A Taste of Sicily: Inspector Montalbano

**** An enjoyable read, colourful with touches of humour

As promised, my thoughts on Inspector Montalbano...

You may have already seen the television series (Series 1 and 2 aired on BBC4 in the last few years, starring the estimable Luca Zingaretti ...).

If so, Salvo Montalbano will need no introduction. To be honest though, this series probably didn't get as many viewers as it might have done, due to its BBC4 slot, the place reserved for foreign language viewing. I'm not sure of the viewing figures, but I haven't seen a craze for Italian shirts and jackets to match that for Scandinavian knitwear after the The Killing, Wallander etc. Shame because it is a great television series. 

Why do I like it? Well, the way I describe it to the uninitiated is: imagine a good-looking Inspector Morse, not roving among Oxford's dreaming spires, but Sicily's rolling sunbaked hills and swimming in its blue seas; rubbing shoulders not with Oxford academia, but with the Italian police and the mafia; and instead of drinking beer in Oxfordshire's fine pubs, he eats baby octopus in the house of his colleague. As a television series these are nice, feature length dramas with an occasionally bad-tempered, but loveable detective with strong morals, and some wonderful sidekicks and other characters (though there's no consistent Watson or Lewis figure, he develops  an unlikely sidekick in a leggy Swedish blonde in some of the episodes, in others he has different confidantes.).

Like Morse the series displays the full range of human motivations for murder, passion, jealousy, money, honour.  These are good mysteries of the police procedural type. 

Fans of the series will recall his long-distance relationship with the enigmatic, chimerical Livia. But his passion for food and the surroundings of Sicily is perhaps the main reason why I like the television series. It's Inspector Morse on holiday! Exactly what the British viewer needs! 

So I decided to give one of Andea Camilleri's novels a go.

I am afraid, as the picture above shows, I am unable to comment on the Italian. I get the impression that the translation is good: it is not too laboured, but clear enough so that some Italian idioms or Sicilian phrases come across, and there are some notes in the back if you want to read them. (My Italian speaking friend tells me that the series doesn't always translate the idiomatic Italian well, especially Catarella's speech. It works all the same). Unlike the television series, we see less of the Sicilian landscape, but one can imagine it all the same. Food, I am pleased to say, plays a big role. This is a nice touch in a detective series, reminding us that however ghoulish or tragic the murder, life (and its pleasures) goes on. As for the plot of this novel, it was complicated, but ultimately satisfying. It is not a very long book and would make a good holiday read, and is a lighter read than my previous post (our friend Robert Galbraith) in the sense that there is less effort put into characterisation or descriptions of the setting, but the setting and characters are lively and realistic. 

So as a Murder with a Twist goes, I'd give this 4 stars and recommend it to others. A fun, cosy read. Though do catch up on the TV series if you can't be bothered to read them!  

Not sure what will be my next post but watch this space...  and now for a nice bowl of pasta! 

The Cuckoo's Calling : J K Rowling Strikes Again

The Cuckoo's Calling by J.K. Rowling (writing under the pseudonym of Robert Galbraith)

***** Highly recommended, but could do with a little polish.

My relationship with J K Rowling is complicated. I wasn't really one of the Potter generation. When her books came out in 1997 I was already reading Inspector Morse and Brother Cadfael. I didn't get round to reading any Potter until later. I read the third Harry Potter in paperback, stealing it off my brother, whose interest in the novel waned as mine grew. I still stand by the fact that Book 3 is a good read for plot, even if you don't particularly like Harry Potter. Then I bought and read the others.

I do like the Harry Potter books but I always read them with a critical eye. What I love about them is her characters, particularly the adult characters, such as Syrius Black and Professor Lupin. Her plots are another feature I enjoyed. However, even as a semi-fan I found the fifth book overwritten and parts of the seventh tedious, and was in no way surprised by the plot twist *NO SPOILERS! I PROMISED NO SPOILERS!* involving a certain character in Book 7. Still, as I said, I find them readable and enjoyable, though not necessarily something I would teach in schools or force my children to read (if I had any). She is a good synthesiser, picking up ideas from elsewhere and putting them in her own work without exactly plagiarising, although I know some people prefer Tolkien and C. S. Lewis. (I do!). We all know she is a classicist, because she sneaks in classical references. Her style isn't great, I admit. But she is good with names. All the characters have what in Russian literature is called 'talking names', i.e. the names conjure up something about the character. A feature also found in Dickens.

Brilliant cover art by Sian Wilson on the left with (I presume) the paperback cover on the right, courtesy of the internet.

However ... back when I read Book 3, I saw in it something in it of the mystery or detective genre. I paid no interest to The Casual Vacancy (her first post-Potter novel) when it was published, but when I heard that she had written a detective novel I was intrigued. I had thought she could make a good writer of detective novels.
I ordered the hardback from Amazon but at the time I was reading PD James (see previous blog post). I was rather disappointed by that, and somewhat amused that I could read the novice detective writer back to back with Rowling - a fact which pretty much inspired me to start this blog.

The truth is - I am unashamed to admit - I loved it.

Hold on before the anti-Rowling people and nay-sayers start crying out. Yes, I have some criticisms. There are these somewhat bizarre epigraphs, which don't seem very necessary (but do remind me of the erudition of, say, Inspector Morse, and also, strangely enough, of Pushkin). I think this is a clue that here is someone who wrote children's books, but now wants to prove that she is a grown-up.

Evidence found elsewhere in the occasional use of very long, obscure words for no particular reason. The novel is a bit long - but here's the thing - I really didn't mind. Here is a detective novel you can get your teeth into. The reason why this works is because, unlike the Harry Potter books, it isn't just plot driven - although it has a very strong plot - but character driven. It is genuinely one of the deeper detective novels I have read, allowing the author to display her sensitivity to the complexity of human relationships and emotions that she didn't really allow herself to in the Harry Potter novels. I adore the main detective who is flawed yet loveable, and his sidekick (who you cannot help but love from the moment she appears).  All the other characters stepped off the page, as they might do from the pen of Margery Allingham (my favourite crime writer). There is a slight lack of polish, for example bits of it could be cut slightly, but we are talking a page or two, not 20% of it, like Tolstoi. Let's face it, Tolstoi and Dostoevskii got away with it!

What else did I love about it? The setting in London is nicely done. Our detective Cormoran Strike drinks Doom Bar in a pub near Tottenham Court Road (although he does seem overly obsessed with Doom Bar, which gets some free advertising), pops into University of London Union to use the showers, and eats near the Serpentine in Hyde Park. And although I don't know any of the type of people  J K Rowling describes, I get the impression she has described them really well.

Signs that this was written by J K Rowling and not some Robert Galbraith bloke - yes quite a few. Particularly the epigraphs, and the names. And her tendency to use Tottenham Court Road in her novels! I could go on, but anyway that little mystery is thoroughly solved so there's not much point in going over that ground now.

Unlike PD James, she doesn't fall into the trap of the deus ex machina type of ending where you couldn't have feasibly guessed who done it or why. The plotting is complex with all the twists and turns you want, but all the suspects are clearly drawn, just as in Agatha Christie. It is a classic locked-room mystery, by the way. And all this is pulled off with confidence. The reasons why the murderer killed are clear and the ending is satisfying.

You may disagree with me, but personally I think J K Rowling might just have found her new calling.

I would highly recommend this novel, and not just to Potter fans, and I am looking forward very much to Cormoran Strike's next outing.
If you don't agree, let me know - I haven't met any one else who has read it - and if you want to borrow it, give me a shout!

Next up - a bit of Sicily, anyone?