{"id":8319,"date":"2020-01-06T08:02:23","date_gmt":"2020-01-06T13:02:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8319"},"modified":"2020-01-06T08:09:37","modified_gmt":"2020-01-06T13:09:37","slug":"3-top-notch-foreign-crime-novels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8319","title":{"rendered":"3 Top-Notch Foreign Crime Novels"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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High-velocity plots and gritty characters typify American and British crime thrillers. Yet, this style is an artistic (and marketing) choice, not a precondition for gripping fiction. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are three recent crime novels from Nigeria, Argentina, and India that I enjoyed tremendously that stand up to the US\/UK\u2019s best. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

*****My Sister, the Serial Killer<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Oyinkan Braithwaite \u2013 For a book about violent death and two sisters\u2019 efforts to cover it up, this entertaining fiction debut from Nigerian writer Oyinkan Braithwaite is remarkably full of life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can\u2019t help but be charmed by the narrator Korede, who early on in her tale provides this advice: \u201cI bet you didn\u2019t know that bleach masks the smell of blood.\u201d It\u2019s a lesson she\u2019s learned the hard way, covering up her sister Ayoola\u2019s crimes now three times. The sisterly bond is more than the glue in this story; ultimately it is its subject.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Braithwaite infuses her narrative\nwith insights into the culture, not only of Lagos, Nigeria, where the story is\nset, but also of the hospital where Korede works\u2014the rivalries among the women\nstaff and the administrators who do not lead. There\u2019s not a shred of meanness\nin any of this, and much of it is quite funny. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Braithwaite\u2019s light touch when exploring serious matters and the extraordinary honesty of the writing prompted numerous media outlets to name it one of the best books of last year, garnered it a 2019 Booker Prize nomination, and a made it a finalist for the 2019 Women\u2019s Prize, among other honors. Best of all, it\u2019s fun! Order it here.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

*****The\nFragility of Bodies<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

By Sergio Olgu\u00edn and translated by Miranda France \u2013 This award-winning Argentine novelist\u2019s fast-paced 2012 crime novel is only now available in English. With all the elements of an engaging, visually arresting drama, no wonder it became an eight-episode tv series in 2017.<\/em> The protagonist is a crusading reporter who acts with dedication and truth-telling, and if you enjoy the banter and oneupsmanship of the newsroom, as I do, you\u2019ll find those scenes entertaining indeed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Glamorous investigative journalist Ver\u00f3nica Rosenthal lives a privileged life in Buenos Aires. She\u2019s pursued by attractive men, has loads of friends, drinks and smokes too much, but she\u2019s serious about her investigative work. As a character, she\u2019s fully developed, as are most of the men she interacts with, old and young, and there are some steamy sex scenes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A\nwire service blurb about the suicide of a railway worker captures her attention\nwhen it quotes the man\u2019s apology for the crimes he committed, especially the\ndeath of a child. Was the letter a confession or an explanation? Suicide by\ntrain is rather common, she learns. The drivers of the killer trains see the\ncatastrophe coming, yet are helpless to prevent it. Some can never drive again.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worse, on one specific train line, pairs of young boys are playing chicken with the speeding trains, and, occasionally, one waits too long to jump out of the way. Olgu\u00edn makes the boys\u2019 contests\u2014how they think about them, how they prepare\u2014into high-tension, truly horrifying encounters, and the closer Ver\u00f3nica gets to the truth behind this diabolical game, the greater the danger to her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The admirable translation by Miranda France is so smooth, you\u2019re never aware it actually is<\/em> a translation. An unusual, brilliant read. Order it here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*****Miss\nLaila, Armed and Dangerous<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

By\nManu Joseph \u2013 When an apartment building collapses in Mumbai, the lone survivor\nis a man filled with regrets, and complicated efforts are under way to extricate\nhim from the rubble. The catastrophe coincides with the election victory of a\nconservative Hindu nationalist party, and the influence of politics on the\ncharacters in the past and in the current emergency is never far away. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author Joseph is known for his biting political satires, and the significance of this book is enhanced by his sly observations about the state of Indian politics. (If you read Dexter Filkins\u2019s recent reporting<\/a> in The New Yorker<\/em> about the Modi government\u2019s anti-Muslim rhetoric and actions, events in the novel will seem all-too possible.)  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The unknown man is alive, but confused and mumbling about a terrorist threat involving two people (but who?) headed somewhere (but where?) to carry out an attack (but what?). The intelligence forces see the need for drastic preventive action, but no one knows what that should be. Overreaction seems almost inevitable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joseph\u2019s character descriptions are strong throughout, making it easy to appreciate the characters\u2019 motivations, as well as the stresses of living in a culturally and religiously polarized society. Although he makes strong points, he\u2019s not giving a lecture. He lets the story make his case. Joseph is a literary author who has won several awards for his previous novels and is a former columnist for the International New York Times<\/em>. Order it here. <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Picture: GDJ for Pixabay.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

High-velocity plots and gritty characters typify American and British crime thrillers. Yet, this style is an artistic (and marketing) choice, not a precondition for gripping fiction. Here are three recent crime novels from Nigeria, Argentina, and India that I enjoyed … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8320,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"3 Top-Notch Foreign Crime Novels - a crusading Buenos Aires journalist, a Nigerian nurse skilled at hiding family crimes, and an Indian man muttering a scary tale about terrorism. Great reads, all!","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[52,1288,40,261,268,126],"tags":[1675,1530],"class_list":["post-8319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","category-culture","category-fiction","category-journalism","category-politics","category-reading-2","tag-argentina","tag-nigeria"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/fingerprint.png?fit=391%2C640&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2ab","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8319"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8322,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8319\/revisions\/8322"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}