Tag: crime

#BookReview House of Beauty by Melba Escobar, translated by Elizabeth Bryer

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House of BeautyAbout the Book

House of Beauty is a high-end salon in Bogotá’s exclusive Zona Rosa area, and Karen is one of its best beauticians. One rainy afternoon a teenage girl turns up for a treatment, dressed in her school uniform and smelling of alcohol. The very next day, the girl is found dead.

Karen was the last person to see the girl alive, so the girl’s mother is desperate to find out what Karen knows. Most important of all: who was her daughter going to meet that night?

Format: Paperback (247 pages)     Publisher: 4th Estate
Publication date: 7th March 2019 Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Literature in Translation, Crime

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My Review

Told from multiple points of view, initially I found it hard to distinguish between the different narrators, especially Lucia and her friend Claire, although it helped that Claire’s sections are written in the first person, whilst the others are in the third person. The story also skips forwards and backwards in time meaning, although billed as a crime novel, it’s not long before it becomes less of a ‘whodunnit’ but more a ‘will they get away with it?’

The House of Beauty of the book’s title not only provides a connection between many of the  characters but is also a place of work for beauticians like Karen and a place of indulgence.  ‘House of Beauty takes me in, I’m submerged in the silence and the expensive perfumes, the rosewater, oils and shampoo.’ In the case of Claire, the intimate services performed there are a kind of substitute for the affection that is lacking in her private life. It’s also an almost exclusively female environment, causing one of the male characters to refer to it as ‘that place, off limits to men, where there was room for all kinds of conspiracies and secrets’.

If it’s secrets and conspiracies you’re after, there’s no shortage of them amongst the male characters and there’s certainly little beauty. Take your pick from a rapist, a drug addict, a corrupt politician, a dodgy taxi driver, and any number of unfaithful husbands. The only male characters who display any integrity are Cojack, the private investigator hired by Consuelo, the mother of the dead girl, and Jorge, Consuelo’s ex-husband.  They find themselves pitted against corruption in high places and a bureaucratic legal system that moves at a snail’s pace.

As the book progresses, Karen becomes the dominant character in the story, finding herself in situations that force her to make increasingly more desperate and risky choices and casting her in the role of victim. But is Karen’s story true or is her life a fiction constructed by herself or others?

At one point, Lucia observes, ‘Life is a fabrication, don’t you think? Something we make up from start to finish.’ Whilst ostensibly about the search for the truth about a young girl’s death, House of Beauty exposes the corruption at the heart of Colombian society but also explores the notion of artifice, whether that’s the double lives led by many of the characters, the cosmetically enhanced faces and bodies presented to the world, or the external beauty that hides ugliness within.

In three words: Intriguing, thought-provoking, dark

Try something similar: The Liar by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen

Melba EscobarAbout the Author

Melba Escobar is a fiction writer and a journalist. She lives in Bogota, Colombia with her children and husband. (Photo credit: Goodreads suthor page)

Connect with Melba
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About the Translator

Elizabeth Bryer is a writer and translator from Australia. Her translation of Claudia Salazar Jiménez’s Blood of the Dawn was published by Deep Vellum in 2016. In 2017 she was a recipient of a PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant.

#BookReview A Better Part of Valor (Valorie Dawes Thrillers Book 3) by Gary Corbin @garycorbin

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A Better Part of ValorAbout the Book

While jogging off-duty along the riverfront, rookie cop Valorie Dawes discovers the body of a young girl  – and ignites a manhunt for a serial killer.

The Shoeless Schoolgirl Slayer has remained a step ahead of the Clayton, CT police for months. All of his victims drowned. All were found barefoot. And all bear the same strange, fresh tattoo. Then rookie cop Val Dawes notices patterns that eluded the department’s more traditional senior detectives. Following her intuition, she discovers clues that convince her she’s closing in.

But is she? Or is the clever and elusive Slayer laying a trap to make Val the next victim?

Format: eARC (423 pages)                      Publisher: Double Diamond Publishing
Publication date: 21st September 2021 Genre: Crime

Find A Better Part of Valor (Valorie Dawes Thrillers Book 3) on Goodreads

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My Review

I seem to be making a habit of reading Gary’s books part way through a series! For example, I’ve previously read The Mountain Man’s Badge, book three in the Mountain Man Mysteries series, and Lying in Vengeance, the follow-up to courtroom drama, Lying in Judgment.  True to form, A Better Part of Valor, published on 21st September 2021, is the third book in the author’s Valorie Dawes series. The book can be read as a standalone but the references to key events in Valorie’s life and the previous investigations she’s been involved in would be spoilers for the earlier two books. So if you fancy embarking on a new police procedural series, start with the first book, A Woman of Valor.

The book contains meticulous detail of police procedure and the step-by-step process of a murder investigation: narrowing down suspects, cross-checking alibis, interviewing witnesses, identifying connections between the victims, trawling social media for background information on victims and suspects, not to mention recording every piece of evidence, every conversation and interaction in minute detail. As the hunt for the killer progresses, the long hours take their toll on everyone involved in the investigation, including Valorie who seems to exist solely on a diet on coffee and the odd snatched breakfast.  How she finds the energy for runs and punishing gym sessions I don’t know! The team also have to put up with interference from the Mayor, Megan Iverson, anxious for a crime wave not to jeopardize her political ambitions, shared by her husband.

Val’s back story, the details of which are slowly revealed, helps the reader understand why she is so driven to solve the case, why she often underestimates her abilities and can at times take unnecessary risks. Luckily, she has former partner, Gil, to provide wise advice. Recovering from a serious injury incurred in a previous case, Gil is the person who knows Valorie best and one of the few people from whom she will accept advice – and actually take it! Gil’s description of Valorie as ‘intelligent, intuitive, relentless, and gutsy as hell’ sums her up nicely and makes her an engaging protagonist. I really liked the relationship between Gil and Valorie, and his wise advice when Valorie doubts herself, ‘Find the best part of you. That’s the key’.

Given the nature of the crime, the suspects are all male most of whom are rather unpleasant characters or suspiciously too helpful.  I had various suspicions about who the perpetrator might be but the author skilfully led me up several blind alleys before returning to main street. The tension ramps up in the final chapters in which the hunter becomes the hunted.  But is the real conflict within Valorie’s heart as she ponders the risks of crossing the boundary between friendship and something more?

A Better Part of Valor is a chunky read but its intricate plot, likeable central character and sense of authenticity kept this reader turning the pages way past her bedtime.  My thanks to the author for my digital advance review copy.

In three words: Intriguing, detailed, suspenseful

Try something similar: Payback (DI Charley Mann #1) by R.C. Bridgestock

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GaryCorbinAbout the Author

Gary Corbin is a writer, editor, and playwright in Camas, WA, a suburb of Portland, OR. In addition to eight published novels, his creative and journalistic work has been published in BrainstormNW, the Portland Tribune, The Oregonian, and Global Envision, among others.  His plays have enjoyed critical acclaim and have been produced on many Portland-area stages.

Gary is a member of the Willamette Writers Group, Nine Bridges Writers, the Northwest Editors Guild, PDX Playwrights, and the Bar Noir Writers Workshop. He serves as treasurer of The Pulp Stage, and participates in workshops and conferences in the Portland, Oregon area.

A homebrewer and home coffee roaster, Gary is a member of the Oregon Brew Crew and a BJCP National Beer Judge. He loves to ski, cook, and root for his beloved Patriots and Red Sox. And when that’s not enough, he escapes to the Oregon coast with his sweetheart.

Connect with Gary
Website | Twitter |  Goodreads