November First Monday Crime – Review of The Stasi Game by David Young @djy_writer @ZaffreBooks @1stMondayCrime @vbradleywriter @crmcgeorge @kinkstah @inkstainclaire

As promised in yesterday’s post, I have a review of The Stasi Game by David Young for you today. David will be joining us on Monday 2nd November at 7.30pm on our Facebook page along with Vicki Bradley, S.W. Kane and Chris McGeorge with Claire McGowan asking the questions. Before I give you my review, here’s the blurb.

The Blurb

Dresden, East Germany, 1980 – A man’s body is found buried in concrete at a building site in the new town district. When People’s Police homicide captain Karin Müller arrives at the scene, she discovers that all of the body’s identifiable features have been removed – including its fingertips.

The deeper Müller digs, the more the Stasi begin to hamper her investigations. She soon realises that this crime is just one part of a clandestine battle between two secret services – the Stasi of East Germany and Britain’s MI6 – to control the truth behind one of the deadliest events of World War II.

The Stasi Game brilliantly fictionalises the true story of how Britain’s wartime leaders justified the fire-bombing of German city of Dresden, which many have since condemned as a war crime.

My Review

I’m a little sad writing this review. It’s likely this is the last book in the Karin Müller series. I have absolutely loved these novels and The Stasi Game is no exception. David Young has provided great insight into life in East Germany. His research is second to none. It’s fair to say David has made Karin go through a lot over the years. Demoted after her last escapade, she finds herself in Dresden rather than Berlin. She’s with her trusted (?) colleagues Werner Tilsner and Jonas Schmidt. A body’s been found in concrete on a building site. A few suspicious looking builders suggests the Stasi are looking at this from a distance but making Karin and her team do all the hard work. So Karin is back playing cat and mouse with the Stasi but it isn’t long before she realises there’s more than one cat in this game.

As always, there’s a historical angle to this story. David has looked at a number of events in his past books but this is possibly the most controversial, even today. The heavy bombing of Dresden in February 1945 caused a firestorm that killed at least 25,000 people. Oxygen was sucked out of the air and German citizens died either of asphyxiation or were burnt to death. Was Dresden, the Florence of the Elbe, a legitimate target and therefore bombing was a justifiable act or was it a city of culture obliterated in a war crime? These things are looked at in a very interesting way and certainly made me think.

Apart from the serious nature of this novel, there was one bit that made me laugh out loud. I won’t tell you what it is but David Young obviously had some foresight when he wrote The Stasi Game. All I will say is that the favouritism and practice of rewarding deeds in 1980s East Germany is very much alive and well in this country today. You’ll know what I mean when you read that section!

Of course, the other star in this book is East Germany itself. Across the series David Young has taken us on a tour from East Berlin to Rügen (East Germany’s largest island) to Dresden to name just a few. It’s a country of ruins and new concrete housing blocks. Young really plays on the disparity of the two as East Germany seeks to obliterate the past in favour of an egalitarian future. Except of course, Karin knows that not all are equal in her home country.

So is this really the last book in the Karin Müller series? The ending suggests it could be.  The acknowledgements hint maybe it’s not quite the end of the road. Personally I would love to see one more book. This novel is set in the early 1980s. There is clearly one more recent historical event that needs to be looked at. Karin Müller needs to be there when the Berlin Wall falls. And given the ending of The Stasi Game, I really think she ought to be.

The Stasi Game is available in e-book and audio from the 12th November and out in paperback on 31st December. You can pre-order here.

The Author

East Yorkshire-born David Young began his East German-set crime series on a creative writing MA at London’s City University when Stasi Child – his debut – won the course prize. The novel went on to win the 2016 CWA Historical Dagger, and both it and the 2017 follow-up, Stasi Wolf, were longlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. His novels have been sold in eleven territories round the world. Before becoming a full-time author, David was a senior journalist with the BBC’s international radio and TV newsrooms for more than 25 years. He writes in his Twickenham garden shed and in a caravan on the Isle of Wight. The Stasi Game, his sixth novel, is available to pre-order now. You can follow him on Twitter @djy_writer

November First Monday Crime @1stMondayCrime @crmcgeorge @AlainnaGeorgiou @orionbooks @vbradleywriter @djy_writer @kinkstah @inkstainsclaire

With so many of our favourite things being cancelled this Autumn, it’s good to know that First Monday Crime is still here albeit online. You’ll find us live streaming to our Facebook page on Monday 2nd November at 7.30pm. Just like the page and you’ll be able to watch. We’ve got a great line-up for you in November with Vicki Bradley, S.W. Kane, David Young and Chris McGeorge. All four of our authors are graduates of the City Crime and Thriller MA and Claire McGowan, one of the lecturers, will be interviewing them to find out how their careers have progressed since finishing. Jacob Collins over at Hooked From Page One shared his reviews for Before I Say I Do by Vicki Bradley and The Bone Jar by S.W. Kane on Monday. Tomorrow I’ll be sharing my review for The Stasi Game by David Young. Today though I have an extract for you to read from Chris McGeorge’s new book Inside Out which is published today. Happy publication day Chris! Thanks to Alainna Hadjigeorgiou at Orion for sending the extract. Let’s find out what it’s all about.

The Blurb

SHE WAS SENT DOWN…
Cara Lockhart has just commenced a life sentence in HMP North Fern – the newest maximum security women’s prison in the country. She was convicted of a crime she is adamant she didn’t commit.

SHE WAS SET UP…
One morning she wakes up to find her cellmate murdered – shot in the head with a gun that is missing. The door was locked all night, which makes Cara the only suspect.

BUT THAT WAS JUST THE BEGINNING.
Cara needs to clear her name, unravelling an impossible case, with an investigation governed by a prison timetable.
But as Cara starts to learn more about North Fern and the predicament she is in, she finds connections between the past and present that she never could have imagined.

Indeed it seems that her conviction and her current situation might be linked in very strange ways…

The Extract

A ringing. Loud. Too early for the alarm. Must be his phone.

            He opened his eyes and reached over in the dark. A 12-44. Couldn’t be real. But he had to check.

He got up, got dressed, turned the window on for a moment. There was an avalanche outside. Lovely. He turned it off again.

            He left his bedroom, slipping his Cuff on as he went down the corridor into the control room.

            Continell was at the desk, watching all the monitors, a half-drunk cup of coffee forgotten next to her.

            ‘Harper,’ Continell said, as he leant on the desk. She sounded worried. ‘One of the Cuffs just went off. No life signs.’

            ‘Which one?’ Harper said.

            ‘FE773 Barnard.’

            ‘That’s Lockhart’s cell? You got VA on it?’

            Continell didn’t even need to press any buttons. She already had it up on the screen. An overhead of a cell, two beds with two women sleeping. Then the cameras went to static.

            ‘VA is lost for 12.3 seconds,’ Continell said, ‘and then…’

            A sound. Loud. Like a roar ripping through the static. Gone as soon as it hit his ears. And the camera clicked back on. One of the women was still sleeping as before. The other was draped over the bed, head falling to the floor. Some kind of substance was flowing onto the floor from her forehead. Harper was glad the camera was black and white.

            ‘What—?’ He couldn’t say anything. ‘What happened?’

            ‘That sound,’ Continell said. ‘I heard it. Not on the cameras. I actually heard it. From two floors away. I think it was a gunshot.’

            ‘You checked the records on the door?’

            ‘No one went in or out. No prisoner. No guard. Lock wasn’t disengaged. Records are one hundred per cent, no one can change them.’

            ‘One hundred per cent?’

            ‘One hundred per cent.’

            Harper picked up Continell’s coffee without asking and downed the rest of the contents. ‘Wake ’em up. Tell them to suit up. 12-44.’ He started out of the room.

            ‘Who am I waking up?’

            Harper paused at the door. ‘All of them.’

            Ten minutes later, they were all at the lifts. All in their armour. All carrying their service weapons.

            They got in the lift. Went down two floors.

            Harper paused them all at the entrance to the Unit. ‘This is the first time we’ve dealt with something like this. Krotes has signed off on the weapon usage, but no one is firing unless absolutely necessary. Let’s not be trigger-happy.’

            ‘Don’t need to tell me twice, Chief.’ Anderson smiled, cocking his shotgun. Why the hell had they given him a shotgun?

            At least the others appeared more apprehensive. ‘OK,’ Harper said, ‘me and Abrams take point. Truchforth and Anderson take the rear.’

            They went through the double doors into the Unit, and down into the Pit. Prisoners were waking up, shouting questions through their cell doors. They ignored them. Got to the cell.

            Harper took a long breath, nodded to Abrams and the others behind him. Then held up his Cuff. The light on it went green. And so did the light above the cell door.

            They rushed into the dark. Abrams had a torch and she found Lockhart’s face. The young woman was still asleep, or doing a damn good job at pretending. And then the torch went down to the puddle of blood on the floor, and then to Barnard’s face. A hole in the middle of her head. Her eyes open, forever.

            ‘Jesus,’ Harper said.

Then the lights clicked on. And they all saw.

Harper found himself frozen. As Anderson and Abrams rushed to Lockhart, woke her up, got her in cuffs. She was gibbering about not knowing what was going on. And then she saw Barnard, and was gibbering about how she didn’t do it.

Something was wrong.

Truchforth was scanning the cell, searching for the gun. He completed the quick search. ‘There’s no gun in here.’

Just a brief look-round. He could be wrong.

Lockhart was getting dragged out of the cell. All three of them were restraining her, taking her off to the Hole. But Harper couldn’t move. All he could do was stand there, looking and thinking. About something…

‘Harper.’ Continell, in his ear. ‘I’ve been looking over the footage.’

He looked up at the camera.

‘12.3 seconds the camera was down,’ Continell said. ‘I layered over the before and after images, on either side of that cut.’

‘What about it?’

Continell paused a little before speaking. ‘Lockhart doesn’t move. She doesn’t move even a millimetre. The images are identical.’

‘What are you saying?’ Harper asked.

But she didn’t need to answer. Because Harper was thinking it as well.

Was there a possibility that Lockhart didn’t do it?

 

Wow! Inside Out sounds like the ultimate locked room mystery!

You can buy Inside Out at your local bookshop or click here.

The Author 

Chris McGeorge lives in Durham and is a recent graduate of the Creative Writing (Crime/Thriller) MA at City University. He loves film and acting in an amateur theatre group and can be found on Twitter at @crmcgeorge.

Blog tour – This Green and Pleasant Land by Ayisha Malik @Ayisha_Malik @ZaffreBooks @Tr4cyF3nt0n #ThisGreenAndPleasantLand

I’m thrilled to be taking part in the blog tour for This Green and Pleasant Land by Ayisha Malik. Thank you to Tracy Fenton for inviting me to take part and to Zaffre Books for an e-copy to read via NetGalley. Before I give you my thoughts, here’s the blurb.

The Blurb

In the sleepy village of Babbel’s End, trouble is brewing.

Bilal Hasham is having a mid-life crisis. His mother has just died, and he finds peace lying in a grave he’s dug in the garden. His elderly Auntie Rukhsana has come to live with him, and forged an unlikely friendship with village busybody, Shelley Hawking. His wife Mariam is distant and distracted, and his stepson Haaris is spending more time with his real father.

Bilal’s mother’s dying wish was to build a mosque in Babbel’s End, but when Shelley gets wind of this scheme, she unleashes the forces of hell. Will Bilal’s mosque project bring his family and his beloved village together again, or drive them apart?

Warm, wise and laugh-out-loud funny, This Green and Pleasant Land is a life-affirming look at love, faith and the meaning of home.

My Review

The death of a parent is always hard, especially if he or she makes a deathbed request. How can you refuse? Bilal agrees to his mother’s request but it’s an impossible task – to build a mosque near his home in the village of Babbel’s End. If the village was in a Muslim country then it wouldn’t be such a big problem but Babbel’s End is in rural England. Bilal knows he has a fight on his hands and pretty soon, the village is torn in two.

This is a very timely book. It’s fair to say that tensions are running high in the UK and politics is becoming increasingly polarised. This novel reflects this but in a wise and observant way. Using multiple voices we get to hear from people on opposing sides. There’s Shelley, the leader of the ‘No to the mosque’ camp. At first she appears to be a NIMBY but it becomes clear that her motivation to control things stems from not being heard at home by her apathetic husband. There’s Bilal and his wife Mariam. His dedication to carry out his mother’s request rocks his marriage as well as the village. The vicar, Richard, is trying to hold the two sides of the village together as well as battle his love for one of his parishioners, Anne, a grieving mother. But my favourite character by far is Bilal’s Auntie Rukhsana. Bilal was raised by his mother and his auntie and so when his auntie becomes unwell, she comes to stay in Babbel’s End. She was widowed young and was sheltered by her older sister and the surrounding Muslim community. Removed from that safety net, she begins to grow in Babbel’s End. She speaks little English but it doesn’t stop her from finding friendship with Shelley. Despite being on opposing sides, Auntie Rukhsana’s generous spirit and perseverance wins Shelley over.

This wise and sensitive novel doesn’t shy away from the UK’s colonial past though. It’s not done in a ‘bashed over the head’ way but a subtle pointing out that the British brought their own culture, including churches, to a country it occupied i.e. India. That wisdom and sensitivity is extended to other topics, particularly grief in all its facets. From the loss of Bilal’s mother to the loss of Anne’s son and the effect that had on the village as a whole. There’s also Mariam’s grief of being abandoned by her first husband – the father of her son – and the temptation he brings when he comes back into her life.

So the main premise of this book may be the attempt to build a mosque in a village but there’s a lot more depth to it. Sometimes hilarious, sometimes poignant, this is a story with wonderful characters that will live on long after you finish reading it.

You can buy This Green and Pleasant Land here

Or alternatively pop down to your local bookstore!

 

About the Author

Ayisha Malik is a British Muslim, lifelong Londoner, and lover of books. She read English Literature and went on to complete an MA in Creative Writing. She has spent various spells photocopying, volunteering, being a publicist at Random House, and managing editor at Cornerstones Literary Consultancy. Her novels include, Sofia Khan is Not Obliged and The Other Half of Happiness. She is also the ghost writer for GBBO winner, Nadiya Hussain and has contributed to the anthology, A Change is Gonna Come.

Ayisha was one of WH Smith’s Fresh Talent picks, Winter 2016. This Green and Pleasant Land is her latest novel.