James McClure (1)Recensioni

Reason read: South African crime writer
This was a new to me author. I don't read a lot of crime/detective books but this was alright. I think the author did a pretty good job dealing with South African culture. This book was written in the seventies so I would guess much has changed since it was written. Over all it was good, i had some trouble with the story line. I think there was two things happening but the main thing was figuring out how the girl and her snake died and why. I learned about pythons too. If you like detective/crime fiction you might like this.

El teniente Tromp Kramer, de la Brigada de Homicidios y Robos de Trekkersburgo, se traslada a una remota reserva de caza en Natal, al norte de Zululandia, para investigar el asesinato de una mujer y un hombre blancos, este último policía. Allí encontrará una realidad mucho más salvaje y descontrolada que en su jurisdicción habitual, una cara del apartheid violenta y cruel donde la magia negra de los brujos y adivinos todavía marca el destino de los hombres.

La víspera de Navidad, el teniente Kramer es reclamado para que investigue el asesinato de un blanco católico, muy piadoso, ocurrido en uno de los mejores barrios residenciales de Trekkesrburgo, en Sudáfrica. Sin embargo, apenas iniciadas las pesquisas, es trasladado de caso, para que se ocupe de un simple accidente de tráfico con una víctima normal. El asesinato del beato blanco le es encargado a su amigo el sargento zulú Mickey Zondi. ¿Por qué separan a Kramer y a Zondi? ¿Qué misterio oculta esta sucesión de extrañas casualidades?

¿Quién no ha jugado en su infancia a policías y ladrones? Pero en el caso del niño afrikáner Boetie Swanepoel, el juego ha ido demasiado lejos. Cuando su cadáver aparece mutilado en una plantación a las afueras de Trekkersburg, todo hace pensar en la obra de un pervertido sexual: hasta que la aparición de una oruga extrañamente biseccionada desmonta la teoría y apunta a que se trata de un crimen premeditado. Pero, ¿quién podría estar interesado en acabar con la vida de un niño de doce años? O más bien ¿quién no lo estaría si el empeño de ese niño es descubrir una verdad que a nadie le interesa en absoluto que se conozca? El teniente blanco Kramer y su fiel sargento de color Zondi lucharán por resolver el misterio.

Una atractiva rubia es asesinada de un modo inusual: un radio de bicicleta atravesándole el corazón, un método que lleva la firma de los bantúes. Poco a poco, Kramer y Zondi seguirán una serie de pistas para tratar de averiguar si fue asesinada y por quién. A lo largo del camino, el lector se encuentra con elementos sutiles y no tan sutiles de los horribles aspectos del apartheid en Sudáfrica.

I recall reading this series many years ago and tried it again. However, the rampant racism; all whites are bosses and all blacks are kaffirs for example, is such that I quit after 50 pages.

This strange novel sat on my bookshelf for very long. It was given to me in New York by someone who has downgrading and followed me to Africa. I kept it because I could not obtain it in ebook form and because I wanted to read more from African writers. Now that I am relocating it came to my attention as a book I need to read before I decide to give away or discard and on the whole I am glad I did.

The book is about a competent medical doctor who is in the middle of a midlife crisis. His obsession with the daughter of a friend is tragi-comic, and so are the lengths he goes to in justifying and explaining her behaviour. For me it shone a bright light on how the emotional aspect of life can cast a shadow on a professional career, and relegate it, momentarily, to something unimportant. Even for a doctor whose work can spell life or death for his/her patients. The characters are laughably human in their frailties and emotions and the story is relate-able enough to keep going.

There is no genre that really fit, except a slice of life tragi-comedy. It is not a love story in the traditional sense, just a cautionary tale about middle age, the shifting landscape of longing and unrealised dreams, and the silver lining that is at the heart of every predicament.

These titles are all at an angle, not the obvious sort of thing I expect. This had its moments. As in most detective fiction the criminal psychology is the weakest link. Sorry Miss Louw! But you're better off without the bugger.

South Africa in the 70s, police procedural. Just right for the moment I found it. Protagonist is a likeable bastard and not too likeable. Opening scene has him hiding in the restroom, naked and trying to cool off during the December heatwave.

The acrid edge to these books and the very foreign to me setting make for a smooth getaway. I will have to go back and read Snake when I can find it.

As the author intends we get to imagine how appalling it would be to be racially reclassified and sent to another neighborhood, school, etc. Plenty of victims.

This was a tight installment. The series is an anti-vacation to apartheid South Africa in the 70s. Tromp and Zondi's bromance shines through.

white/Bantu team solve murder of white woman really colored, interesting view of apartheid

The first of the Kramer & Zondi series was published in 1971, twenty years later McClure introduced Zondi, the Zulu detective, in this "prequel". The setting is South Africa during Apartheid and if you can tolerate the predictable racism, our black and white detectives, Zondi and Kramer, work well together and show the beginnings of their respect for each other. Using their individual talents they solve the grisly murder case but McClure's novel offers more than just a mystery story, but a glimpse of Apartheid in the old South Africa. A light touch of humour, well-developed characters, and a distinct sense of time and place makes this first-class entertainment.

A book that takes an in-depth look at the police in inner-city Liverpool as of the late 1970s/early 1980s, in a period just before serious riots broke out in that city. The author takes a look at the ethos of the police, and how attitudes and techniques/tactics had been changing in the generation before, as well as some of the challenges facing the force. I did think a lot of the book was a bit windy, especially some of the narrative by the police, and I wasn't completely happy with the quasi-fictional nature of the narrative as well (such as with the retired "Chalky"); to me, that reduced the impact of the book. Comparable, in some ways, to Dennis Smith's "Report From Engine Company 82."½

Kramer is sent to investigate the murder of another police officer and a popular young housewife in a home explosion. A dislikeable product of his racist times, Kramer turns out to be smarter and more thoughtful than expected, especially when he teams up with "kaffir" Zondi, and of course they eventually get to the bottom of the crime.

It took me a bit to adjust to the style of the author on this book. It also seemed to jump around a little too, in the telling. But I did enjoy the story line and there are some very good twists and turns.

I do like Tromp and his partner, Mickey. It took a little getting used to reading their dialogue as the story takes place in South Africa. Their speech patterns are different and so are their customs and style.

Over all, it is a good read and can keep you tracking along to find out the solution.

Set in Trekkersburg, a small unfashionable town just north of Durban, South Africa this police drama sets itself down smack dab in the middle of 1960’s apartheid. Bantu gangsters fill the town with crime which Kramer and his surprising side kick, Sergeant Zondi, a Bantu native get to solve. Zondi is able to get the other kaffirs to open up to him where they would not have to a white police officer and so the remarkable team gains a foothold on local crime.

The surprise we find in The Steam Pig is that the criminals are local politicians who get themselves mixed up with a Miss Le Roux, who it turns out is a mixed-race female passing herself off as white. Unable to face that they have had a relationship with the young lady she turns up on the slab at the mortuary.

Kramer seems to stumble through the mystery, the debut novel in a series starring the two policemen, as clues seem to get dropped at his feet. Luckily for him he is astute enough to recognize them and along with the information passed on from the Bantu informant, the unfortunate Shoe Shoe, and the invalid Indian Moosa, who watches the neighborhood from his upstairs bedroom window, the mystery begins to unravel as the pieces fall in place.

Just the title alone, The Steam Pig, spoke of a juicy, mouth-watering story. I knew in an instance that is somehow referred to the beautiful blonde laying on the stone slab, but McClure keeps the secret literally until the last page. A taut, secretive story that leans on the hate of an apartheid society, to the shocking conclusion that shows that nothing is as it appears, and that even a mother cannot grieve publically for her daughter in case the secret of their life is revealed

Set in Trekkersburg, a small unfashionable town just north of Durban, South Africa this police drama sets itself down smack dab in the middle of 1960’s apartheid. Bantu gangsters fill the town with crime which Kramer and his surprising side kick, Sergeant Zondi, a Bantu native get to solve. Zondi is able to get the other kaffirs to open up to him where they would not have to a white police officer and so the remarkable team gains a foothold on local crime.

The surprise we find in The Steam Pig is that the criminals are local politicians who get themselves mixed up with a Miss Le Roux, who it turns out is a mixed-race female passing herself off as white. Unable to face that they have had a relationship with the young lady she turns up on the slab at the mortuary.

Kramer seems to stumble through the mystery, the debut novel in a series starring the two policemen, as clues seem to get dropped at his feet. Luckily for him he is astute enough to recognize them and along with the information passed on from the Bantu informant, the unfortunate Shoe Shoe, and the invalid Indian Moosa, who watches the neighborhood from his upstairs bedroom window, the mystery begins to unravel as the pieces fall in place.

Just the title alone, The Steam Pig, spoke of a juicy, mouth-watering story. I knew in an instance that is somehow referred to the beautiful blonde laying on the stone slab, but McClure keeps the secret literally until the last page. A taut, secretive story that leans on the hate of an apartheid society, to the shocking conclusion that shows that nothing is as it appears, and that even a mother cannot grieve publically for her daughter in case the secret of their life is revealed

Set in Trekkersburg, a small unfashionable town just north of Durban, South Africa this police drama sets itself down smack dab in the middle of 1960’s apartheid. Bantu gangsters fill the town with crime which Kramer and his surprising side kick, Sergeant Zondi, a Bantu native get to solve. Zondi is able to get the other kaffirs to open up to him where they would not have to a white police officer and so the remarkable team gains a foothold on local crime.

The surprise we find in The Steam Pig is that the criminals are local politicians who get themselves mixed up with a Miss Le Roux, who it turns out is a mixed-race female passing herself off as white. Unable to face that they have had a relationship with the young lady she turns up on the slab at the mortuary.

Kramer seems to stumble through the mystery, the debut novel in a series starring the two policemen, as clues seem to get dropped at his feet. Luckily for him he is astute enough to recognize them and along with the information passed on from the Bantu informant, the unfortunate Shoe Shoe, and the invalid Indian Moosa, who watches the neighborhood from his upstairs bedroom window, the mystery begins to unravel as the pieces fall in place.

Just the title alone, The Steam Pig, spoke of a juicy, mouth-watering story. I knew in an instance that is somehow referred to the beautiful blonde laying on the stone slab, but McClure keeps the secret literally until the last page. A taut, secretive story that leans on the hate of an apartheid society, to the shocking conclusion that shows that nothing is as it appears, and that even a mother cannot grieve publically for her daughter in case the secret of their life is revealed

"El teniente Tromp Kramer, de la Brigada de Homicidios y Robos de Trekkersburgo, se traslada a una remota reserva de caza en Natal, al norte de Zululandia, para investigar el asesinato de una mujer y un hombre blancos, este último policía. Allí encontrará una realidad mucho más salvaje y descontrolada que en su jurisdicción habitual, una cara del apartheid violenta y cruel donde la magia negra de los brujos y adivinos todavía marca el destino de los hombres. La canción del perro, la última novela del detective Kramer y su sargento cafre Zondi, es al mismo tiempo la primera de la serie, en la que se narra el encuentro de estos dos personajes que ocupan un puesto de honor en la novela policíaca contemporánea. James McClure vuelve a sorprender con un ritmo narrativo vertiginoso y su capacidad para retratar una realidad social muy oscura, casi más que negra."
(edit. promo.)

A pesar de que tenía demasiado reciente otra de intriga ambientada en Sudáfrica, como me la recomendó Olatz y después de El diablo a todas horas tengo en muy alta estima sus recomendadiones, pues me he puesto con ella y me he enganchado como un tonto.

Aunque, por la historia que narra y, sobre todo, por dónde está ambientada, podría ser muy parecida a la de Roger Smith, es completamente diferente. Y éso que sólo cambia la fecha (en ésta, acaban de encarcelar a Mandela y te sorprende con frases como la que dice que en la única parte en la que podías ver a un negro y a un blanco juntos era en un coche de policía).

Algo que me ha gustado mucho es que el autor da más pistas sobre el crimen al lector que a sus protagonistas. Al subir al lector a una categoría superior de conocimiento, te permite disfrutar más de la historia y apreciar el trabajo hecho en la ambientación (sutil pero contundente. De hecho, como al principio partes de prejuzgar el contexto como el actual, luego te das una sorpresa cuando, ya más hacia la segunda mitad, comprendes el ambiente en el que están y las limitaciones a los que sujeta a sus personajes) mientras vas viendo cómo van dando palos de ciego en una dirección equivocada de la investigación.

Parece que la serie no ha tenido mucha suerte. La editorial (el libro presentaba una edición muy cuidada, por lo que tiene pinta de ser de estas editoriales pequeñas con mucho gusto) parece que ya ha publicado otro más (El cazador sordo) y en la red de biblios aparecen todos los demás títulos, así que habrá que seguir con ello (aunque no creo que estén tan bien traducidos como éste)½

This was an excellent book as much for the history as for the mystery.

This is an excellent series.

South Africa during the apartheid era is beautifully portrayed in this novel. The mystery genre is one in which all aspects of society can be examined and included in an interesting story. In SNAKE, one of the crimes being investigated by the team of Afrikaaner Kramer and Bantu Zondi involves the white population with clues leading to members of the higher social classes. The second set of crimes being investigated by these two men in falls in the poorer sections of town and what they often referred to as the nonwhites which includes people from Greece and Portugal and India.

James McClure does a good job of highlighting many of the injustices and iniquities of the time and in his subtle way suggests how many of the prejudiced notions were hogwash, while at the same time shows examples of the strengths of the different cultures. Nonetheless there's definitely an excellent sense of time and place in the 1960s in South Africa.

-- Although I still don't understand (South) African politics after reading ROGUE EAGLE I recognize McClure is a great writer. Novel is engaging. A yr. or two ago I read his GOOSEBERRY FOOL. --