DISTURBED

[For danske læsere: se en dansk version af teksten her. Husk ugens bog-konkurrence, som udløber søndag ved midnat.]

Writing exercise. Write a ´slow text´ in no more than 400 words.

DISTURBED
Joan pulled out one pair of silk socks after the other, felt with her hands in all corners and nooks of the drawers, pulled them out and checked under the bottom. Systematically she continued with shelves bulging with vests and pants, sticking her hands deep down each and every pin-striped pocket and into the toes of the polished shoes.

Halfway through she tiptoed back to the large bedroom. Erlandson´s wife was still moaning quietly with a cold cloth over her eyes . The curtains were drawn and threw a sickly-green tinge over the bed. One could almost feel pity for the woman.

Joan continued with the bed and the bedside table. Checking under and over, inside and behind, up and down. She pulled the sheets off and turned the mattress. The two small drawers revealed a large collection of main-stream porn and the occasional dust mouse, but not a shred of interesting paper anywhere.

She swung out the flat screen from the wall, scrutinized the backside and let her fingertips run down the wallpaper. Nothing. But she knew her subconscious mind had registered a detail which jarred. A bird sailed past the window, and her heart skipped a beat.

She placed herself in the doorway and looked around her as if she saw the room for the first time. The bed, the wardrobe, the bedside table. The walls and the carpet. She had even tried if the skirting boards were loose.

The table! He had put the alarm clock and the ashtray in the windowsill. Why use the sill when there was a table at hand? Joan knelt down next to the square piece of furniture. Experimentally she dragged it away from the wall, rocking it from side to side. Something rattled inside the plinth…

“What do you think you are doing?”

Her eyes darted round and revealed to her what the room must look like from his point of view. Underwear and socks spilling out of the drawers, a couple of porn magazines on the floor, both wardrobe doors wide open and here she was, sitting on his sheets, turning his bedside table upside-down. She let the four round legs slide back into the four corresponding marks in the carpet as if the drawers were loaded with nitroglycerine. She drew herself up and let go of the table.

She knew that she could not talk herself out of this.

Donna Leon, Mord i fremmed land (1999)

Denne krimi er den anden i den amerikanske forfatters serie om kriminalkommissær Brunetti fra Venedig.

”Liget lå og flød med ansigtet nedad i kanalens snavsede vand. Tidevandet vuggede det blidt hen imod det åbne vand i lagunen for enden af kanalen. Hovedet bumpede et par gange mod de algedækkede trin foran Basilica SS. Giovanni e Paolo, sad et øjeblik fast, men da vandet fik fødderne til at svinge i en smuk balletagtig bue, rev det sig løs og drev videre ud mod det åbne vand og friheden.”

Kriminalkommissær Guido Brunetti bliver sat på sagen om den unge mand, som bliver fundet myrdet i kanalen. ”Dæk hans ansigt. Han døde ung” siger kommissæren, og røber hermed, at hans kone i hvert fald kender sine klassikere. Politiet overvejer motiverne bag mordet, er der tale om røveri, handel med stoffer eller terror.

Offeret viser sig at være en ung, amerikansk soldat, udstationeret på den store militærstation i Venedig, som udgør et lille stykke Amerika, og tilsyneladende følger sine egne love og regler. På overfladen virker amerikanerne åbne og samarbejdsvillige, men det er måske ikke alt, de fortæller, og ret hurtigt får Brunetti besked på ikke at forstyrre amerikanerne igen. En ordre, han selvfølgelig ikke følger helt.

Den sympatiske Brunetti er lykkeligt gift med Paola, en intelligent kvinde, som er i stand til at underholde sig selv, og ikke har skjulte dagsordener, og kommissæren har i det hele taget en sund, naturlig appetit på livet.

Forfriskende bekendtskab med en kriminalkommissær, jeg bestemt gerne vil møde igen.

Death in a Strange Country (1993)
This novel is the second in the American writer´s series about Commissioner Brunetti from Venice.

“The body floated face down in the murky water of the canal. Gently, the ebbing tide tugged it along towards the open waters of the laguna that spread out beyond the end of the canal. The head bumped a few times against the moss-covered steps of the embankment in front of the Basilica of Santi Giovanni e Paolo, lodged there for a moment, then shifted free as the feet swung out in a delicate balletic arc that pulled it loose and set it again drifting towards the open waters and freedom.”

It is up to Commissioner Guido Brunetti to solve the case of the young man who is found murdered in the canal. “Cover his face. He died young” Brunetti says and reveals that at least his wife knows her classics. The police consider the motive behind the murder; is it a mugging, drug-related crime or terror?

The victim is a young, American soldier, stationed at the large army base in Venice, a small scale America, with its own laws and rules. On the surface the Americans seem open and eager to cooperate, but there may be things they forget to tell the Italian police, and quite soon Brunetti´s superiors instructed him not to disturb the Americans again. An order he does not quite follow.

The pleasant Commissioner Brunetti is happily married to Paola, an intelligent woman who is capable of keeping herself amused and has no hidden agendas, and on the whole this couple have a sound and healthy appetite on life.

A refreshing acquaintance with a protagonist I would like to meet again.

Next Step: the Michelin Guide?

[For skandinaviske gæster: husk at deltage i ugens bogkonkurrence]

Even though I try to take my own principles seriously and blog about crime fiction exclusively, I know I stray from the path now and then. And why not; you never know when & where you will be struck by fame. Just see this comment which came my way very early this morning:

Hi,

We have just added your latest post "DJs krimiblog: Italian Food for Thought" to our Food Directory . You can check the inclusion of the post here . We are delighted to invite you to submit all your future posts to the directory for getting a huge base of visitors to your website and gaining a valuable backlink to your site.

Warm Regards Xxxxx team.

DJ´s Bait in the box # 20 (konkurrence)

[The pretty box belongs to Julia, A Piece of My Mind]

This Scandinavian crime novel is a debut. For English readers, please leave a hint as usual, but remember not to write the title or the author´s name as this post is a competition for Scandinavian readers who can win a Danish book.

The book will be reviewed on Sunday to give the participants time to send in their answers.

“When her father called one Monday evening in October, for the first time in nearly a year, he made Julia think of bones washed up on a stony beach. Bones, white as mother-of-pearl and polished by the waves, almost luminous among the grey stones in the water´s edge.
Bone fragments.
Julia didn´t know if they could be found there by the beach, but she had waited for more than twenty years to see them.”

Gæt en bog # 20 – konkurrence.
Denne uges gæt en bog er specielt rettet mod skandinaviske læsere. Send mig en mail med titel og forfatternavn på den skandinaviske debut, og vind en dansk bog. Konkurrencen udløber søndag aften ved midnat.

”Da hendes far ringede en mandag aften i oktober, for første gang i næsten et år, fik han Julia til at begynde at tænke på ben som blev skyllet op på en stenet strand.
Ben, hvide som perlemor og blankslebne af bølgerne, næsten selvlysende blandt de grå sten i vandkanten.
Benstumper.
Julia vidste ikke, om de fandtes der ved stranden, men hun havde ventet i over tyve år på at få dem at se.”

Konkurrence-regler:
1) send en mail med forfatterens navn og bogens titel til do.hu.ja@mail.tele.dk
- husk at skrive din postadresse på, og den ønskede bog (jeg sender også til udland)

2) få en ekstra vinderchance ved at reklamere for konkurrencen på din blog – på dansk eller et andet skandinavisk sprog (husk at sende mig et link).

Gevinsten: frit valg mellem tre brugte krimier (læst én gang)

1.Mary Higgins Clark, Stille som graven – hardback
2. Mary Higgins Clark, Kærlighedsmordet – hardback
3.Colin Dexter, Mord i annekset – paperback (vist nok ubrugt).

Susan Moody, Penny Black (1984)

[Denne serie er ikke oversat til dansk]

This crime novel is the first in the Penny Wanawake series, and Susan Moody´s debut.

Tall, black and beautiful Penny is an amateur sleuth and the daughter of an African diplomat and a British upper class woman. She goes to California to visit her old friend ´Marfa´, a blonde, beautiful and dumb model, only to realize that Marfa has disappeared.

Penny is a very resourceful and capable detective who is determined to find out what has happened to Marfa. The reader is somewhat better informed about the young girl´s fate, but not why she dies wearing a white orchid.

“… Marfa was still blonde, still dumb, but no longer very beautiful. Marfa was never going to look good in a bikini again. Nor in anything else. She wasn´t even going to make what you might call a tasteful corpse. She sat slumped in a washroom cubicle, the weight of her body holding the door shut. Her face looked as though a tribal witch-doctor had been experimenting with the placing of ceremonial scars.”

Penny is an entertaining and refreshing heroine, and if she needs a helping hand, Barnaby, lover, friend and gentleman thief, is at her service.

The series seems to be somewhat uneven, however. The fifth volume, Penny Wise, is a rather colourful action thriller to put it kindly.

Konkurrence

Kom tilbage på onsdag og kig: deltag i konkurrencen ´gæt en bog´ og vind en dansk krimi.

Frit valg mellem tre brugte krimier i pæn stand.

Have you ever met Penny?

“The man came round the end of the bed towards her, and she launched herself at him. Six feet of outraged black female. One hundred and twenty-six pounds of bone and muscle. She sprang suddenly out of the darkness, one long leg smacking hard against him. He fell heavily to the ground.

´Jesus H. Christ!´ he said.

Penny sucked in a long, long breath to dilute the adrenalin which had her still on the balls of her feet, arms up and out in front of her, ready to grab and hurt.

´Barnaby?´ she said.”

This crime novel is the first in what I think is a largely forgotten series. Or am I wrong? Is Penny on your shelf – written by a British author of many names who has a certain connection with Denmark?