that she could be "retired". But like a true noir protagonist, Jo has a self-destructive streak in her alcoholism and every action sinks her in deeper. With the police on one side and The Lady on the other, it looks like Jo has very few escape options.

The story is fast-paced and thrilling will well developed characters and flowing plot. The ending is excellent and a surprise. I did have a few inklings of the direction things might go but didn't find it had a telegraphed ending. If you like female centered stories and you like noir then this is the book for you because you get both.