REVIEWS FROM AARON STANDER
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ALL YOURS
CLAUDIA PIÑEIRO
Bitter Lemon Press Trade PBO 1/12
ISBN: 978-1-904738-80-0
ALL YOURS by Argentinian writer Claudia Piñeiro is a slim, tightly packed novella with rollercoaster-like dips and turns. The book opens in the voice and head of Inez, an upper middle-class wife and mother whose world revolves around all things domestic, especially her husband and their teenage daughter. In the early part of her monologue, Inez ponders a month-long absence of conjugal bliss. She attributes her husband's sudden loss of libidinous interest to overwork and exhaustion. This view is shattered when she opens Ernesto's briefcase in search of a pen and finds a heart, sketched with lipstick, transected by the words, "All yours".
Inez's initial anger at the discovery of the lettre d'amour quickly morphs into a defense of her family, the "house to die for", and the trappings of her comfortable bourgeois existence. A few nights later Ernesto tells her he must run back to the office to handle a major problem. She follows him to a nearby public park next to a lake and from a distance observes him in a frantic confrontation with his secretary, Alicia. As Alicia tries to cling to Ernesto, he pushes her away. She falls, striking her head. Inez watches as Ernesto tries and fails to resuscitate her.
Inez sees Alicia's death as an opportunity to put their marriage back together again. To this end, the next morning she goes through Alicia's apartment, removing any evidence that might tie Ernesto to Alicia. She also works with Ernesto on the perfect alibi. The alibi is unneeded because Ernesto tossed the body in a lake, and it doesn't surface again until the end of the plot.
Inez soon suspects that Ernesto has other amorous interests. She begins to move from a position of defense to one of revenge, but it's hard for her to hold to any strategy in the rapidly unfolding series of revelations and discoveries.
The second plot line, much less developed than the first, is the narrative of Lili, the daughter of Inez and Ernesto. She is as oblivious to their lives as they are to hers. And she's struggling with her own major trauma.
ALL YOURS is a fast, compelling read. The world of this desperate housewife of the Argentine continues to spin out of control with murderous consequences to the final sentence in the story.
NIGHTS OF AWE
HARRI NYKÄNEN
Bitter Lemon Press Trade PBO 4/12
In the open pages of NIGHTS OF AWE, Ariel Kafka, a violent crime detective and one of two Jewish policemen in Finland, stands looking into a dumpster at the body of a street person. Kafka thinks that a crazed companion probably did in the victim, perhaps in a struggle over a now empty booze bottle. He stands and reflects on the meaning or meaninglessness of life. His musings are appropriate, even for a non-observant Jew, on the eve of the High Holy Days. Tradition runs deep; it is a time for introspection.
Later that morning Kafka runs into his sometime rabbi on the street. Rabbi Liebstein aggressively confronts Kafka on his lack of religiosity and his absence from synagogue. He reminds Kafka that, "The soul requires rest, otherwise the person becomes as frail as the ashes of burnt silk, and eventually crumbles into the tiniest motes of dust."
Liebstein's words are prophetic, for within hours of this conversation Kafka's life is spinning in a maelstrom of events; two murders are followed by two more. All the victims are men from the Middle East. At first the crimes appear to be tied to narcotics trafficking, perhaps signaling the beginning of a turf war between competing gangs. Then things become even more sinister as possible links to international terrorism emerge. More murders and explosions follow and Kafka, as lead investigator, has to move the probe forward, juggling the interests of various police agencies and intelligence services, each with its own agenda.
Most of the story is presented in dialogue and first person narration. It is a book about character rather than place - the settings and landscape are seldom mentioned. The plot is complex - connecting Finland to a history not of its making, turning this remote northerly landscape into a battlefield of warring religions and ideologies. At the end the plot, coming almost full circle, is resolved. Along the way Ariel Kafka's loyalty to friends, family, and his religious community compete with his professionalism. And all of these influences merge in a surprising and original conclusion.