A Malian Mystery: Death in Timbuktu by Moussa Konaté

Based on my current TBR and previous reading, I may declare 2021 the most diverse literary year ever. Besides my regular authors from English and German speaking realms, a whole list of possibilities opened up - mostly in translation - of authors representing countries with a very limited, if any, presence outside their home countries.

After virtually meeting my first writer from Congo one month ago, I just finished half an hour ago a crime novel by Moussa Konaté, a prolific Malian author with a known literary presence in Mali as well as in the Francophone realm. The author,who died in 2013 in France, was very active in developing and promoting the Malian literature and publishing industry.

Meurtre à Tombouctou - Death in Timbuktu - which I´ve read in the original French language is a relatively short book - under 170 pages, the sixth from the crime series centered around the commissioner Habib. Although I hope to be able to find more books from the series at my generous French Institute in Berlin, I did not have any moment the impression that I am missing something from the previous episodes as the story is developing highly independently. 

The story is moderately paced, with fragments pertaining from old African stories, but it touches bravely contemporary topics for the Malian society such as the pervasiveness of terrorism, the clash between customs and laws, the corrupt politician and the power of tribes. It is also eyes opening for the diversity of the local society as well as the cultural diversity. The magic of Timbuktu, a regional center of trade from the Middle Ages onwards, therefore a melting pot of languages, traditions and cultures is balanced by the realities of the everyday life and struggles.

The case assigned to Habib, which is very empathic and with a genuine sense of humour, deals time with a murder of a young touareg, apparently the result of either a feud between families or maybe some unaccounted love story. At the first sight, all can be equally suspect and innocents, including some French acquaintance with a couple of chips on his shoulders. Meanwhile, the wise men of the village demand without success a pause in the investigations until a diviner - marabout devin - is requested to take the reins of the search for the culprit. 

The various episodes leading to the final conclusion - which was completely unexpected for me, also because I could not figure out the social and cultural complexities of the story - reveal in a non-judgemental way different aspects of the society while offering more and more hints. It opens up like a flower in bloom and I love the smooth way in which the ending is set. Again, although the solution may sound outrageous, it is exposed in a simple, non-judgemental way, with the focus on the details explaining the crime.

I am glad for having the chance of discovering a new literary world and a new author that I would love to get to know better in some new books, hopefully soon. As for Timbuktu, I haven´t lost the hope to be able one day to visit this city, his bookstores and libraries as well. 

Rating: 4.5 stars

My July Movie Selection

Looking back on my long list of movies I had the chance to watch in July it looks like I was pretty lucky to spend so much time with screenings covering a variety of topics, styles and languages. The movies in the German language were my main criteria of choice, but besides I had the opportunity to explore some old authors and new topics and I can only be grateful for my freedom of spending my time (mostly) as I really want to, busy with various cultural thoughts and activities.

Greta directed by Armando Praça

Listening to Portuguese, especially Brazilian Portuguese, makes me always feel good. But Greta by Armando Praça is anything but ´feelgood´ movie. Pedro, the 70-year old gay nurse, taking care of Daniela, her dying transgender friend. In order to safe a hospital bed for her, he helps escape a sought-criminal to whom he grows fond of. A simple fact of life, often taken for granted, develops into a fine drama of loneliness and the hearthbreaking trauma of hidden identity.

Rating: 4 stars 

The Perfect Candidate directed by Haifaa al-Mansour

Haifaa al-Mansour is Saudi Arabia´s first - and probably only - film director. One year ago, I´ve watched Wadjda, a simple story about a girl who wants to ride a bicycle in a society that until very recently not too long ago sent women daring to drive into prison. The Perfect Candidate is about a woman doctor forced to challenge her fellow citizens and authorities to answer a call for repairing the roads around her hospital where she works as a doctor.

It´s a men´s world and Maryam is only guided by her stubborness to change something. Besides, this movie reveals so many ongoing clashes between tradition and modernity, focused mostly around the role the women were forced to assign. It´s both a good movie - which I streamed on MUBI - and a window into a different world which is worth seeing if interested in the Middle East topics.

Rating: 4.5 stars

Deep Web documentary directed by Alex Winter

I watch a documentary every couple of days, but Deep Web directed by Alex Winter deserves a written mention. Although it focuses - way too much, in my opinion - on the cracking down of the Silk Road, a marketplace used for illicit, under the Internet radar exchanges of all kinds, it is also a testimony of an episode of libertarian thought. In practice though, as it is happening right now with the crypto, such movements cannot stay away from state involvement, of different kinds which may control, infiltrate or simply destroy such alternative online spaces because they have the means and the influence and particularly, the power. In many respects, libertarianism is just another mind creation, whose greatest danger is to start being put into practice.

The documentary has many interesting testimonies and points of view, but I was even more interested in more philosophical/ethnical discussion.

Rating: 3 stars

Jibril directed by Henrika Kull

Maryam is an independent divorced mother of two living in Kreuzberg´s Berlin. A second-generation Iraqi Muslim she is easygoing not necessarily looking for someone but charmed by Lebanese soap operas she is watching every evening after work. Until she met Jibril a young man who cannot ofer her anything but raw feelings. They fell in love despite the warnings and advices trying to convince her that stability may be more important than feelings. Jibril (very good played by Malik Adan, also playing in the popular Tatort) is the least recommended candidate given his very special situation, but I will not spoil more of the story for those interested to watch the movie.

Although I am not so good when it comes to such personal choices and most probably will say a strong YES to stability and normality, the movie is not bad at all and worth watching and not only if you are looking to improve your German language skills. The film director has a very neutral stance, allowing the characters to freely move within their human emotional spaces.

Rating: 3.5 stars

Die Kommune directed by Thomas Vinterberg

Die Kommune is running very far away from my intellectual comfort zone but my curiosity is always winning. When the architect husband of a famous TV star inherits a huge bourgeois house his wife convince him to build up a comuna, gathering old and new friends. The decisions are taken together and the daily tasks are distributed. Peace, flowers and happiness, and a couple of swimming by night all together naked. Until the unempathic architect wants to bring in his much younger student, half his age at least, as his lover, but not loved enough to break with his wife. 

I am very very old style when it comes to relationships and also when it comes to sharing my living space - living room included - and the poor emotional shapes of the characters haven´t make it easier to accept those differences. (Seriously, your son just died and you are up and again the next day to discuss about organisational directions in the comuna?). 

I watched it without any previous research and was not sure if it was a time well spent, but at least pushed me to think a bit about relationships and how selfishly humans inflict emotional trauma to one another.

Rating: 2.5 stars

Shelter - Aus nächster Distanz - directed by Eran Riklis

Shelter - in the German translation Aus nächster Distanz - is a reunion of good things. First, the two actresses - the Iranian-born exiled Golshifteh Farahani which is such an emotional - in the very good sense of the word - presence, the Israeli Neta Riskin - who had a role in Shtisel, among others, and also coached Natalie Portman for the role in A Tale of Love and Darkness - and the Israeli film director Eran Riklis whose Lemon Tree movie has an important role in challenging my former narrative on the Middle East. 

The story unfolds from Lebanon to Tel Aviv and Hamburg, where a Mossad spy - Golshifteh - is under protection and ungoing dramatic physical changes in order to be saved from the long arm of Hezbollah, dispatched in Europe to punish her betrayal. It is a complex take on good and bad and responsibility and motivation which is fascinating. However, I´ve found a bit too easy and unreliable that their hidden nest in Hamburg was found so fast. I know, I am nagging all the time and rarely happy with a story as it is...

Rating: 3.75 stars

Morgen sind wir frei - Tomorrow We are Free - directed by Hossein Pourseifi 

And one more movie based in the Middle East. Especially as based on a true story, Morgen sind wir frei - Tomorrow We are Free - is even sadder. The Iran-born living in Hamburg Hossein Pourseifi picked up a story of a Toudeh - the former Communist Party of Iran, once the biggest in the Middle East - militant and journalist - enchanted by the fall of the Shah to return in the country with his GDR scientist wife and daughter. His belief in the revolution - most probably not an ´Islamic´ one - was so great that blinded his sense of survival and he will end up being eaten up by the movement that was blindly supported without someone being able to endeavour its tragic development - except a very few who actually were in control from the very beginning. 

It was a pleasure to watch to great play of actors like Reja Brojerdi, Zahra Amir Ebrahimi (one of my favorite actors in this movie) and Katrin Röver. 

How many tomorrows will pass until freedom, real freedom will even happen?

The Notebook directed by János Szász

Movies set in a very complex political and historical context are always sad. The Notebook by the Hungarian film director János Szász, after a bestseller book by Agota Kristof, is deeply troubling. I rarely watch movies set in WWII as the real story about those terrible times I grew up with are enough for me. I don´t need any fictional representation either in books or movies.

However, I did it this time. The Notebook was revelatory for focusing the story mostly on the two twins growing up during the last years of the war with a stone-hearted grandmother they never met before, in a lost village at near the border. The soul can be hardened so fast and for ever. It takes shorter to turn a heart into stone than it takes to make it into flesh again. The hardships of the separation from their parents created a well of traumas that they learn to fight by all human means to counter. But there is one last trauma that took longer to live with: their own separation.

It is a sad and heartbreaking movie revealing the suffering of a whole post-war generation. My only solace was to be able to hear again the Hungarian language. 

Rating: 4 stars

The Young Marx directed by Raoul Peck

Last but not least, let´s finish my movie marathon with some nice Marxist talks. I was familiar with the film director, the Haitian Raoul Peck which has a movie-worth life himself, from a documentary about Patrick Lumumba which despite some clear bias is nevertheless a good contribution to the leftist film representations. The Young Marx features the late 20s of the founder of communism, the beginning of his friendship with Friedrich Engels, with accurate references to the outstanding pressure of the new social class of the proletariat brought up by the Industrial Revolution.

I would never refuse a discussion about the state of the world - proletariat included - while sipping from a glass of champagne on a comfy leather chair. With a revolutionary music background, probably. But let´s be honest: proletariat should leave their own social class if they want to turn into game changers. Otherwise, the daily hard work will never allow them the priviledge of spending not even an hour free of the capitalist pressure of producing - something, anything. 

In the movie, Marx wanted to spend his time writing and was a legitimate wish, while Engels was enabled to do as the son of his industrialist father. I am not too much into historical movies but I think that it is useful to watch The Young Marx for the discussions and some name dropping and the idea of beautiful intellectual friendships. Yeah, I know, I cannot run out of the profit-oriented (including intellectually) kind of life.

Rating: 3 stars

That´s all for July, but my long list of August movies is already in the making...

The Latest Book by Ottessa Moshfegh: Death in Her Hands

 

In the last weeks, I am doing my best to read as much as possible good literature in German, and even tried to read books originally published in English in translation. I don´t have a clear plan, I rather prefer to be taken by the wave of the instantly available titles from my online and physical local libraries.

Unsuccessful to get an ARC of the latest Ottessa Moshfegh´s, I waited until the translation was ready. Until reading Death in Her Hands, translated into German as Der Tod in ihren Händen by Anke Caroline Burger, my enthusiasm for her books was relatively limited. As limited as in really enticed by the writing but lacking any sympathy for the characters. But my perspective was wrong, because this is not how I am expected to behave towards the literary characters. I should read about them, get to know them and feel challenged by them, shocked and compelled to run out of my comfort zone.

During a random walk in the woods, Vesta Bruhl, the 72-year old widow living in a lakeside cabin with her dog Charlie and the ashes of her late husband discovers a scrap of paper with the following lines: ´Her name was Magda. Nobody will ever know who killed her. Wasn´t me. Here is her dead body´. 

What would you do when reading such a note? What would I do? I would just try to figure out the geography of the place and look for the body probably. Handing the note to the police would also be part of my scenario. But me, I am a very non-literary person in my everyday life. I operate with mathematic clarity and minimal emotions, although I love to read complex stories, sometimes with strong emotional emphasis. 

Vesta though, she is creating a story for Magda, a murder-thriller story, at the limit of mental insanity, using all the available resources, from AskJeeves to a pastor´s radio show. At a certain extent, Vesta is a kafkaesque character: with a life spent in the front of a closed door, she is gathering all her strength to get herself on the other side of life with the last energy breath. 

I´ve read a couple of reviews about the book outlining the crime/whodunit layer, but I´ve read the book differently. For me, it has more to do with the power of imagination and the ways in which the unexpected affects normal, very ordinary lives. Ordinary, at least the the first sight, as in fact, each existence is different and has its own story. Also Vesta´s. Sometimes, we need to embrace the power of the unexpected, that may be harder than life and place a bet. Even in the end we may end up completely overwhelmed by the genuine power of the event - in a very phenomenological sense of the world.

Death in Her Hands stirred in my mind so many questions about life´s way of playing with us and how to react to the unexpected - which, at a certain extent, is 90% of what happens to us. It inspires also thoughts about the power of the written words and how easily we can be taken away by the waves of the imagination. But the good news is that imagination is such a rich depository and this new book by Ottessa Moshfegh explores its limits until its very end, through prose and poetry and provocative thoughts.

A special mention for the cover of my German edition which adds the final aesthetic touch to an excellent translation. One day, I hope to have enough information to write an informative piece about the elegance of German book covers.

Rating: 5 stars

Random Things Tours: The Basel Killings by Hansjörg Schneider

 

One of my biggest literary achievements of the last months is to have come to know and read more Swiss authors. With the Switzerland National Day around the corner - 1st of August - and me still stuck in Germany for pandemic reasons, books offered me a virtual comeback in a country I have so many fond memories about - for all the good and wrong reasons. 

The Basel Killings by Hansjörg Schneider (translated into English by the Scotland-based Mitchell Mike) invited the reader into a slice of Switzerland one may rarely encounter - particularly if just getting the information about the country from glossy travel magazines or short touristic stops into the country. The Basel introduced by Schneider is mostly under the radar, with its red district and petty crime and a high level of intolerance towards foreigners, a category including all those without a couple of hundreds of years local lineage. Most likely this is the world that your average Swiss will experience on a everyday basis though.

The grumpy inspector Peter Hunkeler from the Basel City Criminal Investigation team is tracing a couple of strange crimes that might have been motivated by an ethnic reason. Coping with his aging limitations and with a life less than exemplary - among others, too many hours spent in the red district - Hunkeler is caught between his lifelong duty and the need to take a break from his past, purchase two donkey and spend the best of his time left in their company. Compared to the rough life of humans, donkeys sound as a reward, because most of the characters from this story are far from the glamorous characters of the pristine representations of Switzerland. They are real and direct and do have lost their way home or just want to forget completely who they once were. The reasons for hiding are diverse and so are their everyday life burdens. 

There is a big cast of characters mostly originary from the Balkans as there were many victims of the Yugoslav wars that were taken by the Swiss authorities and distributed within diferent cantons, the member states of the Swiss Confederation. At what extent those people were integrated and how they were locally treated is another story for another time and maybe another book. There is a slight confusion though as countries like Albania or Kosovo are not part of Central Europe, as it is mentioned in a kind of haste in one place. Switzerland´s treatment of its own minorities is a topic rarely approaches in the media or literary depictions therefore The Basel Killings has also an anthropolotical value besides the clear literary skills.  

The descriptions are often infused with references to social discrepancies and priviledges - here is an example of many: ´A state cripple, safeguarded against crises and destitution, secure in the Helvetian net of prosperous uprightness´ - , and some dialogues sound just raw, but so are the characters uttering them.

The pace is not necessarily alert but it flows in a daily life rythm which takes into consideration realistically the normal way of living. Fast forwarding facts and events is exciting for the reader but often disconnected from the reality. For this book, finding the murderer is less important than the construction of the plot as it gives time and space for filling up stories and create diverse characters with individual narratives spectaculary coming together in the end. There is a classical crime novel touch here that I always appreciate when it is set in different setting. 

Schneider is a playwriter and it is literally appreciated for the use of local dialects. If the richly worded translation of the book and the precision of the details recreated at a great extent the local ambiance in a theater-like installments, reading in translation took away from the curious language lover the richness of the dialects. Thus, I can only hope one day to be able to read this author in the original Swiss German language(s).

As The Basel Killings, winner of the prestigious Friedrich Glauser Prize, is the first from the Inspector Hunkeler series, I would definitely be curious to follow the next adventures. He is not at all the kind of person I would ever like to meet, but has a point and a good eye for an underworld that most people abroad never ever meet in real Swiss life. 

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review and as part of a blog tour, but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Random Things Tours: Under a Greek Moon by Carol Kirkwood

 

Summer books should not be easy or diabetically sweet or, in other words, cheap. Also books dealings with adventures set in Greece.

The debut novel by the popular weather British presenter Carol Kirkwood, Under a Greek Moon has all the glamour and fairy tale touch of a delicious summer novel, with a handsome Greek man in the shipping business living on an island. But, the dramatic twists and the revealing secrets - particularly towards the end of the story - make the book both entertaining and intellectually pleasant. 

Shauna Jackson´s may scream success but her life is more complex than the glamorous appearances. Recently widowed, entangled in a scandal so typical for the entertainment industry, yet inquisitive and good natured, jumping with grace over the life obstacles. And as we will find out shortly before the end of the story, she had a lot to cope in her life. And so had the handsome Greek Demetrios, with whom she is reunited after 20 years.

Under a Greek Moon is a story about traditional obligations towards parents and life struggles who are equally distributed no matter the social status and the size of the bank account. I appreciated the balance between the dialogues, the characters´ development and the plot construction. I would have been pleased to wait less until the two of them met again, but at a certain extent, it was worth waiting while getting to know the characters. Also the brand dropping was a bit too much sometimes, but it helps to create the glittering ambiance of the socialites with old and new money from all over the world, particularly places like LA or Monaco.

If you are lucky enough to visit Greece or just dreaming about reading while on a cruise crossing the seas, at least you have the book for now.

Rating: 3 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered part of the blog tour, but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Random Things Tours: The Matchmaker by Hélene Fermont

I cannot resist a matchmaker story, but The Matchmaker by Hélene Fermont is much much more than that. Set mostly in the rich London neighbourhood of Knitsbridge and Brighton´s expansive world of nightclubs, it revolves mostly around Marcia Bailey´s secret/second life.

´Marcia Bailey was a huge success yet very few people knew the real woman behind the successful facade´. Apparently though, there were many people who knew about her, roaming in her vicinity - geographical and physical, including as business partners and associates of her husband. However, her husband is the last to find out about her real self. After a mysterious call threatening to expose her adventures before she took the current name and the appearance, the situation escalates rapidly and soon she would be found murdered in her own luxurious home.

Instead of getting shorter, the list of potential suspects is permanently expanding. Her life as a very young woman in Brighton involved many men, particularly from one family or having to do with this family. However, the author is diplomatic enough to stop blaming the woman for the men shortcomings. Tracey/Marcia´s problematic background and family history are more relevant than stigmatising her for luring men, particularly one rich man, into her bed. Making accusations is not the real point, in fact. Finding the culprit and understanding his/her reasons it is.

Exploring the web of lies everyone is part thereof kept me interested in the book until the very end. The portrayal of mental health issues, faced by the unfortunate character Charles is one of the most appealing part of the book though. None of the characters are likeable and it seems that everyone is hiding behind a smokescreen of treacherous life episodes. Some weaker than the others, many do lack the basic self respect and are true believers of the idea that money can buy anything, particularly the moral sense. But would you really keep reading a book about perfectly honest and moral people? Are such individuals real, anyway?

I´ve appreciated the diverse cast of characters and the many surprising twists - actually, I´ve been so enthralled by the love story of Marcia and her husband that I didn´t expected the verdict, but that´s stupid me and love stories, I can´t believe they can ever end - but there is something that I´ve resented in this book. I love dialogues, good old dialogues as they gave a lot of spine and flesh to a book, espcially a fast-paced thriller. However, in The Matchmaker, there are mostly background voices who are filling the void regarding the past and the stories between characters. Too much background and monologues for my taste, which renders the writing a bit artificious. I´ve also had the feeling that some of the events are taking place too fast - like the selling of the matchmaking agency so fast after Marcia´s death or the change from rags to to riches of Marcia´s sister, Connie. 

As for the matchmaking, there are far more important things to deal with in this story...

Otherwise, if you are looking for an exciting summer read, with plenty of good twists, The Matchmaker is a great choice. Reading good thriller stories is one of my favorite ways to fill my Corona-marked life and anyone fighting to cope with pandemic-related restrictions should follow my example. It gives you the feeling that there are much more terrible things happening than being forced to spend an impressive amount of time within my small four walls.

Rating: 3 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review and as part of Random Things Tours, but the opinions are, as usual, my own.  

On Earth We´re Briefly Gorgeous

 

I love reading and I am reading a lot every single day, but lately I am rarely impressed deep until the most secret layers of my brain by a writer or a writing. Especially the writing.

Since I´ve read Ocean Vuong´s poetry collection I wanted to read his debut novel with a strong autobiographical layer On Earth We´re Briefly Gorgeous. Thanks to my generous libraries I am surrounded by, most of my bookish wishes are becoming reality. When the first book of an author left such a strong good impression, I am usually careful to not break the spell and wait a bit longer for the second one, but this time I simply couldn´t wait for too long. And my impatience was generously rewarded.

A Vietnamese-American queer son called Little Dog is writing a long letter to his illiterate mother, Rose. Raw, direct, emotionally intense yet simple in the choice of words and exquisite in the investigation of the feelings and their match into the mind and everyday reality, the book shares the same poetic touch, but transposed in a fictional environment it makes it even more pertaining. The son is observing the mother alone and during their direct interactions, the mother as a source of life and a direct connection to the past and present. It is through the mother and his mother´s mother that his integrity - as soul and body - is created and Vuong builds the perfect balance between the two. Hence, it´s organic originality of language and narrative. ´I hate and love your battered hands for what they can never be´. The mother is never answering but by concentrating the writing on a different person it gives direction and dedication to the story.

The writing is strong not only as essentially wordsmitten but for the purposeful sophistication of the simplicity. Through words, a whole world is remade and questioned. This is one of the many examples of writing: ´Some people say history moves in a spiral, not the line we have come to expect. We travel through time in a circular trajectory, our sintance increasing from an epicenter only to return again, one circle removed´. 

On Earth We´re Briefly Gorgeous is everything one lover of word(l)s can expect to read over and over again, one paragraph or page or book at a time.

Rating: 5 stars

Book Review: My Heart by Semezdin Mehmedinovic

 

How deep are the traces of memory! How deep our mind and our heart is connected and how a break of the heart my affect our mind, our memory of the present loss or the memories of the memories of this loss!

My Heart by Semezdin Mehmedinovic - translated from Bosnian by Celia Hawkesworth - published by Catapult reunited disparate fragments of the author´s life in America following his and his wife heart attacks. Essentially autobiographical, this short novel is also a kind meditation about the time passed and growing old - or growing up, depends who is in the center of the story - in a family dislocated by war. 

Language and its distorsions are a frequent topic. The author writes literature in Bosnian, his native language, although not living any more in his country of birth - once Yugoslavia, now Bosnia-Herzegovina. Compared to other exiled writers, he is not even trying to convene his thoughts and words in a translation. He´s radically dismissing the suggestion of one fellow writer he met in America to switch to his adopted language: ´(...) this one language in what I wrote was enough for me, and I wouldn´t want to change it´. Language is a creative prison and refusing to switch between cells is a very brave art of creation.

The family dynamics are treated with the deepest love and emotion. Either it is about his son, or his ailing wife, the ties that connect them are larger than life. A life lived together under the threat of a war, when even fellow literates like the once poet turned into perpetrator of mass-murderer, Radovan Karadzic. 

The relationships are shaped by those common memories created during times of hardship, like the Siege of Sarajevo (1992-1996). He said to his son: ´We are two bodies filled with trauma that were never appropriately treated´. And about his wife: ´But when I say, ´she´s my wife´, that is a simplification. She´s more than that. For instance, in 1993, during the siege of Sarajevo, a murderer pointed the barrel of a Kalashnikov at my chest. And she stepped between the gun and me´. 

Although there is a certain commonality with Mehmedinovic and other literary memoirs when dealing with coping with life abroad: from the challenges of the language to the difficulties of pronouncing his name, but what matters in such a situation is the quality of the testimony and the kindness of living the experience. 

I particularly loved the balanced voice for sharing such strong memories. The voice is not resentful or dramatic, but follows the flow of a smooth story recovering fragments of stories long stores in the shelves of memory. Memory, this traitor who treates both individuals and countries with the discontent of the time passed. 

My Heart opened a shelf of my literary and political memory long gone, from the times when I was not only reading about the Balkans and particularly the ex-Yugoslavia, but I also extensively travelled in this part of the world. Time to resurect my ´Balkan´ section of my virtual and physical library, maybe.

A special well deserved mention for the poetic cover, which encompasses so beautifully the essence of the writing.

Rating: 4 stars

Book Review: Out of Mesopotamia by Salar Abdoh

´A century had passed. Yet not a lot was different in this landscape. We were still fighting the same fight´. 

I read a lot and (almost) everything but I rarely read such intellectually troubling books like Out of Mesopotamia by Salar Abdoh. I read and write a lot about contemporary authors based in Iran or writing about Iran, in translation, but very often the stories are following a relatively common thread: a mention of the Shah times, maybe some references to Tudeh - once the biggest Communist Party in the Middle East - a couple of chapters where the action takes place during the coup against Mossadegh, the hard life under the mullahs of all colours and orientations. All those elements are important and do make sense for the Western audience but for someone interested in diversity and complexity this redundance convinces me rather to take long breaks between books with a Persian/Iranian topic.

Out of Mesopotamia is nothing like that. It´s brutal novelty is troubling though. 

Saleh, the storyteller, is a middle aged Iranian journalist, writing for a popular TV show and random art reviews. Willingly he is embedded with the Iranian forces fighting ISIS in Syria and Iraq. ´What were we doing here? Vultures perched on Mesopotamia´s tired bones´. He is not a fanatic believer and none of his companions really are. ´Martyrdom was our shibboleth; we distinguished each other´s sincerity by the way someone talked too little or too much about it´. But everything has a price. ´Our vocation of martyrdom had prices and estimations, it seemed. The war too had turned into an auction. And the martyrs were the works being sold´. The families of those dying as martyrs are offered benefits and even a special social status. Most got a fair refund for the dead one. 

Saleh is not a rebel, he is a fish in the water when he is observing his comrades and also in Tehran, where he goes to art galleries or to cafés. He is also accepting the transition of his comrades from fully humans to just body parts. As a member of the Defenders of the Holy Places he is offered serious material for writing the script for a movie, but his idea is stolen by someone else. The woman he fancied - not loved, not even liked - married his boss at the newspaper. 

Their present life is underline by the curse of the 1919 Sykes-Picot Agreement, when UK and France, with the benediction of the Russian Empire and Italy, agreed secretly how to slice the dying Ottoman Empire. Maybe after all I have to accept as well the many curses of the Middle East random geographies. 

But more than the curses and the intellectual lowliness of Saleh, the very subject of the book is intellectually and morally challenging. There is no induced opinion about what and whom the reader should consider good and what bad. People are fighting one against the other, as they did for centuries. They do have families and their own stories and emotions and hopes. There is even one guy who is reading The Remembrance of All Things Past by Proust and engages in intellectual/literary conversations. 

In a landscape of conflictual memories and religious inimities, we the Westerners are rarely aware of in their smallest details. ´We were ruined and romantic at the same time. There was a reason that Lawrence of Arabia had gotten carried away with himself in these landscapes and wrote about it, as if he were writing about something divine´.

Should we be judgemental about the topic? Be in awe that such people are becoming literary characters? Consider of maybe diminishing the political responsibility of their commanders based on the induced accidents of history and geography and geopolitics? Condemn the cruelty of the war, any war? What about giving up any clear ideological stance and enjoy reading the story? Imagine that world and cities and cafés populated not by mystical djinns from story books translated for the taste of Western readers but by fighters coming back from work on the fields on two feet or in several pieces. 

Also, I don´t remember to have read any recent Iranian-based novel featuring a synagogue as a random part of the urban landscape. Just an observation.

Personally, I have doubts about the real meaning of embedding journalists. On one hand it may offer a kind of protection - not guaranteed though as happened in the case of the Pulitzer-winning journalist Danish Seddiqi - but obviously the sources of information the journalist is offered are largely biased. They are a kind of press trips for the war journalists. 

But maybe, as in life, it is much appreciated to stop judging and just listen to the story? Are we moral beings enough when we don´t use our moral compass to compare and evaluate and dismiss? How are the cardinal points of this compass set up? etc. etc.

What a book...

Rating: 4 stars

Random Things Tours: Writers vs. Censorship

 

The worst thing it can happen to a writer or a journalist writing in a world regulated by censorship is to interiorize the pace and rules of the forbidden words. Self-censorship is the final stage of a social illness induced with the fist of political randomness. Actually, it´s impossible to predict which topics may be more dangerous than the others, as the list of potential risks is permanently expanding. The criteria are mostly random, as influenced by the personality and fears of the censor as well. In some dystopic context, even a childish line about blue flowers in the park can be considered subversive because, who knows, the author wanted to send a secret message calling for a protest in the park.

I´ve read those stories of writers facing different kinds of censorship from all over the world with a wide curiosity. The styles are different and so are the topics and personal experiences. Writers from London, Capetown, Manchester, US, Chile, Iran, Zambia and Nigeria are offering first hand literary stories about the pervasiveness and complexity of censorship. Controlling the body or the mind or both is the final aim of the censorship and the mortal danger for the workers with words.

With a foreword by Guardian journalist Coco Khan (The Good Immigrant, It´s not about the Burqa) and illustrations by Daniel Clarke, Aiden Shaw´s Penis & Other Stories of Censorship from Around the World is a wide opening testimony that should definitely continue. Only the power of stories about censorship, revealing how naked the king is in fact, can break the long lists of forbidden words of censorships. Thus, the writers and journalists writing under pressure will know that there is in fact an end and their words are powerful enough to break the walls. One story at a time.

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered part of a book tour, but the opinions are, as usual, my own.

Corylus Books Blog Tour: Little Rebel by Jérôme Leroy (trans. by Graham Roberts)

 

Less than 80 pages but what a ride Little Rebel by Jérôme Leroy (translated from French by Graham Roberts) is! The latest publication by the courageous Corylus Books whose politically and literally challenging novels I had the chance to review before, this book is unexpectedly good not only in terms of the topic - identity politics in France - but as an impeccable work of literature.

Taking place in an unnamed city in the West of France, it unfolds - faster and faster until the end - in point-counterpoint kind of episodes, starting from the accidental shooting of an officer of the Drench Directorate for Internal Security until the very thrilling end. It unfolds as a historical chronicle of our busy hectic - both physically and intellectually - kind of times, controlled by the narrator who may decide - or not - to share with us details of the life of the characters as projected in an unclear future. In this very complex and detailed construction, the characters, all of them, including and especially Little Rebel are just pawns randomly played on a chessboard where victory is the last achievement that really matters. Rather, it´s the excitement of the game who really matters and I am thankful for the healthy adrenaline rush I´ve been shared during the short reading of the book. (Actually, I´ve read it twice, for all the good book-reviewing reasons, of course.)

Indeed, if it is something that really bothered me was the relative shortness of Little Rebel. However, the author is such an architect of the words and plot construction that I am left with no literary regrets only with the insatisfaction that something so good just ended way too fast.

As a very political reader, I´ve appreciated the unorthodox spinning of the story: instead of following the classical clash of religions and civilisations patterns, it adds an unexpected element that you´ll better discover by yourself. Hint: not all people frustrated with the social order are on social media.

Launched on Bastille Day, Little Rebel is an useful mental map of nowadays France, with its many micro-societies and burning questions. A thoughtful inconvenient read that stays with you for a very long time. 

Rating: 4.5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

A Woman on Her Own Terms

There is always something wrong when political regimes are based on religious inspirations. No matter the religion, an involvement of religious people - predominantly men - in the everyday management of politics will end up in oppression and disrespect of basic human needs and rights. Obviously, those men of faith consider themselves inspired by their imagined relationship with the holy powers and request obedience based on this projection that rather has its place in a psychiatric hospital than on the hallways of a government. 

I respect everyone´s religion until it is turned into a weapon of everyday oppression.

Abnousse Shalmani´s father decided to leave Iran for offering to his rebelious daughter freedom from a religious practice she rejected in the most frontal way, by showing to the guardians of morality the part of her body that it is always hidden. I can imagine the shock of the chadori women upon being faced with such a radical act of protest. But repeated, such an act can only lead to serious attacks against individual freedoms.

Once arrived in France, until 13, she wanted to be both Emile Zola (that she thought it was, in fact, a woman) and Madonna. Her love for France and its Enlightenment remained, as she will never forget to disavow the inadequacies of the religious police she had a close look from a very early and formative age. 

Khomeiny, Sade et moi is partly a memoir, partly an open pledge for respect of women´s rights and dignity. Although France is far from being a good example of tolerance and even secularism can become suffocating towards individual endeavours and diverse identities, it offered to people like Shalmani and her family a safe place. Especially today, on Bastille Day, it´s a good reminder of France´s role in offering a safe heaven to freedom thirsty from all over the world. 

Altough I´ve found the book repetitive sometimes, with the same topic said in different ways but without bringing anything new to the narrative, I´ve appreciated the open mind and the joyful style, the searches of a woman to define herself on her own terms. 

Rating: 3 stars

Children Book Review: Eyes that Kiss in the Corners

 

There is such a deep happiness to finally be able to read a book you wanted to - for all the very good reasons - for a very long time. Especially when it is such a beautiful story.

Eyes that Kiss in the Corners by Joanna Ho, illustrated by Dung Ho has a touch of beauty that you rarely encounter - both in books and in real life - those days. I´ve read it to my son several times because both of us could not have enough of the images that seem to tell the story from heart to heart. 

The language is equally evocative and empathic. Those eyes that ´kiss in the corners and glow like warm tea´ are a generational pattern but through them, there are thousands of stories told and remembered. Indeed, not all eyes look the same, but each pair are a beautiful mirror through the soul and those stories are rich and deeply connect generations. 

My only issue for me had to do with language though. As this picture book is recommended for children between 2 and 7 years old, I´ve found the final sentence of the book a little bit difficult to explain to my (almost) 6 yo son. What is a ´revolution´ and how can I explain it in a very easy, childish way?

This book is a recommended read for understanding from an early age the differences which make us unique, as well as the respect towards differents heritage and physical appearances. We need more and more such stories to be told to our children. I will definitely be sure to include Joanna Ho´s next books on my list of multicultural reads. 

Rating: 4.8 stars

Wuhan Memories

 

There must be somewhere a book - or maybe two - about the representation of China in the French literature and/or everyday psyche. If the Middle East is usually represented as a geography where France can do its best by condescending helping those nations to shine culturally and politically, China is often regarded with awe and fear. Alain Peyrefitte, long-time confident of Charles de Gaulle and diplomat warned that the world will shake when China will wake up (the original title of his book was: Quand la Chine s´eveillera...le monde tremblera). I also remember a random Sci-Fi book I´ve found in our vast library by a French author whose name I never knew, which ends with an apocalyptic image of the end of times when a couple of Chinese - bluntly depicted as ´yellow´ - are the only survivors of a deadly war of the worlds. They were supposed to rebuild the new post-atomic or of any other deadly nature floods. 

Un hiver à Wuhan by Alexander Labruffe is shaken by apocalyptic blows by the very nature of the moments most of the events reflected are taking place: Wuhan shortly before the outburst of what we designate nowadays as Covid19 pandemic. As a cultural attaché he is shortly facing the realities of a dystopic world overwhelmed by pollution and permanent grotesque supervision of foreigners. The dispersed fragments of the reality are interferred with memories of another stay in the same place, 20 years ago, when Labruffe, a Chinese language graduate, worked there as a kind of technical supervisor for products supposed to be sent to Europe. 

The serious environmental problems, the hunt for foreigners to both control - including by scaring them with visits in the middle of the night for various ID checking (episodes that I´ve been several times told about by friends who worked and lived in China for various amounts of time) - but use as an important linguistic and relational tool (betting that a foreigner representing a Chinese company in the West will have a serious advantage in convincing the same West of the viability of the quality of the business offer). 

The serious problem is that those attempts are considered as clear proof of a threat coming from China, a conquest through all means. Meanwhile, let´s continue business as usual anyway and leave it to the scribblers the duty of amplifying the threats and complaining about the inevitable end of the world.

Un hiver à Wuhan is a short (kind of) diary but in full honesty, I did not feel impressed at all. Would have expected at least a bit more of sense of humour and maybe some genuine human stories, instead of the ´we´ vs. ´them´ kind of approach, vomited by fear from the top of the imaginary superiority ladder. 

Rating: 2 stars 

Book Review: Children of War by Ahmet Yorulmaz

´(...) what kind of sin is that we´re paying for?´

The cruelty humans are keen to inflict to each other for reasons pertaining to religious, cultural or historical reasons, or all at once plus racism is never ending. The more I delve into the world history, the more I see how no nation or group seems to be safe from the mortal sin of hating the other, for reasons that have less to do with the human nature, but more with inherited traits that no one can really avoid or change overnight.

Children of War by Ahmet Youlmaz, translated by Paula Darwish is the first-person story of Hassanakis, a former resident of Creta where his family settled for 15 generations. As a consequence of the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne who allowed the deportation of 1.8 Million Turks to mainland Turkey, plus a love affair with a Greek-Christian woman, he is forced to start a new life. Originally written in Turkish, it was inspired by three notebooks left by a Cretan refugee who died in Ayvalik, Turkey in 1948. The author familiar was no strager to his parents were Cretan deportees themselves.

It is a slow paced, evocative story, with a fast forward timeline and many observations about the human psychology, particularly when it comes to the neighbours who are suddenly becoming enemies or the people who never met before deciding to take accountable for all their shortcomings the members of a different cultural group. The Balkans, the Middle East, Europe during WWII has plenty of such stories to tell. Sad stories about the volatility of human fate and relationships. 

For the Cretan Turks, a new trauma was waiting as they arrived in the homeland they never been before: many did not speak the language and they were unwelcomed anyway. In a limbo between countries and cultures, they remained nostalgic about the life as it once been, the graves of their parents left in a country where they most probably not come back. 

The book includes many historical references and notes which are helpful for acknowledging the historical context and the political evolutions. Therefore, the book is both informative and relevant as a story in itself set in a dramatic historical time.

Although I was deeply delved into the story, my honest explanation is because of the novelty of the topic for me, as well as the recognition of elements that I was familiar with from other contexts. Those details put aside, I´ve found the story relatively simple and more focused on the events than on a coherent plot or the encounters between the characters. It follows a relatively simple line and it is nothing wrong with it. Only that I am that kind of multi-tasking reader that wants sparkles of intellectual excitement on every page. That´s one of the reasons I usually avoid historical fiction, because it is rarely enough.

Children of War - the name of a taverna - is nevertheless an important reading in a syllabus of historical and cultural references, dislocation and identity trauma. Unfortunately, the list is growing bigger and bigger every day.

Rating: 3 stars 

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Random Things Tours: Crossfire by RD Nixon

 

What happens when you add in the same storyline: an unsolved murder, old wounds, coming-of-age stories, betrayal and a bit of Scottish Highlands? Invaluable ingredients for a heart-beating crime novel.#

Crossfire by R.D.Nixon is the first installment from the Clifford-Mackenzie Crime Series and as an opening, it promises a lot of crime-related entertainment. The dynamic of characters and the ways in which their relationships evoluate or deteriorate are an important element in developping the story. The crescendo of the tension, once the final elements of the story are revealed is important in creating an ambiance unique to the story, which one may carry on with long after the book is over. 

It is always a pleasure for the reader to be offered a complete immersion into story, landscape and secret life of the characters and Crossfire has those perfectly plotted elements which convince. Writing gives the power of creating a world in itself and while reading this book I´ve enjoyed being on a ride through the fragments of the story and witnessing how they matched together. 

The music references are equally an important element which create the specific ambiance of the book. I wish there are books that can create also soundtracks that may accompany the book, preferably as recommendations to listen while reading the book itself.

As for now, I can´t wait to read the next Clifford-Mackenzie Crime Series. Really curious about the next topic and the author´s art of writing and storytelling.

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of a book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own

Book Review: The Devil´s Road to Kathmandu by Tom Vater

 

Once upon a time, not so long ago, people used to travel en masse to places like Kabul or Peshawar. On the board of the Magic Buses, adventurers hippies were going Far East looking for enchantement, drugs and alternative realities. I am not sure if those frequent contacts with the local cultures and humans contributed to a different perception of those places, or a higher tolerance, but in any case, I suppose the awareness and the acknowledgement for the existence of those places was higher than nowadays. 

Dan, Fred, Tom and Thierry are four of those people, four friends on their way around the region. On their way to Kathmandu, they are getting involved in various drug-related incidents and adventures. One of them, Fred, will simply disappear once they arrived at their destination. With him, an important amount of drug money. 25 years later, the story is revived and the friends, and Dan´s son are about to return to Kathmandu to reveal an old mystery and many human truths.

Beyond the very loaded action line, which appeals to the action-thirsty reader, The Devil´s Road to Kathmandu by the author and journalist Tom Vater has very fine human observations and a well-tempered timeline. The idea of coming back and forth from a period of time to another is a frequent choice of plot development, but it is not a guarantee for a great story as it can only split the events without securing a proper story flow. In this case though, the two timelines - 1970s and 2000s - are well connected and enrich the narrative mutually. It creates the background for further story developments and setting of new actions. 

Another part of the book that I loved was the local ambiance and the picturesque landscapes featured. As someone dearly missing travel right now and always on sought for travel writing inspiration, the book has good samples of wordsmitten descriptions of far away places.

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the author in exchange for an honest review  

Book Review: Memorial by Bryan Washington

´But I guess that´s the thing: we take our memories wherever we go, and what´s left are the ones that stick around, and that´s how we make a life´.

Good, warmhearthed, empathic people are underrated in the contemporary literature. 

Memorial by Bryan Washington is debut novel whose perceptive writing is like no other books I´ve read before. 

Benson, Black and Mike, Japanese, are a couple living in a gentrified neighbourhood in Houston, Texas. Their relationship has ups but many downs, both carrying the weight of complex family dynamics which includes the acceptance of their coming out and after all, identity. As Mike is unexpectedly leaving to Japan to assist his dying father, Eiju, his mother, will come to the US and will remain meanwhile in their flat. Her limited English knowledge is compensated by the food she loves to cook for Benson. 

Both the writing and storytelling style are simple, without adornments but flowing in a way which is unique. The choice of words on one side and the simplicity and clarity of the story are contributing in making up an account which resonates with the layer of humanity in the reader.

The impulse of helping and being empathic towards each other are coming up naturally, in the most possible human way. It´s not negotiable and therefore very beautiful. There may not be high stakes, passion and take-it-or-leave-it kind of approaches. In real life we rarely have this luxury, as most of us we are floating in between words, stranded between the possible ´no´ and impossible ´yes´.

I don´t remember when I´ve been so literarily pleasantly enchanted by a book but now I have a bookish memory to carry with me on the mind maze of my libraries.

Rating: 4.5 stars

Book Blog Tour: Tally and the Angel by Eleanor Dixon

 

As a midgrade (very) bookish child, I was fascinated by books set in faraway lands. Thanks to some of those books I decided, later as an adult to spend as much time as possible on the road, discovering other cultures, languages and people from different - sometimes very far away - lands. 

While reading Tally and the Angel by Eleanor Dixon I was took back to those times, when I immersed in worlds that looked mostly the product of literary imaginations than real places on the physical map. Nevertheless, I insisted to dream that one day I will visit them for sure. Sooner than later.

It happens that I have been in India before, the place where most of the action in the book one from the series is happening. However, in comparison with Tally, the brave young girl who is the main character in the book, I was not lucky enough to be supported by a real angel to get into serious investigations. 

Trying to recover after the tragical death of her mother, Tally is moving to India with his father. With the help of Angel Jophiel - according to Kabbalah, the guardian of wisdom - she is about to discover where the kidnapped kids of India are gone. 

Dixon is skilfully integrating elements of personal loss and suffering into a general - political and social narrative - through the eyes and actions of a young teenage girl. I was pleased by the natural, drama-free approach of loss, but also about the role of exposure to different cultures and approaches as part of an individual healing process. Growing up and stepping into adulthood means also acknowledging the power of good and evil and how those values may happen often to be inter-changeable. 

In Tally and the Angel those - sometimes bitter - life lessons are not offered as a lecture, but part of the individual development of the characters and the general book action. I was particurly pleased also by the local descriptions set in India and I am looking forward to the next installments in the series. 

The chapters are short, concise enough for the limited attention span of the nowadays teenagers, and the discrete visual snapshots are an attractive adornment for the readers´ eyes. 

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered part of a book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own.

Historical Fiction Book Review: The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner

 ´History doesn´t record the intricacies of women´s relationships´.

As a person who is often charmed by beautiful covers, I may say that The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner has without a hint of doubt a very beautiful visual appearance. I had access to the paperback and there is nothing special about the lettering or the interior design, but the cover is standing out by its beautiful simplicity.

Now, let´s move a bit further to the book itself. I may confess that I am more nuanced and conflicted about the topic and particularly its approach.

The Lost Apothecary is a told mostly through women voices. There are three women whose stories are creating fragments of a bigger story set in London 200 years ago: Nella who inherited an apothecary that will be used for creating deadly poisons aimed particularly at unfaithful men, Eliza, her short-time 12-year old accidental apprentice and the American Caroline who´s about to break free from her unfulfilled family life, particularly after discovering her 10-year husband unfaithfullness. 

While on a random tour, Caroline discovers a jar with some old inscriptions that will lead her to the stories of Nella and Eliza. As on purpose, hoping that one day history will be written differently, taking into account the small people too, Nella is keeping a record of the different potions and the clients. Through her historical investigations - that are taking place within a couple of days only - Caroline can find a couple of puzzle missing and even trace the two women, although the latest records - media articles - mention their death, while being followed by local police forced, following the revelation of their deadly business.

The idea of unearthing individual stories of nameless people is excellent and the episoded placed at the end of the 18th century are well crafted. However, once the action is taking place in our times, the inaccuracies abound. As someone familiar with historical research, finding so many relevant details of a story mentioned in maximum two articles, in just a couple of days is largely impossible. 

Another problem I had with the storyline has to do, again, with the present-time situation. Caroline seems to react as she knows already the information shared by the women from the 18th century, which is largely unlikely. She takes for granted information that are known to the reader but are not supposed to be known by her. 

Caroline´s personal details and her relationship with her husband are often presented in a hurry which steal from the consistency of the characters´ personality. Last but not least, I can understand her hurry to take off from her previous life, but there may be a time - at least couple of days - between submitting your application to Cambridge and being accepted. In the book, she sent the application and overnight was accepted which is again, less likely to happen in real academic life.

Despite my observations and criticism, The Lost Apothecary has some generous good ideas about women solidarity and women in history. It´s just my fault - not the first, probably not the last - for being disappointed of not reading a book at least at the same standard with its cover. Childish, superficial me...

Rating: 2.5 stars

Random Things Tours: The Secret War by Louise Burfitt-Dons

The reason I am so much interested in reading as many books as possible that are set during the last Covid-year is my curiosity for literary interpretations of ongoing socila and political events. Catastrophies of all kind are a volatile yet inspiring environment therefore my almost impulsive reaction to abandon anything else for a sip of literary reality.

The Secret War by Louise Burfitt-Dons is the third book from the series featuring police investigator Karen Andersen. I haven´t read the previous ones but it was no problem for me to focus and understand the latest installment. Starting in the UK - Liverpool - but with ramifications all over the world, mostly China and US, the book is a fast-speed political thriller with international implications. Andersen has a seven-day deadline to stop a deadly biological attack on New York city controlled by a conservative division of the Chinese Communist Party. It displays the dangers of bioterrorism in a world confused by fake news and unreliable online information, in a time of world crisis.

The topic in general is very sensitive and requires a smooth and smart approach which Louise Burfitt-Dons skilfully did. Many of the international references are on point and it creates a great background for the unfolding actions and particular story, without oversimplifications and easygoing stereotypes. I am not extremely pleased by the cover is despite being spectacular and colourful it is stereotypically inaccurate - which Communist Chinese is dressed like this, anyway - but otherwise the story is purely inspired on various scenarios and geopolitical assumptions. 

The book reads fast, with the rapid fire of words being exchanged between the characters and fast successions of scenery. I can see this book as a good action movie too.

The Secret War is a recommended reading choice for anyone passionate about political thrillers with a taste for world threats during threatening times. 

Rating: 3 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of a book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own.

Book Review: Carnaval Noir by Metin Arditi

 

I read a lot, and almost everything, but nothing will have my attention for hours in a row than an alert story where politics, history and religion are mixed creatively. For the long summer days of no-travel - at least for now - I collected mountains of books, some of them written by completely authors I am slowly discovering those days. 

As it seems that I do miss Switzerland more than I am willing to admit, I keep reading some of its contemporary star authors. Like, for instance, Metin Arditi. Of Turkish-Sephardi origin, living in the French part of Switzerland, his books are often inspired by the daily political realities and old historical struggles translated into modernity.

Carnaval Noir - Black Carnival -  enters into the intricated net of conservative Catholics aimed to revive a 4-century old prophecy. As in the 16th century, those who happen to enter in touch with various details of the story may pay with their lives. The chief of the Catholic Church himself is supposedly the target of a complex assasination plot which would prevent the eventuality of a wide plan of reforms. 

The topic is elaborated and the historical and political details are coming together in a smooth, creative way. The characters do have complex biographies and the suspense is built-up with intensity from an episode to another. The details are academically elevated but without overloading a reader not necessarily familiar with European religious history and political tendencies within the Vatican. Set between the 16th and the 21st century, between Italy and Switzerland, Carnaval Noir plays with historical geographies and topics of current interest, such as the anti-immigration policies or the clash between conservative politics and modern democratic tendencies.

My biggest regret is that there is a relative overload of events and characters and given the complexity of the situations they fail from not being consistent enough. Also, the pace seems to slow down with no reason in the middle of a relatively tensed episode when the reader is already prepared for more adventures.

There is also a slight error, as there is a mention of ´Königsberg´ as a Turkish Berlin borough, instead of probably ´Kreuzberg´. I swore I´ve seen this error before, but cannot remember exactly who made it and where. 

I am ready to read more books by Arditi as it seems he is often writing about topics that I cannot and don´t want to resist.

Rating: 3 stars