Crime Fiction

Discovered this little grab of two short stories whilst wandering around the KOBO site recently (love love love my Android Tablet and the way I can have multiple bookshops at my fingertips), but I saw this and thought I've not read any early Val McDermid stories for a long time, so why not.

The best thing about this is that idea of going back to the starting out of a character and a series. I don't think, by any stretch of the imagination, that you could suggest these are the most indepth, intricate and complicated plots that you've ever read in crime fiction, but they certainly were enjoyable little stocking fillers, ideal for a quick read over a stinking hot post-Christmas period.

You know how the rule goes, you're not supposed to barrack for the "bad guy", but seriously there's no way I wasn't totally and absolutely on Osgood Sneddon's side from the start. I mean Osgood? No wonder he uses the jokingly dubbed alias of Furt Bent from Aldaheit. Which is just silly, even if you can pronounce Aldaheit and goodness knows I changed my mind a 1000 times about how to.

When I wasn't being thoroughly and completely entertained by FURT BENT FROM ALDAHEIT that is. It's a book that combines good pace and action with a dry and quite dark sense of humour, highlighting a central character, who despite being a delinquent thief and troublemaker, is somebody that you just kind of have to end up liking. A Lot.

Having a little peak around post reading the book I believe some of the action could have been inspired by some true life events in New Zealand, which is rather intriguing, as a lot of the action is quite out there. Sneddon is not your run of the mill kid as he manages to survive in the very dangerous world of crime and prison using a combination of wit, brains and sheer gall. A determined, resourceful and relentless survivor, he's a kid that packs a hell of lot into a very short life. There are other characters built into the story, the obvious one being DI Hubbard, and whilst that supporting cast are believable people, they are inevitably a supporting cast. This book is all about Osgood Sneddon and it does a very good job of that. FURT BENT FROM ALDAHEIT was an unexpected, and very engaging pleasure to read.

(Read as an ebook from Amazon)
 

It's almost impossible now to read these books and not have visions of the perfect Essie Davies as Phryne in the TV series wafting elegantly before your eyes. Which actually enhances the storylines as, although always beautifully described and outlined by Greenwood, she now has a physicality and a more three dimensional feel. It also didn't hurt that the dialogue, which was always crisp, sharp, clever and funny, has a voice as well.

I sort of lost my way with the Phryne Fisher series somewhere back in the middle of what is now 19 books, and it was actually sharing the listening to the audio books with himself in the car that rekindled interest. It's too easy to forget the humour, and the gentle social commentary in these books, especially when the cover art and the blurbs often tend to suggest that there's something slightly on the cosy side about the series. Whilst the delivery might be cleverly on the lighter side, and the humour subtle and very tongue in cheek, the plotlines are often veering into non-cosy territory (as does Miss Fisher's love life), but possibly, to my memory, never quite so pointedly as in UNNATURAL HABITS.

For a book that's set in 1929 there's something depressingly current day about the main storyline - the mistreatment, abuse and exploitation of young girls. Girls who are the victims of rape, abuse, poverty, neglect or simply girls who made a mistake, they were abandoned to systems and organisations which, whilst carefully revealed in UNNATURAL HABITS, were obviously appalling. Whilst Greenwood is cautious in her revelations of details of what went on, there is no masking the revulsion and disapproval of the institutions and facilities that treated young women, and their babies with such awful cruelty. It's the restraint with which many of the observations are made that makes them all the more pointed.

As with all things Phryne however, this is not a single stream plot. In the search for missing young girls, Phryne encounters a variety of establishments and people from the "gentlemen-only" Blue Cat Club, to the farming commune of women in Bacchus Marsh, and a brush with the "middle-class" which seems to have the potential to derail Phryne more than any of society's "fringe dwellers" ever would. In a particularly satisfying sidebar, there's also the small matter of a vigilante anaesthetising and surgically, and very skilfully, sterilising serial women abusers.

Melbourne, and Greater Victoria, are always lovingly rendered in these books. There's obviously considerable research into the locations of the period, but the books never read as a geographical treatise. The action insinuates itself into the landscape of the time beautifully, the little details of what Phryne sees, and experiences, come alive for the reader, transporting you back, for example, to the fledgling Apple Orchards of Bacchus Marsh and surrounds.

As you'd expect, there is quite a bit of ladylike and very non-ladylike action in these books. Phryne commits acts of daring doing in order to save the day, ably assisted by her retinue of minions (now where have I heard that word before...). Her household continues to evolve, her wardrobe to beguile, and her Melbourne enchant. You can't help but foster a sneaking desire for an Adventuresses Club, to see the wonder of the Blue Cat Club, and the Block Arcade as it was then.

UNNATURAL HABITS, by dint of the subject matter that it tackles, seems to have headed off into slightly darker territory than previous books, but it does it elegantly, and with the same sense of wrongs to be righted, offences to be avenged, and life to be lived.

It's hard not to sympathise with Montalbano about the heat. Especially as I sit here trying to write this note on a 38°C day. With a worse one to come. It's something that was really particularly marked in this book - the way the heat became a part of the story, just as the sense of place, and character is so very strong. You could see Montalbano and his colleagues slogging out an investigation in the dreadful heat. You could sympathise with him when the holiday house from hell reared its ugly head, and you definitely could understand how he might be tempted by the twin-sister of the murder victim, no matter how wrong it seems.

At the heart of the book is another tightly constructed plot with aspects of the political and the Mafia built in, but not in a manner overwhelming. This isn't a story about the Mafia's control, rather it's a story about the possible outcomes, the idea that some people might be protected as a result of their connections. And it's a story, as always, about Montalbano's dogged pursuit of the truth. To the detriment of a lot around him. Except his meals of course. Some things are sacrosanct.

At this time of the year for some reason, goodness knows what, I crave dark, violent, humorous escapism. I crave pulp, noir, hardboiled, I'll even happily take nasty. THE COLOMBIAN MULE delivered exactly what I was looking for.

It doesn't hurt that this isn't a police procedural, a stereotypical lone wolf private detective or any of the expected scenarios as well. Instead we do have a PI, who works with a group of old friends, to solve problems. In this case, the problem is why one man seems to have been set up to take the fall as the recipient of drugs smuggled in by a Columbian man who has a big reason to be worried about himself. What doesn't make sense is why he's seemingly identified the wrong man as his contact. Our hero, ex-con, former blues singer, fixer, secret bar owner and his intrepid team set out to work out what the real story is.

The book is sparse, tight and beautifully balanced, with not an excess word in sight. Peopled with some very original characters, who slide and dodge their way through life, with every action, every act, tempered by the understanding of what doing time in jail will do to a man.