Review of Almost Blue by Carlo Lucarelli (Vintage, 2003, Italian 1997)

Simone spends his days in his room, pretending to be asleep every time his mother knocks on the door, the rest of the time scanning the airwaves of Bologna eavesdropping on CB radios, mobile phones, police and taxi frequencies, and internet chat played through a voice synthesiser, charting the social lives of its citizens.  Blind since birth he hears the world as colours and whilst turning the dial he picks up on a cold green voice that sends shivers up his spine.  It is the voice of a serial killer reeling in his next victim; a disturbed young man who listens to music constantly to drown out the bells ringing in his head.  Detective Inspector Grazia Negro works for the Unit for the Analysis of Series Crimes in Rome and she’s spotted a pattern in what seem like unconnected murders in Bologna.  On her first major case, with her blue voice, she needs to persuade the local authorities to take her analysis seriously, but more importantly she needs to catch the killer before he strikes again, and before he can track down the one person who can identify his voice.

I think Lucarelli is one hell of a writer.  He immediately plunges you into a story and he writes in a show don’t tell style that is pared back and yet full of insight (see my post on how it paints a short but effectively portrait of the city).  The story charts the interactions of the three principal characters, with Simone and the serial killer written in the first perspective.  The characterization is excellent, and there are some nice observational touches.  The plot is relatively straightforward and well structured.  My two gripes are the same as with the three previous Lucarelli novels I’ve read – there is not enough in the way of back story (the reader literally gets dropped into the characters’ lives for the week or so the story lasts but knows little else about them) and the story itself seems somewhat underdeveloped.  I’m not a fan of padding for the sake of it, but Lucarelli pares back the story to just about the bare minimum.  The result is the book feels like a TV episode as opposed to a full movie.  A very well written TV episode, but without the benefit of previous episodes to frame things for the reader.  The result is I’m left kind of conflicted – delighted with the writing yet somehow short-changed.  It makes me hungry for his other works, but worried that they’ll also give a high that doesn’t last long enough. 

This city isn't like others ...

"This city isn’t like others, Matera has said.  It’s not only big, it’s complicated.  It’s contradictory.  If you look at it from a pedestrian perspective, it seems like there are a lot of piazzas and porticoes.  But if you fly over it in a helicopter, because of the courtyards and gardens between the buildings, it looks like there’s a forest below.  And if you go beneath its surface you’ll find that it’s a city built on water and canals, like Venezia.  It’s freezing cold in the winter and tropical in the summer.  It has communist ideals and millionaire cooperative organisations.  It’s run by four different mafia groups that, rather than shoot at each other, help each other recycle Italy’s drug’s money.  Tortellini and satanic cults.  This city isn’t what it seems, Ispettore; it’s always hiding something."


The above passage describes Bologna and is taken from Almost Blue, a novella by Carlo Lucarelli.  I like it because it paints a very quick and vivid description of the city and lets the reader place and visualise it.  Which other writers do you think create this kind of sense of place in such few words?

January reviews

A slow month of reading, especially in the latter half of the month. It's been a while since I read only one book in a week. Last week I read none but my own whilst I tried to deal with other things. I'm slowly making my way through Havana Fever by Leonardo Padura at the minute, so that'll be the next review up. My book of the month. Hmmm. I'll go with Via Delle Oche.

Dead Set by Kel Robertson ****
Up in Honey's Room by Elmore Leonard **
The Fugitive Pigeon by Donald Westlake ***
Via Delle Oche by Carlo Lucarelli ****
Shinjuku Shark by Arimasa Osawa **
Isle of Joy by Don Winslow ****
The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley ****

Review of Via Delle Oche by Carlo Lucarelli, translated by Michael Reynolds, Europa Editions (2008, in Italian in 1990)

Via Delle Oche is the third part of Lucarelli’s Commissario De Luca trilogy. The three books cover the period 1945 to 1948 in post-war Italy (the other books being Carte Blanche and The Damned Season) and follow the De Luca’s attempts to survive as a policeman in the transition from a fascist regime to a fledgling democracy. A few days before the crucial election that will decide whether Italy turns to social democracy or communism, De Luca has been demoted to Sub Commissario and reassigned to the vice squad in Bologna. On his first day he is dragged away from the station by Pugliese, a former colleague, to a supposed suicide in a brothel on the via della Oche. The death has been ruled as a suicide, but it’s clear to De Luca that there’s been foul play. As he starts to investigate he is repeatedly warned off, but despite his own vulnerability he continues to put his nose where it’s not desired. Soon other deaths occur and the evidence points to a cover-up between politicians and members of the police, and De Luca realises he might have pushed too far.

As with the previous two books, Via Delle Oche is a short book (133 pages), but unlike the previous two, I didn’t feel the story was so under-developed, although it could have benefited from some fleshing out in places. De Luca is a complex, conflicted character and the story captures the atmosphere, politics and corruption of a country in turmoil. I am particularly taken with Lucarelli’s storytelling which focuses on what the characters say and do, with little thick description or the use of metaphors or similes. Rather than being dull and lifeless, Lucarelli’s prose is rich and the story races along. I’m not sure if Lucarelli has plans for any other De Luca novels, but I’d certainly welcome them and I’ll be checking out his other translated fiction. The production values on the books is excellent and I love the covers. A fine piece of writing and a satisfying end to the trilogy.

Review of The Damned Season by Carlo Lucarelli, translated by Michael Reynolds, Europa Editions (2007, in Italian in 1991)

The Damned Season is the second book in Lucarelli’s De Luca trilogy set at the end of the second world war in Italy. Former Commissario De Luca, a leading investigative detective in the fascist regime and now a wanted man, is heading south from Milan trying to sneak through partisan country towards Rome. Exhausted and hungry he’s discovered resting by a young cop – Brigadier Leonardi – who’s learning his trade in a rural area where official law is still loosely applied in the post-Mussolini period. Leonardi immediately recognises De Luca as a detective who’d lectured on his training course, but rather than hand him over to the authorities he decides that De Luca could give him valuable one-on-one training, and he has a horrific case that needs solving – Delmo, a local peasant, and his family have been tortured and killed. De Luca reluctantly agrees but soon all the locals are wondering who this stranger in their mist is, not least Carnera, the local partisan leader.

I have pretty much the same issues with the second book in the series as I did with the first, Carte Blanche (reviewed here). I think Lucarelli is a wonderful writer – I love his style and the way the story is told, but the book is simply too thin for me and the story underdeveloped (the book is less than 100 pages long). What I wanted as a reader was the story fleshed out to give more insight into De Luca’s flight and the back story of the area and some of the locals, particularly the various victims and the partisans. As it stands, Lucarelli has pared it back as about as far as it’ll go to tell a relatively complex story. It almost feels like an extended synopsis rather than a dense novella. In addition, the story wasn’t as compelling as the first book, particularly as the ending was so flimsily resolved (they’re looking for a needle in a haystack and they find it straightaway). So at one level, I really admired the writing, but at another I was left a little frustrated. Like the first book, I’m left with the sense that what is an okay novella could have been a minor masterpiece if extended and deepened. That said, I'm compelled to read the final installment to the trilogy.

The largest geopolitical project in living memory

Over the past year I've read a number of novels set either just before or during the second world war including books by Alan Furst, Philip Kerr, John Lawton, Marek Krajewski, Hans Fallada, Carlo Lucarelli and others, along with some straight history books, but I haven't been keeping track of history itself. Today marks the 70th anniversary of the start of the Second World War and Germany's invasion of Poland (The Polish Officer by Furst does a good job of capturing the first few days as Poland desperately tries to put in place the basis for resistance knowing that it is being over-run).

Of course, I haven't pre-prepared a post, but I have been thinking about doing one based on a conversation I had with Martin Dodge last week, so I'm hastily moving it forward. At his Mapping Manchester exhibition we were talking about whether the John Ryland's library had survived the blitz intact and that led onto a discussion about bomb census maps. Martin kindly sent me on a link to a story that discussed them. I'd be really interested to take a look at them in more detail. I always remember the two old ladies who lived next door when I was growing up who used to describe going up Caldy Hill to watch Liverpool and Birkenhead docks being bombed. They were great story-tellers - you felt like you were there watching the cities burn.

The tracing below is from the Christmas raids of Dec 20-22, 1940 on the Merseyside area when 365 people died. It is designed to be overlain on a base map, hence why there are so few roads, etc. shown (much cheaper to keep a clean map and have lots of tracings). A daily tracing would be taken so that the pattern of bombing could be tracked over time.


The tracing shows the area between Bootle and Walton and plots 26 separate incidents in quite a confined area. Each incident is given a number, followed by the size and type of bomb, and the location of any unexploded ordnance. Collectively the maps reveal that by the end of the war Liverpool was the second most bombed UK city after London.

These other maps are of Brighton and Bristol.

I've been fascinated by the Second World War for a while now given it was the largest and most complex geopolitical event in modern history with many civil wars operating inside transnational wars, and political ideology explicitly reshaping territory and lives through violence. I've been trying to collect books that explains what went on different parts of the world, including some that traditionally get looked over (e.g. Aleutian Islands [the only bit of the USA occupied by the Japanese], Malta, Isle of Man, Ireland, etc) so I can have a go at mentally stitching the whole lot together.

I'll perhaps try to do something on Irish neutrality tomorrow. Ireland declared its neutrality on the 2nd Sept, the day before Britain and France declared war. It was a policy that was rigidly maintained right to the end of the war.

Lest we forget ...

Review of Carte Blanche by Carlo Lucarelli, translated by Michael Reynolds, Europa Editions (2006, in Italian in 1990)

April 1945 in Northern Italy and Commissario De Luca has transferred from the Brigata Ettore Muti – the political police - to the civil police force, insisting that he is nothing more than a police man, not a puppet of the fascist regime. His first day in his new job and he’s assigned to the murder of Rehinard, an Italian citizen, member of the Fascist Republican Party with political connections to Il Duce and Count Tedesco (the Minister for Foreign Affairs) and a serial womaniser. As the allies advance northwards and the partisans gain in confidence and take pot shots at the fascist forces, De Luca becomes unwillingly embroiled in a political fight between members of a dying regime, picking his way through the minefield whilst determined to solve Rehinard’s murder.

‘What do you think the Chief will say?’
‘What will the Chief say?’ Pugiese repeated with a wry smile.
‘What I’m about to tell you now.’ De Luca pulled his badge out from inside his trench coat and opened it before a militiaman who was heading towards them with a menacing look. ‘Out of my fucking way, son,’ he said. ‘This here is none of your business. Just forget it.’

Carte Blanche is a novella, less than 100 pages long. The narrative is driven along by what the characters say and do, with little thick description of looks or thoughts or back story. However, the characterization does not suffer from such a writing style and De Luca and his colleagues are brought to life in an economical fashion that lets the story rip along. The book might be short, but the story is complex, full and rounded, and my immediate response on finishing was, ‘I need the next book - now!’ On reflection, I’m trying to decide if that’s partially a response to the book being so thin; that I wanted Lucarelli to flesh out Carte Blanche into a full novel – and I certainly think there was scope to do that. I’m not sure - I really enjoyed this book, and it does work as a novella, but I can’t help wondering if the other two parts of the trilogy are simply the last two parts of the same story split into two further books (they are only another 290 pages between them) , or feeling that there was an opportunity lost to produce a real masterpiece. Nevertheless a fine piece of work and I’ve already ordered the other two parts of the trilogy.

Uriah Robinson at Crime Scraps recommended the book to me - thanks. His review is here.
Also reviewed by Eurocrime.