The Beggar's Opera (Inspector Ramirez) - Softcover

Blair, Peggy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0143186426 ISBN 13: 9780143186427

Publisher: Pintail, 2013

Synopsis

IN BEAUTIFUL, CRUMBLING OLD Havana, detective Mike Ellis hopes the sun and sand will save his troubled marriage. He doesn’t yet know that it’s dead in the water, much like the little Cuban boy last seen begging the couple for a few pesos on the world famous Malecón.

For Inspector Ricardo Ramirez, head of the Havana Major Crimes Unit, arresting Ellis isn’t the problem—the law is. He has only seventy-two hours to secure an indictment and prevent a vicious killer from leaving the island. And Ramirez has his own troubles. He’s dying of the same dementia that killed his grandmother, an incurable disease that makes him see the ghosts of victims of his unsolved cases. As he races against time, the dead haunt his every step. . . .

First in a new series featuring Inspector Ramirez, The Beggar’s Opera exposes the bureaucracy, corruption, and beauty of Hemingway’s Havana.

About this title

About the Author

Peggy Blair was a lawyer for more than thirty years. A recognized expert in Aboriginal law, she worked as both a criminal defence lawyer and Crown prosecutor. Her critically acclaimed mystery The Beggar’s Opera, won the 2012 Scotiabank Giller Prize Readers' Choice award and was selected as one of Amazon's best books in 2012. She lives in Ottawa.

Reviews

*Starred Review* Not only does Canadian Blair’s exciting new series take place in contemporary Havana—a slam dunk of a setting for crime fiction—but it also boasts an unusual and unusually intriguing premise: Inspector Ricardo Ramirez, head of Havana’s Major Crimes Unit, sees dead bodies, the ghosts of the victims of his unsolved cases. But this isn’t another paranormal wrinkle in a realistic crime series (like Charles Todd’s Inspector Rutledge novels); no, Ramirez may have inherited something called Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), in which the victim suffers from vivid hallucinations. But he hardly has time to worry about his dead companions at the moment, as a Canadian policeman, Mike Ellis, is being held on suspicion of the rape and murder of a young Cuban boy, and the police have 72 hours to formally charge or release him. Meanwhile, a Canadian lawyer, Celia Jones, arrives to help Ellis negotiate the formidable Cuban bureaucracy. Each of the three major characters could hold up a crime novel on his or her own, and Blair interweaves their stories beautifully; she also invests Havana geography (with its decaying buildings and rusting American cars) with new vigor by focusing not only on photo-worthy street scenes but also on the complex lives of the people who live inside the broken buildings. A fine novel and the launch of what looks to be a superb series. --Bill Ott

Edition details

• Publisher: Pintail
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0143186426
• ISBN 13: 9780143186427
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352