I just finished
a more recent Kerr noir detective novel, “A Man without Breathe”. I implied that Kerr’s writing might have the
effect, for me, like that of Travis McGee, whom I associate with depression,
because J.D. MacDonald had Travis doing the same thing: over and over again,
without any steps forward.
Anyway, for
whatever reason, I’ve got the itch for Philip Kerr’s Bernie Gunther now. I finished my second, “A Quiet Flame” and am
now working on a 3-story volume, “March Violets”, “The Pale Criminal”, and “A
German Requiem”.
Bernie is a
classic noir detective: he gets beat up a lot, but survives; he gets lots of
gorgeous women chasing him, and he allows a few catch him; he’s after jewel thieves,
missing persons, and/or murderers, and he always gets his man.
The twist with Bernie
is that he’s a part of the German police in the 1930’s. He’s anti-Nazi, and politically, liberal associations
with Jews seem to cause him no end of trouble.
Somehow he gets through it all.
This
book finds him seeking refuge in Argentina.
It’s the late forties, early fifties and the Peronistas are running the
country.
As
always, leading bad guys are not the mafia, but sadistic SS men.
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