The black and police universe that Álex Martín Escribà analyzes so well in Interrogatoris (Clandestina) – its introduction and its interviews that explore all the avenues of the genre are excellent – ??is capable of flirting with comedy, subverting it, or sinking into darkness to decipher it.
There is no light for young Kiara. She can’t afford to rent her apartment in Oklahoma and her brother is a parasite. Wandering through the night, getting into trouble with some police officers, she is part of the Creatures nocturnes (Periscopi) – in Spanish the novel is called Between the shadows of the night (Uranus) – that the Californian Leila Mottley – so young and so powerful – describes exceptionally.
Dramatic is the world – real, very real, and from a few years ago – that the police and criminologist Xavier Álvarez reveals in El Confident (Rosa dels Vents). Based on a gang war in Barcelona, ??with a shooting on Meridiana, this narrative identifies hitmen, traffickers, snitches and other members of a turbulent landscape.
From that darkness to the fog of San Lorenzo del Escorial, once again the scene of a series that revealed to the Spanish reader the existence of Teresa Cardona. She is intelligent, thoughtful, with determination, she is responsible for the researcher Karen Blecker. As she did in the previous A Relative Good. In La carne del cisne (Siruela) she speaks once again about appearances. A beautiful house near the golf club, clues that could – but not – solve the case immediately.
Skillful and dizzying like no one else, the author of The Hour of the Spider and father of Álex Cross James Patterson began this series with The First to Die (RBA), which hits with a slap-in-the-face crime on the first page. And he captivates with his leading female quartet: the homicide inspector, the seasoned journalist, the coroner, and the prosecutor’s assistant. They are so tremendous, in a world where there is still some dirty cop who goes and says: “Women always cry at weddings.”
Speaking of strong women, my admired judge from Bari, Gianrico Carofiglio, created this young woman who had to abandon judicial life to investigate on her own. Penelope Spada serves at a bar table, accepting cases at her discretion and, this time, to a daughter who she does not believe in the official version about the death of her father. Rencor (Duomo) is the apt title of this uncomfortable foray into the past.
Another woman who faces the worst, the disappearance of her son. It is the starting shot of Fear in the Body (Alrevés), where Empar Fernández follows the trail of a boy who is not like the others, while discovering an organization. Surprising from the first scene, and the detail of this apparently close Barcelona, ??truly strange.
Someday we will know the identity of Lorenzo G. Acevedo. From his ancient religious vocation he had the wisdom to plot this criminal matter in a 13th century monastery, with Gonzalo de Berceo as the investigator. From beginning – with that macabre and hilarious banquet – to end, La tavern de Silos (Tusquets) is a malicious and exquisite piece.
There are towns that are not forgotten. Saint-Louis, when France ends and Strasbourg approaches, is where the unpredictable Graeme Mcrae Burnett set The Disappearance of Adèle Beaudou. And there she returns, with the investigator making her a little more lonely and a little sadder. And a dead man in The accident on the A 35 (Impedimenta). Remarkable in its setting; This writer is one of the best discoveries of recent years.
There are characters that shock. We meet Charlie Parker, the great creation of John Connolly. But fundamental in his universe are his faithful and fierce friends Louise and Ángel. And it is Louise, a great professional, who as she approaches the place of Nameless Tombs (Tusquets) displays efficiency, impiety, cold blood.
The terrifying is also present in La por de la bèstia (Amsterdam), by Anna Monner, with a predator with exquisite and macabre tastes. Renaissance art and true originality. Its author, from Valencia, is an art historian.
Romain Slocombe said, in an interview in this newspaper, that there were great inaccuracies in the reconstruction of Paris in 1940. Documented to the maximum, his city of Paris is brilliant despite everything. And tragic, from the figure of its protagonist, Inspector Sadorski, a convinced philonazi (although many Nazis do not like him). Inspector Sadorski’s Yellow Star and his previous installment The León Sadorski Case (Malpaso) are vibrant narratives with a discovery of point of view: a detestable cop.
And in line with the findings, Arturo Pérez Reverte with The final problem (Alfaguara). Set in the sixties, it is the adventure of the actor who commissioned Holmes on the screen for years, so much so that upon seeing him on a Greek island his interlocutor – a writer who makes a good living like Silver Kane – is sure that this Mr. forgotten by Hollywood is as good as his character. It won’t take us long to see it in action when – in the style of Ten Little Black Men – a dead young woman appears. Sharp reflection on intrigue, charming in style and landscape.
Next, two great commissioners and a spy: Adamsberg goes to Brittany, where the murder of a neighbor stirs up the ancient ghost of a lame man, whose wooden leg continues to resonate at night. Sobre la slab (Siruela) is the long-awaited new installment of the series by the excellent Fred Vargas.
The great Guido Brunetti, commissioner of Venice, investigates the death of an undocumented immigrant. His trail will take him to an old palazzo and link him with old ideals, those of his own youth. You will reap storms is the new novel by Donna Leon (Seix Barral).
Jackson Lamb is a great spy of our times, created by a notable successor to John Le Carré, the intelligent Mick Herron. Life in “the swamp house” – where disgraced intelligence agents end up – is altered by several issues. One of them, a psychopath who has already tried to run over a member of this curious office. Because no one there, starting with the irreverent Lamb himself in his attic office, is normal (but is the surrounding politics, or Brexit, normal?). This is what London Rules (Salamandra) is about.
Virtues – and virtuous people – are not lacking: let’s start with the half-brothers Harry Bosh and Michael Haller. Michael Connelly has had the good idea of ??uniting them in a murder investigation. The former police officer and the suspicious lawyer in action, against the official version. And against higher powers, in The Way of Resurrection (DNA).
And while we wait, in January, for Dennis Lehane’s new novel (which is announced to be as notable as Mystic River), here is his investigative partner. Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro debuted in Salamander, and the two of them together, as Boston private detectives, did great things.
Here are the recommendations for these holidays. And Merry Christmas, despite so much evil on the loose.
