Five Decembers

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This is certainly an unpredictable book, even when it comes full circle at the end it feels drastically different than the beginning where you feel like you know where you are. I found some of the twists a bit hard to swallow (particularly the one that covers the long stretch in the middle) but I have to admit Kestrel makes it all worth your while at the end. The killer is mostly an enigma until the last few chapters, and unfortunately, his story ends before we learn too much about him. The killer probably wanted to see himself as someone like McGrady: a good man, a moral man, but a man saddled with the duty to do a job. But he’s also a German intelligence agent in WWII, so his duties and his possible humanity are entirely incompatible,” Mr. Kestrel explained. War, imprisonment, torture, romance…The novel has an almost operatic symmetry, and Kestrel turns a beautiful phrase.”

A Honolulu cop’s search for an unusually brutal killer is upended by the arrival of World War II, which puts his investigation on hold and adds an epic dimension to his quest. McGrady is arrested on trumped up charges in Hong Kong and shipped off to Tokyo, Japan. Fortuitously, McGrady is brought to the uncle of the slain woman, a Japanese official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The uncle and daughter, Kansei and Sachi Takahashi, provide a safe haven for McGrady for the duration of the war. With the end of WWII though, McGrady is determined to find the butcher who killed Kensei’s niece and the Admiral’s nephew. I read Five Decembers due to its nomination for Best Novel in the 2022 Edgar Awards by the Mystery Writers of America. The winners of the 76th Annual Edgar® Awards will be announced on April 28, 2022. Five Decembers feels like it could have been written during the golden age of noir… hugely satisfying.”– SFBook Review The best book I’ve read this year and one of the best I’ve read in a long time...I give it my highest recommendation."

The Confidence Men: How Two Prisoners of War Engineered the Most Remarkable Escape in History by Margalit Fox (Random House Publishing Group – Random House) There are unexpected twists to the murder story as McGrady closes in on the killer and his accomplices.

Unravels much like a traditional mystery, albeit a superior one…. as much a love story as a mystery, if not more…an undoubted success.”-CrimeFictionLover The murder mystery is intriguing. Ex-military Detective Joe McGrady is asked to investigate a gruesome double murder. One victim is immediately identified; he is a beloved nephew of Admiral stationed in Pearl Harbor. The other victim, a young Japanese woman, cannot be identified. But McGrady traces a man who is the probable killer to Hong Kong, which was a British colony in 1941. However, it is December 1941, and McGrady ends up as a prisoner of the war. Joe McGrady is a formersoliderturned Detective in Honolulu. He has never been accepted as a local, but when avicious murder occurs, he is the only Officer available. A man is found hung by his feet, brutally murdered. McGrady’s first major case may justbe his last as it leads to more than onecorpseand more than one country. The Detective travelsto Hong Kong in 1941 to further investigate themurder, a region that is on the brink of conflict. Honolulu, Hawaii, Thanksgiving weekend 1941, and Detective Joe McGrady has been called out to a crime scene. On arrival, McGrady finds the body of a young (white) male. He’s been stripped, gutted, and been left hanging upside down from the rafters. As if that’s not gruesome enough, McGrady finds the body of an Asian woman. Her limbs have been bound and her throat has been cut. She’s been left to bleed out. The young male victim turns out to be the nephew of a high-ranking military identity with plenty of political clout – US Navy Admiral Kimmel. The young female victim it turns out, was much harder to identify. With the connect made to Admiral Kimmel, McGrady is thinking along the lines that this was a professional hit. McGrady is partnered up on this investigation with Detective Fred Ball, who’s a good cop, albeit a little heavy handed. The two detectives soon realise that the killer they are hunting has already left the Island, headed for Hong Kong. McGrady, hot on the heels of the suspects trail, leaves for Hong Kong.Five Decembers is absolutely terrific. I can’t remember the last novel I read that was so beautifully immersive. A joy to read.” -Lou Berney This book reminds me a little of LA Confidential by Elroy. It’s epic and spans five years during world war two. It’s got romance, violence, and most of all good ol’ story telling. This is not one to miss.

When Evil Lived in Laurel: The “White Knights” and the Murder of Vernon Dahmer by Curtis Wilkie (W.W. Norton & CompanyThe book is written in third person from one point of view. The historical time period, the setting takes on its own character with equal importance to the main character. Loved the details. The descriptions of Japan and the aftermath of the bombing is nothing short of brilliant and at the same time horrifying. McGrady is kind of like a pit bull: Really great when he’s on your side, but for God’s sake, don’t break into his house.” stars. Set just before until just after WWII, this is a book that wants to read like a book of the time and mostly succeeds. It has that kind of noir style, though it's much more gruesome than any midcentury book would dare to be and much more willing to talk straight at things than around them, especially when it comes to things like prostitution or drugs, the kinds of things that are usually only obliquely referenced or hinted at. The author's note at the end suggests that there were at least 60,000 words cut out from the final draft. I wonder whether they were important to the plot, or that maybe they should've cut even more out of the final draft... War, imprisonment, torture, romance…The novel has an almost operatic symmetry, and Kestrel turns a beautiful phrase."