A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr (Part II)

A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr (Part II) - In Part I of my review Bernie Gunther returns to the Eastern Front. He is checking out reports of mass graves of Polish Army officers. While investigating he gets involved in a local investigation of the murder of a pair of German soldiers.

Forensic experts from all over Europe and the Polish Red Cross come to excavate and study the buried bodies of the Polish officers. The Russians have developed a method of entombing mass graves with sand to prevent the decomposing bodies from damaging the environment. 

Dr. Marianne Kramsta, a beautiful German forensic doctor, arrives to assist in the investigation of the mass grave. As with every other German officer Bernie is smitten. 

She practises forensic medicine because it is not political. Unlike other areas of medicine taken over by fascist ideals she says “[T]heory and opinion have no place beside the dissecting table”.

Standing with her in the Cathedral Church of the Assumption in Smolensk, Bernie muses as he watches the Germans and Russians praying in the church:

Either way, God was going to have to choose sides and choose soon: the godless communists or the blaspheming Germans. Who would be God with a choice like that?

I wondered what would happen to this romance. Bernie has had so many disappointments.

Bernie’s investigation involves another prominent group in Germany. Numerous high ranking Army officers are members of the Prussian aristocracy. The “vons” and the “zus” are elitist, effortlessly arrogant and condescending. Few are devoted Nazis but they are quite willing to lead the Nazi war of conquest.

Field Marshal Gunther von Kluge commands Army Group Centre. He is a professional who has adapted to the extreme warfare of the Eastern Front.

I had read of Hitler buying the loyalty of Generals with gifts of money and land. Bernie is not surprised by what is given to Von Kluge.

Kerr has a great talent for weaving a plausible murder mystery into a plot concentrated on one or more of the great events and/or issues of World War II. The murder mystery and the major plot theme could be good stand alone books. Together they create great books.

The ending of A Man Without Breath was tense and involved yet more Nazi German leaders.

Several in the book, as others have in earlier books of the series, wonder how Bernie has survived the 11 years since the Nazis came to power with his unruly attitude to authority. Nazis were not noted for tolerance of the eccentric. Bernie lives because he is useful. Heydrich and Goebbels could easily have had him executed for his insubordination. Instead, they vest him with power far beyond his rank of Captain. Unlike the sycophants clustered around them they know he will find out the truth in an investigation not merely what subordinates think their superiors want to know.

The combatants on both sides of the Eastern Front have been so de-sensitized to death that they are indifferent to killing. Where Viktor Frankl, most prominently in his book Man’s Search for Meaning, said all life has meaning it is the reverse on the Eastern Front. 

It has been eighty-three years since the events explored in A Man Without Breath. I fear our current world is getting de-sensitized to death.

While each of the books featuring Bernie is hard to read because of the powerful descriptions of violence and vile human behaviour, A Man Without Breath may be the most difficult. I will read more of Bernie but I need a break from his life.

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Kerr, Philip – (2004) - Dark Matter; (2016) - March Violets; (2016) - The Pale Criminal; (2016) - A German Requiem; (2016) - Berlin Police and the Holocaust - Part I and Part II;  (2016) - Comparing Serial Killers in Three Totalitarian States; (2023) - The One From the Other; (2023) - A Quiet Flame; (2024) - If the Dead Rise Not; (2026) - Field Gray; (2026) - Prague Fatale; (2026) - A Man Without Breath - Part I and Part II

A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr (Part I)

(33. - 1322.) A Man Without Breath by Philip Kerr (Part I) - In 1943 Bernie Gunther is involved with situations which actually occurred in Nazi Germany and Russia that go beyond ironic, surpass the surreal and reach the absurd.

He has left the Berlin Police Homicide Department to join the Wehrmacht War Crimes Bureau. They are tasked with investigating and prosecuting crimes committed by and against German soldiers. A soldier on the Eastern Front convicted of rape and murder might be executed. The murders of hundreds of thousands of Jews by SS special action units on the Eastern Front are outside the Bureau’s jurisdiction. Thus the absurdity that an individual soldier might be prosecuted but the Holocaust is ignored.

While carrying out an investigation Bernie is present at the protests outside the Jewish Welfare Office on Rosenstrasse. Hundreds of well dressed women, the non-Jewish wives of Jewish men, are publicly protesting the arrest and planned deportation of their husbands. Nazi leadership, calculating the consequences of beating or prosecuting or killing them, take the easy way out by releasing the men. It is absurd that Nazi leaders who killed millions retreat from the protests of wives.

Invited to a Jewish family meal after the husband, Dr. Meyer, was released Bernie is injured when a British bomb destroys the apartment. I say it is ironic not absurd that Bernie is rescued from the rubble by “lads from the Gestapo”.

Bernie returns to the Eastern Front where existence is surreal. His superior, Judge Johannes Goldsche, has a delicate mission for him. Some human bones have been discovered near Smolensk in the Katyn Wood. The Germans stationed there suspect a mass grave. For two years there have been reports that the Russians conducted mass executions of captured Polish officers. Are the bones from Polish officers or are they from one of the several alternatives? There are an abundance of mass graves in Russia.

A Signals Unit of the Army is stationed next to Katyn Wood. Bernie stays with them as he quietly seeks information.

Two members of the Signals Unit are murdered. Unable, as always, to stop being a detective, he aids the investigation into their deaths.

On Bernie’s return to Berlin he is summoned to see Dr. Goebbels, the Minister of Public Enlightment and Propaganda. Goebbels sees the immense propaganda value in proving thousands of Polish officers were murdered by the U.S.S.R. He provides Bernie with “letters patent” to act as his plenitpotentiary. An independent inquiry into the deaths will be conducted. For the second time Bernie will personally represent one of the highest leaders in the Nazi Party in an investigation.  Previously, in Prague Fatale it had been Reinhard Heydrich.

The Eastern Front is hell on earth. The Russian war machine is grinding down the German Army. Behind the front line Russians are treated cruelly. German soldiers constantly fear partisans. The Eastern Front brings out the worst in everyone.

Bernie is no exception. I admire Bernie’s stubborn integrity but even his fierce personality is no match for the Eastern Front. It was depressing and, all too realistic, to see Bernie reduced to expediency.

Part II of the review will examine the unfolding of the two investigations.

****

Kerr, Philip – (2004) - Dark Matter; (2016) - March Violets; (2016) - The Pale Criminal; (2016) - A German Requiem; (2016) - Berlin Police and the Holocaust - Part I and Part II;  (2016) - Comparing Serial Killers in Three Totalitarian States; (2023) - The One From the Other; (2023) - A Quiet Flame; (2024) - If the Dead Rise Not; (2026) - Field Gray; (2026) - Prague Fatale

The Rule of Law and China

Desmond Shum Photo: Jonty Davies

Red Roulette by Desmond Shum provides a powerful story of what happens in a nation that is not governed by the Rule of Law. In Canada and other Western democracies citizens and governments must abide by constitutions and statutes and the interpretations by the courts of a country. In Communist China there is only the pretence of the Rule of Law. It is the Communist Party currently dominated by its General Secretary, Xi Jinping, which decides what is the law of the nation. 

The Rule of Law can be an abstract principle. I find examples best illustrate the application of principles. Shum provides examples of how it is the Party, rather than the Rule of Law, which controls China.

In Canada statutes are carefully drafted to be as precise as possible so that they can be clearly understood and consistently interpreted. Canadians, with the aid of lawyers and judges, can be confident that they can rely on the provisions of statutes being applied by the courts.

In China, Shum explains that statutes have a lot of “gray” in them which makes it impossible for the Chinese people to know how the laws, especially in business, will be applied.

There is no independent judiciary to provide a check on the Party.

Even worse, when new laws are passed they are generally “retrospective” rather than “prospective”. In Canada it is the reverse. The problem with “retrospective” laws is that people, in particular, businessmen make decisions based on the law at the time of a decision. 

Even if laws are not changed, the Party in China has the power to require private companies to share or give up ownership of ventures to state owned entities.

If laws are subsequently changed to negatively impact existing business decisions or the Party can involve itself in successful companies it is hard to convince businesses to invest in such an arbitrary country.

With the law so “flexible” in China it is essential for business people to have good and close relationships with the “red aristocracy”, high ranking members of the Party and their families, so that laws are not changed to their detriment and interpretation of “gray” laws on corruption are not applied to them negatively.

In Red Roulette Shum and his wife, Whitney, cultivated a close relationship with Auntie Zhang, the wife of Wen who became the Premier of China. Establishing and maintaining such relationships inevitably involves payments or advantageous business opportunities.

Under the Rule of Law statutes apply to all citizens. I acknowledge there is some discretion in Canada but I have confidence no class of Canadians is exempted from the law.

In Communist China the “princelings”, the families of high ranking Party officials, do not face the same consequences as common folk. Shum describes how Li Peiying, a non-princeling, was convicted of corruption and executed by a bullet to the back of the head but nothing happened to a princeling participating in another corrupt venture at the same time..

Shum stated “the courts functioned as a tool of Party control”.

So far the Communist Party of China has allowed enough economic opportunity for the non-princelings that the economy can flourish and resentment towards the princelings is muted.

When there is no Rule of Law with regard to enforcement of criminal law, especially corruption statutes, everyone lives with an element of fear. Once again, connections with the elite can reduce the fear but never eliminate the anxiety.

Whitney used her connections to prosper, probably to the status of billionaire, and vowed not to make dirty business deals.

However, when unwanted public attention was brought upon the wealth of the Wen family by the New York Times and the Party negatively reacted it was Whitney not Auntie Zhang who was sacrificed.

With regard to criminal charges under the Rule of Law you are entitled to know the charges and have a trial.

Where there is no Rule of Law you can simply be “disappeared” as Whitney was taken from her office in 2017.

Chinese laws requiring the police holding someone to release or formally arrest the suspect are circumvented by shuanggui which:

…. allows investigators to hold people suspected of violating Party regulations. But shuanggui is not limited by any law. Technically, detentions can last forever.”

If a billionaire can be “disappeared” ordinary citizens live at constant risk.

Will the system change?

In 1215 English Barons met with King John at Runnymede and compelled him to sign the Magna Carta which significantly limited the power of the King. 

Among the provisions, as set out in an article on the LawNow website, were:

Clause 39 of the document provided that “no free man” (at the time, this mainly meant the barons) could be imprisoned, lose his possessions or be “deprived of his standing in any way … except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land”.

Its concluding phrase – that no one could be punished or penalized except “… by the law of the land” – is perhaps the most significant of all, both in relation to criminal law and indeed, to our entire system of governance. This concept describes the Rule of Law, which underlies our form of democracy and law: the government, at whatever level and through whatever agency, may only act against a citizen where the law gives it authority to do so. Most important for criminal law, these words meant the state could only imprison or otherwise punish individuals where properly enacted legal provisions say this is possible. Arbitrary and illegal detention and imprisonment would not be tolerated any longer; citizens were no longer subject to being locked up simply because the king or queen took a disliking to their words or actions.

Other provisions established jury trials, that judges be qualified and the requirement that evidence be produced at trials.

Magna Carta was effectively the start of the Rule of Law in England. While the Charter was subsequently challenged the absolute power of the monarchy was at an end.

I think the “princelings” will some day compel the General Secretary of the Communist Party to share power and recognize property and personal rights.

I do not see the Rule of Law coming to China in the near future.

****

Shum, Desmond - (2026) - Red Roulette

Red Roulette by Desmond Shum

(31. - 1320.) Red Roulette by Desmond Shum - Shum grew up in a family both cursed and blessed by the Communist Party of China. His paternal grandfather, a distinguished lawyer, declined to leave the mainland in 1949 when the Communists took over, trusting in the Party’s socialist rhetoric. The Party took away his assets and left him humiliated. His maternal grandfather moved to Hong Kong at the takeover and sent money regularly back to his grandmother gaining status and protection for her, even during the Great Cultural Revolution, as she was associated with “patriotic overseas Chinese”.

Ill-treated by his parents, Shum grew up in Hong Kong. For much of his schooling he was focused on sports, he was a Chinese giant at 6’5”, rather than academics. Seeking the status that comes from an elite education he studied hard to get into Queen’s College.

From their struggles on the mainland Shum and his parents were frugal in ways beyond money. They never wasted food. 

In 1989, just after the Party’s brutal crackdown on student protesters, Shum moved to the United States to attend the University of Wisconsin.

In 1994 he joined private equity firm, ChinaVest, seeking to become part of China’s economic boom.

He soon learned of the corruption within the Chinese government needed to facilitate business:

For me, Robertson’s cultivation of Feng Bo peeled back the curtain on the inner workings of a political system that mouthed Communist slogans whilte the families of senior officals gorged themselves at the trough of economic reforms. These sons and daughters functioned like an aristocracy, they intermarried, lived lives disconnected from those of average Chinese, and made fortunes selling access to their parents, inside information, and regulatory approvals that were keys to wealth.

Shum’s book confirmed the importance of guanxi (connections) described in the crime mystery stories of Xiaolong featuring Inspector Chin during this era.

When he returned to China to live in Beijiang he found himself at a disadvantage. He did not know how the new China worked and lacked connections. Both were essential to exploiting the tradeoff the Party provided:

....give us your freedom and we’ll let you make money.

After a faltering start in business he met The Lady Chairman Whitney Duan (Duan Zong), a powerhouse of a woman who had worked her way from the coastal province of Shandong to Beijiang. Her company, Great Ocean, engaged in real estate developments and importing IBM computers. She stood out in the male dominated business world of China. 

To succeed in China connections with the Party leadership were vital. Whitney had an elite connection through her friendship with Auntie Zhang, the wife of Wen Jiabo who became Chinese Premier, the second most important position in China.

Trained as a geologist Auntie Zhang was known as the “Diamond Queen” for her role in re-establishing China’s jewelry industry. 

While her husband devoted himself to work, Auntie Zhang was eager to do business.

Their children were avaricious, eventually becoming billionaires.

By 2003 Whitney was Auntie Zhang’s “closest female companion” and they had opened an office together.

Shum recounts vividly the intrigues in China’s red aristocracy as its members compete for riches and power. Conflicts in families are inevitable.

Their lives changed when they were able to purchase a small share in Ping An, a giant insurance company. They borrowed $12 million. They held their shares despite a twelve fold increase in value after the company went public in Hong Kong because “China’s controls on the movement of capital banned the sale of Chinese stock overseas”.

When the company was listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange the price went up to twenty-six times the value of their original shares and they cleared over $300 million.

Shum believes “that luck lies at the heart of most fortunes”. When they invested in Ping An they did not knowit was going to go public. 

Shum led the way in their next venture, a logistics hub at the Beijiang airport. Completing the approval process and building the hub took Shum’s people skills, great persistence and some help from their connections in the Party. Shum needed 150 chops (“Chinese seals that are used in lieu of a signature”) in the process and he led the way in getting almost every chop.

Business was unfriendly to family life. Most days he was circulating through offices working out problems. Almost every night he was meeting lower level officials who could keep a project on time or stall it. They would gather to eat and drink for hours. The amount of alcohol consumed was breathtaking.

They made almost $200 million on the project.

Their crowning project was a luxury real estate development in downtown Bejiang in which they combined their experience in luxury hotels and buildings around the world with great designers. It was called Genesis.

As they progressed they believed for a time the Party was ready to adjust governance and control to give some freedom. The opposite proved true. When the Party perceived its control was threatened it acted decisively. Individuals not part of the Red aristocracy would be sidelined and jailed in corruption investigations. State controlled companies demanded control or at least shares in private companies.

They reserved for themselves the 10,000 square foot penthouse in their hotel/condo building. Among its perks was an indoor pool.

When the NY Times ran a front page story that the Wen family was worth almost $3 billion Auntie Zhang sacrificed Whitney. It was Whitney practising “yiqi, the code of brotherhood”.

Shum describes how Xi Jinping maunouvered himself into becoming China’s leader as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party.

Though Wen supported Xi, the family, caught up in the turmoil over their wealth, “ ‘donated’ all of their assets to the state in exchange for a guarantee that they wouldn’t be prosecuted”.

I felt I was reading a real life version, on a grander scale, of the fierce business and personal battles in Hong Kong 40 years earlier described in Noble House by James Clavell. 

The heavy hand of the party and the corrupt actions of high ranking families would seem bound to limit economic success but China has continued to thrive.

Shum has abundant anecdotes and brief histories of the participants while he keeps driving the narrative. 

What happened to Shum and Whitney will be discussed in my next post.

James Comey and FDR Drive and the U.S. Department of Justice

It is a coincidence that I have just finished reading FDR Drive when there are news stories appearing about the American Federal Department of Justice attempting to bolster their case against the author, James Comey, by using excerpts from the book.

In this post I make references to the book that I would consider spoilers. They do not reveal the ending but readers who want little information about a book before reading are hereby warned there is significant information in this post.

The Department of Justice  has alleged, as set out by Publishers Weekly:

…. that Comey threatened to harm President Trump when he posted a photo of seashells arranged on a beach to spell “86-47.” Comey’s lawyers have asked that the case be dismissed.

Earlier this month Publishers Weekly set out the Department of Justice position:

In a filing earlier this week, the Department of Justice maintained that Comey, similarly to a right-wing podcaster in his legal thriller FDR Drive, sent coded messages to his followers suggesting they kill an enemy of his. The new filing, which seeks to prevent the DOJ’s case from being thrown out of court, also includes a starred PW review of the book, which concludes with the observation that FDR Drive “proves that Comey the crime novelist is here to stay.”

I looked up and read the Government’s submission to the Court and Comey’s response.

The excerpts quoted by the Government from FDR Drive appear in the facts of the submission. They need to be claimed to be evidence to be relied on in an argument.

Leaving aside the issue of freedom of speech I cannot recall where a prosecutor or defence counsel have sought to use statements in a work of fiction as evidence in a criminal proceeding. 

While self-evident the Department of Justice appears to need reminding that the book is “fiction” not “non-fiction”.

There are defamation actions against the authors of fictional works that named real persons or created characters who were obviously real life people. I discuss the issue in a series of posts concerning Palace of Treason by Jason Matthews. In the book Matthews named Vladimir Putin and described him very negatively.

Once again, stating the obvious, defamation is civil not criminal.

In my review of the book I stated with regard to the evil podcaster, Sam Buchanan:

He calls on the patriots of White America to act to defend the nation from the others intent on taking over. He names people he identifies as tyrants. Two have been killed.

****

As a precedent the prosecutors look back a thousand years to King Henry II asking his knights who will rid him of the meddlesome Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket.

****

Buchanan states:

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants, as Jefferson said.

The government’s filing quotes the reference to Henry II but not the portions of the book connected to the first and third references. I include them for context.

In the book prosecutors realize there is a problem with connecting the words to the actions of the killers. To remedy that weakness Comey creates a jailhouse informant. By accident Buchanan is housed with a serial criminal informant, Michael James Gerardi. Buchanan on tape, unprompted, freely says to Gerardi that he knew what would happen “because I wanted it to happen, I was committed to having it happen”. The prosecutors have the connection for a conspiracy.

The Department of Justice has no one saying Comey told anyone that FDR Drive is connected with his posting of the photo of the seashells to allegedly threaten President Trump. The Department of Justice does acknowledge that Comey denies arranging the seashells and that Comey stated:

I posted earlier a picture of some shells I saw today on a beach walk, which I assumed were a political message. I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence. It never occurred to me but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.

I further note President Trump is not mentioned in FDR Drive.

It is ironic that the Department of Justice is using an example of writing in which a fictional highly conservative right wing podcaster is sending messages which incited violence.

If there is a message to be drawn from the book it is that any real life highly conservative right wing podcasters, talking about their opposition as tyrants and that “the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants” are a danger to American society. I would not say they should be subject to criminal charges.

Publishers Weekly further said:

In the filing, prosecutors also said Comey had an “apparent financial incentive to stir up controversy,” suggesting the seashell photo was shared in an effort to juice sales for his “eerily on-the-nose novel.”

The “apparent financial incentive” was a poor incentive. The Guardian newspaper reports that, according to Circana BookScan, Comey’s novel has sold 6,471 copies as of August of 2026.

I consider the Department of Justice position such a far fetched theory that no author of crime fiction could advance it in a book.

Comey’s lawyers, in their reply to the Department of Justice submission, did not bother to respond to the submissions on FDR Drive.

The material is now before a Federal Court judge. I will be very interested to read the judgment.

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FDR Drive

FDR Drive by James Comey

(35. - 1324.) FDR Drive by James Comey - Being a federal prosecutor in New York City has made Nora Carleton acutely aware of “the darkness in the world”. Recently appointed “the Deputy United States Attorney, the number two position in the Southern District of New York” (SDNY), she is taking the lead on a prospective case of terrorism.

The United States Attorney for the SDNY is her friend and colleague Carmen Garcia.

Carleton is a lesbian in a good relationship with Captain Demitria “Demi” Kofatos of the Westport, Connecticut Police Department. 

A staff prosecutor at the SDNY, Sean Fitzpatrick, has come to believe:

“..... that the biggest domestic threat ws no longer Cosa Nostra but what the FBI called ‘racially motivated violent extremists’ - and the most active of these were White people who believed that non-Whites threatened them and the continued existence of the United States of America.”

One of the leaders of the movement is Sam Buchanan, a swift talking podcaster. While banned from the mainstream platforms he makes his way on to the internet through messaging apps, shared clips and a steadily growing email subscription service. He speaks eloquently, no doubt aided by his Harvard education, to the “voiceless Americans of European ancestry”. 

He is following in the footsteps of Rush Limbaugh and Alex Jones though his words are more inflammatory. He calls on the patriots of White America to act to defend the nation from the others intent on taking over. He names people he identifies as tyrants. Two have been killed.

Fitzpatrick, as the  Chief of the National Security and International Narcotics unit better known by its acronym, NSIN, wants to investigate Buchanan for “seditious conspiracy”. (The SDNY is an acronym rich environment.) He needs to know if Buchanan has direct links with the killers.

As a precedent the prosecutors look back a thousand years to King Henry II asking his knights who will rid him of the meddlesome Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket.

In the highly polarized America of the mid-2020’s Garcia wants to proceed cautiously.

Assisting Carleton is Benny Dugan, a huge powerful man, who is an investigator for the office. 

Buchanan is portrayed in every unflattering way possible from demagogue to sexual predator. He has not a single redeeming quality. He is a cardboard villain.

While an evil guy I wondered where the evidence would come for a conspiracy involving Buchanan. There is no physical evidence. There is an abundance of Buchanan making vile comments but where is the connection with the killers. There is a mid-plot twist to deal with that issue that felt contrived. The effort to distance the SDNY from the twist supported my feeling.

The pre-trial manoeuvring was well done. Comey knows U.S. Federal Court rules and practice. Legal issues are handled credibly.

I would have said one of the defence lawyers was incompetent and it was not credible that the lawyer represent an accused on a murder charge had I not watched several of the lawyers who have represented President Trump in recent years.

Jury selection is prolonged and challenging for the lawyers as they have to consider which potential jurors will move to becoming jurors as the prosecution and defence use their peremptory strikes.

The trial was interesting. It reminded me of many television shows on trials where the questioning is condensed to just the highlighted issue. The compression takes up fewer pages than a real examination or cross-examination. What is lost is the subtlety of how a witness testifies and responds on cross. The book could be taken directly to a T.V. series or movie. The producers would hardly have to cut any dialogue.

The trial addressed whether Buchanan was a just a loudmouth advocate for his vision of America or inciting his listeners to violence. What was the intent of his words? He never directed anyone to commit violence in his lengthy monologues on his show. What does it mean for a criminal prosecution when he says:

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants, as Jefferson said.

The Anglo-American-Canadian legal systems require accused to be found guilty beyond all reasonable doubt of the charges against them. It is an intentionally high burden. It is difficult to meet that standard on a charge of conspiracy.

While there is a shortage of analysis in the book there is a recognition of perspective with regard to the participants in the January 6 storming of the Capitol and the participants in riots after George Floyd was killed.

There is a conspiracy that has elements of plausibility and improbability.

As often occurs in crime fiction an informant of the State lies to strengthen the prosecution.

The book reminds me of many television shows in that the good people are great and the bad people are wicked. There is barely any gray in the characterizations.

FDR Drive is well written and crisply paced. I find it not possible to discuss a significant flaw in the structure of the book for me because it is too big a spoiler. I think I need to read another of Comey’s books to draw better conclusions about the author. I am sure he can write a book that is not a T.V. show in print.

I am very aware Comey is the former director of the FBI and a continuing target for the Trump Department of Justice. I reached my thoughts for this review without considering his non-authorial life. I may have more to say on the current references to the book in a Department of Justice brief in its effort to prosecute Comey.

The Music of What Happens by John Straley

(34. - 1323.) The Music of What Happens by John Straley - Reading of bitter custody, now called parenting, disputes reminds me of the many cases in which I have represented a father or a
mother or grandparents. They are among the most difficult of legal cases for objectivity is lost. Emotions are dominant. I have not found that either gender is dominant in being irrational.

Cecil Younger, private investigator in Alaska, is working for Priscilla “Cilla” DeAngelo in a battle with Robert Sullivan II over the custody of Young Bob Sullivan that started while he was in the natal ward of the hospital in which he was born.

Priscilla is convinced that State Senator Wilfred Taylor, a friend of Young Bob’s grandfather Old Bob Sullivan, has corrupted the trial judge against her. She storms off to Juneau to confront him. Taylor ends up dead and Priscilla is charged with murder.

Three of the most colourful lawyers I have read about are involved in her defence. 

Dickie Stein is Cecil’s friend. He graduated from Harvard Law at 19 and moved North “disdaining Wall Street to make a name for himself in frontier justice”. He often wears his maroon Harvard sweatshirt. 

Harrison Teller also got his law degree at Harvard. He hates authority and “he would represent you with a depth of passion and vitriol that would garner thousands of dollars in contempt citations with each trial”. Cecil encounters Teller. He is “[A] big man in a heavy wool coat that could have been a buffalo robe”. He has a bushy beard and a wide brimmed felt hat. 

Cecil cannot remember the name of the Associate Public Defender. He does remember meeting the APA in his office: 

His hair had those dirty black horns from where he had been pulling at it all day in court. He was wearing a Blackhawks jersey and baggy black shorts. His tennis shoes were unlaced ….

I doubt I would trust any of the trio with a murder defence.

There is a powerful scene in which Younger accepts he will drown as he sinks down. He feels comforted by knowing “this time I would be the first on the scene and I would know more than the cops, even if I was dead”. When he is unexpectedly rescued he is disoriented.

Younger literally and figuratively stumbles into the investigation. He struggles to make sense of what has happened and is happening.

The setting is so physically different from Saskatchewan. Younger lives amidst the sea, trees and mountains. Only the isolation is the same.

Younger desperately wants to help Priscilla and her sister, Jane Marie, and Young Bob.

While Younger tries to puzzle his way through what is happening he has an amazing experience swimming near a quartet of humpback whales:

Rubbery white fins flashed in front of me. The shadow of something trailing bubbles the size of cantaloupes. The shadow moved slowly but with inexorable force, like a school bus rolling off a cliff. I could never see its entire length in this murky water, but only dim parts of the whole: a shifting of enormous curve and shadow.

Jane Marie is a whale scientist who uses imagination to try to gain abit of understanding of what whales tell each other.

She plays a recording of the whales:

Through the headphones I heard a chorus of sounds: squealing, creaking, and broad sweeping moans.

Younger describes the tape as eerie and beautiful.

While the portrayal of Alaska and life there is brilliant I found the plot somewhat disjointed. It is never going to be easy to describe a fierce custody dispute. Participants too often act illogically. I found it hard to follow the “why”. The senator’s death made it harder.

The conclusion was as dramatic as the opening. It is the middle I found slow going.

I consider The Music of What Happens a good book. I consider the previous two books in the series better.

****

Straley, John - (2019) - The Woman Who Married a Bear and Maureen's Reply; (2020) - The Curious Eat Themselves and Clothes in The Curious Eat Themselves