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Hobby Forum Index » Arts - Books - Reviews » Book Review - Blacklist (Sara Paretsky)
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| Danny Yee |
 Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2003 8:20 pm |
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Blacklist
Sara Paretsky
[detective fiction]
Putnam 2003
415 pages
A book review by Danny Yee
http://dannyreviews.com/h/Blacklist.html
On a mundane assignment to check out night-time lights in a deserted
mansion in a wealthy suburb outside Chicago, private investigator
V.I. Warshawski comes across the body of a black journalist. The local
police write it off as an accident, but she persists in following it up,
even when warned away by her original client. Soon she is embroiled in
the financial and sexual intrigues of the local elite, going back three
generations, to the politics of the 1950s and further.
Politics pervades _Blacklist_. Much of the history that Warshawski
uncovers is tied up with McCarthyite anti-communism and the activities of
HUAC, the House Un-American Activities Committee. And in the present,
Warshawski's lover Morell is on assignment in Afghanistan, while she
herself gets caught up in anti-terrorist investigations carried out under
the Patriot Act. The parallels -- and something of her own politics --
are obvious, but Paretsky avoids any hint of the didactic and never
allows the politics to overpower the plot.
_Blacklist_ maintains a steady pacing, with continuous tension, and kept
me involved to the end. Some aspects of Warshawski's life seem idealised
-- the perfect father figure of next-door neighbour Mr Contreras, for
example -- but she herself is convincingly human. Indeed I found the
descriptions of her cold near the beginning a little too convincing for
comfort, since I read _Blacklist_ while down with the flu myself. Some of
the other characters are also nice sketches, notably the sixteen year old
girl and the ninety-one year old woman whose trust Warshawski has to gain.
Overall? It's not spectacular, but it's solidly entertaining detective
fiction, with some original elements. _Blacklist_ is the first novel by
Sara Paretsky I have read, but I'll be keeping an eye out for her others.
Note: Blacklist is scheduled for publication in September 2003.
--
%T Blacklist
%A Paretsky, Sara
%I Putnam
%C New York
%D 2003
%O paperback
%G ISBN 0-399-15085-4
%P 415pp
%K detective fiction
%W http://www.saraparetsky.com/blacklist.html
%Z PI Warshawski digs up some dirt from the 1950s
11 August 2003
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Copyright (c) 2003 Danny Yee http://danny.oz.au/
Danny Yee's Book Reviews http://dannyreviews.com/
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