4 crime and suspense novels make for hot summer reading

Transcript

TONYA MOSLEY, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. As promised, our book critic Maureen Corrigan is back with more summer reading recommendations - this time, mystery and suspense, crime and spy stories.

MAUREEN CORRIGAN, BYLINE: There's something about the shadowy moral recesses of crime and suspense fiction that makes those genres especially appealing as temperatures soar. I'm beginning my recommendations with two distinctive novels that appeared this spring.

Gary Phillips introduced the character of LA crime photographer and occasional private eye, Harry Ingram, in the 2022 novel, "One-Shot Harry." The second novel of this evocative historical series is called "Ash Dark As Night," and it opens in August 1965 during the Watts riots. Harry, who's one of two African American freelancers covering the riots, has looped his trademark speed graphic camera around his neck and headed into the streets. We're told that Harry's situation is, of course, riskier than that of his white counterparts. Maybe one of these fellas might well get a brick upside their head from a participant, but were less likely to be jacked up by the law. Ingram realized either side might turn on him. Indeed, when Harry captures the death of an unarmed Black activist at the hands of the LAPD, the photo makes him famous, as well as a target.

This novel is steeped in period details, like snap brim hats and rag-top Chevy Bel Air convertibles, along with walk-ons by real-life figures, like pioneering African American TV journalist, Louis E. Lomax. But it's Harry's clear-eyed take on the fallen world around him that makes this series so powerful.

You might think a mystery about an inked-up lesbian punk musician turned nun is a little far-fetched. But New Orleans, the setting of the "Sister Holiday" series, is the city of far-fetched phenomena, both sacred and profane. Margot Douaihy's second book in this queer, cozy series is called "Blessed Water," and it finds the 34-year-old Sister Holiday up to her neck in murky floodwaters and priests with secrets.

Douaihy's writing style - pure, hard-boiled Patti Smith - contains all the contradictions that torment Sister Holiday in her bumpy journey of faith. Here she is in the prologue, recalling how she survived, swallowing a glass rosary bead. (Reading) After my prayers for clarity, for forgiveness, for a cigarette, deep inside the wet cave of my body was an unmistakable tickle. The bead fought my stomach acid for hours, leaching its blessing or poison or unmet wish. Anything hidden always finds a way to escape, no matter its careful sealing. Amen to that, Sister Holiday.

I'm turning now to two new tales of suspense. "The Expat" is an excellent debut by novel by Hansen Shi. The main character is an alienated young man named Michael Wang. He's a first-generation Chinese American, a few years out of Princeton, who's hit the bamboo ceiling at General Motors in San Francisco, where he's been working on technology for self-driving cars. Enter a femme fatale named Vivian, who flatters Michael into believing that his brilliance will be recognized by her enigmatic boss in China. Once Michael settles into life in Beijing, however, he realizes he's been tapped, not as a prodigy but a patsy. "The Expat" wraps up too abruptly, but it's also true that I wanted this moody espionage tale to go on longer.

Liz Moore's extraordinary new literary suspense novel called "The God Of The Woods," reminds me of Donna Tartt's 1992 debut, "The Secret History." There are superficial similarities. Both are thick, intricate novels featuring young people isolated in enclosed worlds. In Tartt's story, a Vermont college campus - in Moore's, a summer camp in New York's Adirondack Mountains. But the vital connection for me was a reading experience where I was so thoroughly submerged in a rich fictional world that for hours, I barely came up for air.

There's a touch of Gothic excess about "The God Of The Woods," beginning with the premise that not one but two children from the wealthy Van Laar family disappear from Camp Emerson in the Adirondacks 14 years apart. Moore's story jumps around in time, chiefly from the 1950s into the '70s, and features a host of characters from different social classes, campers, counselors, townspeople, and local police and the Van Laars themselves.

The precision of Moore's writing never flags. Consider this reflection by Tracy (ph), a 12-year-old camper, who recalls that her father once told her casually that she was built like a plum on toothpicks. The phrase was at once so cruel and so poetic that it clicked into place around her like a harness. Moore's previous book, "Long Bright River," was a superb social novel about the Opioid Crisis in Philadelphia. "The God Of The Woods" is something weirder and stranger and unforgettable. Happy summer reading, wherever your tastes take you.

MOSLEY: Maureen Corrigan is a professor of literature at Georgetown University. She reviewed "Ash Dark As Night," "Blessed Water," "The Expat" and "The God Of The Woods."

Tomorrow on FRESH AIR, comedian Michelle Buteau, who stars in the new movie "Babes," about friendship, pregnancy and motherhood. This year, she became the first woman to film a Netflix comedy special at Radio City Music Hall. I hope you can join us.

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MOSLEY: FRESH AIR's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Amy Salit, Phyllis Myers, Sam Briger, Lauren Krenzel, Heidi Saman, Ann Marie Baldonado, Therese Madden, Thea Chaloner, Susan Nyakundi and Joel Wolfram. Our digital media producer is Molly Seavy-Nesper. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. With Terry Gross, I'm Tonya Mosley.

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