An entertaining clutch of krimis

by Mike Nicol on July 15th, 2009

Exhibit A By special arrangement with FMR here’s a note on a few krimi novels that kept me reading into the small hours during recent weeks.

It is seldom – actually it has never happened before – that I’ve reviewed a book without having it sitting on my desk as I write the notice, but I have to admit that I don’t have a copy of Sarah Lotz’s Exhibit A to hand.

Then again I was able to read it five months ago when it was in page proofs and I was knocked out by this wonderfully funny yet deeply serious novel. At its heart is a rape committed by a cop in a police station cell. You’d think that would be a cut and dried case – but not when the author is Sarah Lotz. She takes this scenario and systematically strips away all the obvious evidence until the charge comes down to the woman’s word against the cop’s.

Lotz has a moral purpose behind this very brave manner of telling a difficult story and that is to expose the injustices in the justice system. And she does this in the best way possible by, writing a book that is often laugh out loud funny and contains some of the most hilarious scenes that have ever found their way into a local krimi. Central to his is her main character and the story’s narrator, Georgie, a lawyer with his heart in the right place but a terrible craving for fast food and very little dress sense. The Exhibit A of the title is a stray dog that he rescues and which proceeds to leave a fine coating of hair over every stitch of clothing he possesses. Georgie also drives a car which is held together by luck and a prayer. Believe me this book has all the ingredients of good crime fiction: you won’t forget the characters, you’ll be appalled by the crime and you’ll have to read it through in a sitting. Choose a wet wintery day. No great difficulty there at the moment if you happen to live in Cape Town.

Police procedurals seem to be the preferred crime novel among writers and here are another two with local settings: the first by that writing due of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip who trade under the pen name of Michael Stanley, and the second by a Swazi now living in Australia, Malla Nunn.

Michael Stanley published the first in their Detective Kubu series last year and have followed up A Carrion Death with another Botswanan tale, A Deadly Trade. This time the large Kubu, who has an even larger appetite than before, finds himself caught up in a situation which has its roots in the Rhodesian war of thirty years ago and is further complicated by present day drug trading across the sub continent. It’s wonderfully atmospheric with enough twists and turns to keep you as baffled as the pragmatic and dogged Kubu.

A beautiful place to die Now I have to admit that of all the sub-categories in the krimi genre, I have a certain reluctance when it comes to police procedurals – it’s probably got to do with all those questions as the cops blunder around. So although I had noticed the enthusiasm with which Australian crime fiction lovers greeted Malla Nunn’s A Beautiful Place to Die – which is set in the 1950s in a dorp on Natal’s border with Mozambique – I have to admit that it didn’t grab me in the same way. Too much Mr Plod and not enough 1950s ambience despite the obligatory racial angle and quaint telephone exchanges. However to balance my prejudices it should be said that Minette Walters calls it ‘a terrific page-turning debut, clever and multi-layered in its portrayal of the people and landscape of apartheid South Africa.’ She loved it.

On the other hand I do have a huge amount of enthusiasm for a graphic novel called Project H by a Capie named Brandon Carstens. It’s a police procedural I have to admit but it is way different. The protagonist of this gritty work is Sam Hart – a man damaged by witnessing the killing of his mother when she is robbed by some street thugs. But that is to present too simplistic a picture of Sam Hart’s psychological makeup, he is a much more complex individual and this graphic novel is a much more complex work than you’d find in your average cape and tights comic. In fact it’s packed with action, intriguing ideas, and enough poignancy and anger to make it a gripping read. Interestingly Project H is a self-publication because Carstens couldn’t find a local publisher prepared to produce it. This at a time when some big names are turning to the comics, among them Ian Rankin whose graphic novel will appear in August. It seems, as they say, that our local publishers should get with the programme.

Exhibit A by Sarah Lotz (Penguin)
A Deadly Trade by Michael Stanley (Headline)
A Beautiful Place to Die by Malla Nunn (Picador Africa)
Project H by Brandon Carstens (Wonjoolaai Studios)