POLICIERING:

By the twitching of my thumb...: Peter Guttridge travels the world in search of the best detective fiction (Peter Guttridge, May 11, 2003, The Observer)

American and British writers have dominated the mystery genre since Edgar Allen Poe created it in 1841 with his story, 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue'. Other countries, including France, Italy and Germany, have had their own mystery writers, but relatively few have been widely translated. In the past decade or so, that has changed and now more non-English speaking writers are playing a major part in the development of the genre. [...]

Italy has provided a rich setting for British writers such as Michael Dibdin and Magdalena Nabb, but its home-grown detective fiction has been uneven. Andrea Camilleri uses dialect in his depictions of life, now and in the last century, in the fictional Sicilian town of Vigata. His mystery books featuring the Sicilian-based Inspector Salvo Montalbano have been bestsellers in continental Europe since Montalbano made his mid-Nineties debut in The Shape of Water.

This sly and witty novel tells of the food-loving policeman's investigation into a death that the coroner believes is from natural causes. To find out the truth, Montalbano must pick his way through a labyrinth of corruption, false clues, vendettas - and delicious meals. The result is funny and intriguing with a fluent translation by New York poet Stephen Sartarelli.

Latin-American fiction has always had a crossover from 'literature' to crime writing. It's taken until now, however, for a writer to come along to do for the corruption of Brazil's Rio de Janeiro what Chandler did for Los Angeles. Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza is an academic, psychologist and philosopher. His first novel, The Silence of the Rain, was published in Portuguese in 1996. His hero, the world-weary Inspector Espinosa, philosopher and romantic, investigates the death of a handsome, young executive found dead in his car. A robbery gone wrong or suicide? As he investigates the executive's life, Espinosa is drawn to the widow and comes upon two more dead bodies. Optional scenarios are broached until Espinosa draws his investigation to a satisfying conclusion.

Ironically, though she's American, Donna Leon's Commisario Guido Brunetti series is the best of the bunch. Of course, Georges Simenon's Maigret is the grandaddy of them all and Netflix has the exceptional Michael Gambon series of Maigret mysteries available.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 9, 2006 12:20 AM