Beneath the Stains of Time: The Key to the Case (1992) by Roger Ormerod

Beneath the Stains of Time: The Key to the Case (1992) by Roger Ormerod: I reviewed two of Roger Ormerod 's late-career novels in January, A Shot at Nothing (1993) and And Hope to Die (1995), which he wrote ...

Beneath the Stains of Time: The House of the Red Slayer (1992) by Paul Doherty

Beneath the Stains of Time: The House of the Red Slayer (1992) by Paul Doherty: Paul Doherty 's The House of the Red Slayer (1992) is the second novel in the Sorrowful Mysteries of Brother Athelstan series, origi...

Aubrey Hamilton Reviews: Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon

Hardcover

Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon (HarperCollins, 1992) is the first in the police procedural mystery series with Guido Brunetti, a police commissario in contemporary Venice, Italy. Brunetti’s adventures occupy 28 volumes thus far, with one released every year since Brunetti initially appeared in 1992.

At a performance of Traviata at Venice’s opera house, the internationally famous and temperamental conductor Helmut Wellauer fails to return to lead the second act. Cautious investigation by the theatre’s artistic director reveals the maestro dead in his dressing room. The sharp odor of bitter almonds proclaims the presence of cyanide in the coffee spilled down the conductor’s white shirt front.

Police soon swarm the back stage, directed by Commissario Brunetti. Brunetti is struck by the brief window of opportunity for the killer—during the opera’s intermission!--and by the number of people known to have visited him in that short time. At first he believes the motive lies within the conductor’s professional past and uses his considerable contacts to mine the gossip about Wellauer’s lengthy career. His ability to continue to perform during World War II, when the arts were severely politicized in occupied Europe, was of particular interest. Then hints about Wellauer’s marriages invited attention, as did his dealings with women performers.

Paperback

While I have read some of the titles in this series, I had not read the first ones and decided the omission should be rectified. Brunetti emerges on the world’s stage as a complete and engaging protagonist who clearly loves his city. His sadness at the damage industrial pollution is causing to landmark architecture is palpable. His acknowledgement of his city’s faults is wryly humorous: Brunetti thinks the low burglary rate in Venice is due to the fact no one really knows how to find their way around the streets and allies.  Brunetti’s incompetent and publicity-seeking boss shows there are no geographical boundaries to bad managers. Some things are the same no matter where you go.

A polished start to a consistently plotted and well-written series.

·         Publisher: HarperCollins; 1st edition (July 1, 1992)

·         Language: English

·         ISBN-10: 0060168714

·         ISBN-13: 978-0060168711

Aubrey Hamilton ©2019

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.

Chess, Comics, Crosswords, Books, Music, Cinema: Dangerous Lady by Martina Cole, 1992

Chess, Comics, Crosswords, Books, Music, Cinema: Dangerous Lady by Martina Cole, 1992: Back of the book No one thinks a seventeen-year-old girl can take on the hard men of London's gangland, but it's a mistake to u...

Aubrey Hamilton Reviews: Compelling Evidence by Steve Martini

Compelling Evidence by Steve Martini (Putnam, 1992) is the first of 15 (so far) legal thrillers featuring defense attorney Paul Madriani in Los Angeles, California. Madriani is building a solo practice after his unceremonious departure from a large corporate practice, caused by the discovery of Madriani’s affair with the much younger wife of the senior partner Ben Potter. After a year of no contact, Potter wants to meet with Madriani, as it turns out, to make sure the hatchet between them is buried. Potter is on the verge of being nominated for the U. S. Supreme Court and he wants no subtle smear to mar the exhaustive background investigation that is about to begin.

Within 24 hours after their meeting Potter is found dead, the victim of a homicide clumsily disguised as suicide. Madriani is inveigled into defending the young Mrs. Potter, uneasy about their past history which, if discovered by the media, would destroy the credibility of any defense he could prepare. Add a partner who is the default recipient of Potter’s wildly successful legal practice if Madriani loses and a judge up for re-election who is determined no appeal or hung jury will tarnish his record, along with someone in the prosecutor’s office issuing unauthorized but damaging information about the defendant to the press, and the case could not be less promising.

Although the early writing in places needed a strong editor that it didn’t get, once the legal part of the story begins, it gallops at a breakneck pace until the surprise ending. (The Kirkus reviewer said the ending was predictable but I have no idea how anyone could have guessed it. Perhaps I am gullible.) Martini has the legal profession down cold, from the set-up and operations of large corporate practices to the showboating lawyer who is always chasing his next media opportunity regardless of his client’s interests he is supposed to be protecting. The lengthy section on the psychology of jury selection is fascinating. Highly recommended to fans of Scott Turow and John Lescroart.

Hardcover: 379 pages

Publisher: Putnam Pub Group (February 1, 1992)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 9780399137129

ISBN-13: 978-0399137129

Aubrey Hamilton ©2019

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night. 

Aubrey Hamilton Reviews: A Stillness in Bethlehem by Orania Papazoglou (Jane Haddam)

Hardback Cover

In the spirit of the season, up for consideration today is A Stillness in Bethlehem by Orania Papazoglou writing as Jane Haddam (Bantam, 1992). This is the seventh book in the Gregor Demarkian contemporary mystery series. Demarkian is a retired FBI agent, one who established and led the agency’s profiling department. In his retirement he began consulting with police departments on a volunteer basis but has no official standing or credentials. He has however a significant reputation as an investigator; the references to him in the more sensational news outlets as “the Armenian Hercule Poirot” cause him much angst.

After a high-profile case Demarkian comes home to Cavanaugh Street in Philadelphia to find his friend Father Tibor Kasparian dangerously exhausted from his work on behalf of Armenian refugees. Their mutual friend Bennis Hannaford arranges for the three of them to travel to Bethlehem, Vermont, to see the town’s long-running Nativity play and to give Tibor a much-needed break. The tiny rural town has found a way to generate revenue and to lift itself out of genteel poverty, similar to the college students in Rest You Merry by Charlotte MacLeod, who created a profitable Yule celebration. The Christmas pageant is a tourist destination and produces most of the income in Bethlehem, so when Tisha Verek, a recent transplant to the area, decides to file a civil liberties lawsuit against the town to stop the play, nearly everyone is upset. Who was upset enough to shoot her in front of her house, however, is not clear, and the State police wrote the death off as a hunting accident. The fact that a second town resident was killed in much the same manner about the same time and not far away did not rouse the State police’s curiosity, who labelled it another hunting accident.

eBook Cover

The town police chief was not so confident and, when he discovers Gregor Demarkian in his village, he begs Demarkian to review the evidence. When a third victim is claimed during the first night of the pageant under Demarkian’s nose, he feels he has no choice but to find and stop the culprit.

In a lifetime of reading mysteries, the Demarkian series is among my greatest favorites. The plots are often downright devious (see Blood in the Water, for instance), and the people on the pages are powerfully developed and finely nuanced. Father Tibor Kasparian is quite possibly the fictional character I would most like to meet; his apartment stacked high with books of all kinds on every surface inspires equal parts hilarity and envy every time I read about it. The structure of the stories is intriguing: Characters are sketched in a prologue to set the stage for the murders, there’s always more than one, and then their back story unfolds as the book progresses. My only quibble with the series is Demarkian’s astonishing obtuseness in his dealings with Bennis Hannaford, a successful writer of fantasy sagas whom he meets on his first case. Nonetheless, these books are simply not to be missed by any mystery reader, and this title is a fine place to start reading them.

·         Hardcover: 289 pages

·         Publisher: Bantam (November 1, 1992)

·         Language: English

·         ISBN-10: 0553090240

·         ISBN-13: 978-0553090246

Aubrey Hamilton ©2018

Aubrey Hamilton is a former librarian who works on Federal It projects by day and reads mysteries at night.