Today it's my turn on the BlogTour The Monsoon Ghost Image by Tom Vater ( A Detective Maier Mystery). This story is a spy thriller come adventure mixed with the harsh reality of modern crime, fraud and betrayal, and topped off with a vicious and noirish vibe.
About the Author
Tom Vater has published four crime novels and is the co-owner of Crime Wave Press, a Hong Kong based crime fiction imprint. He writes for many publications including The Wall Street Journal, The Daily Telegraph, CNN and The Nikkei Asian Review. He is a best-selling non-fiction writer and co-author of the highly acclaimed Sacred Skin (www.sacredskinthailand.com).
Visit tomvater.com
About the book
Dirty Pictures, Secret Wars And Human Beasts – Detective Maier Is Back To Investigate The Politics Of Murder
The third Detective Maier mystery is a taut and crazy spy thriller for our disturbing times.
When award-winning German conflict photographer Martin Ritter disappears in a boating accident in Thailand, the nation mourns the loss of a cultural icon. But a few weeks later, Detective Maier’s agency in Hamburg gets a call from Ritter’s wife. Her husband has been seen alive on the streets of Bangkok. Maier decides to travel to Thailand to find Ritter. But all he finds is trouble and a photograph.
As soon as Maier puts his hands on the Monsoon Ghost Image, the detective turns from hunter to hunted – the CIA, international business interests, a doctor with a penchant for mutilation and a woman who calls herself the Wicked Witch of the East all want to get their fingers on Martin Ritter’s most important piece of work – visual proof of a post 9/11 CIA rendition and the torture of a suspected Muslim terrorist on Thai soil. From the concrete canyons of the Thai capital to the savage jungles and hedonist party islands of southern Thailand, Maier and his sidekick Mikhail race against formidable foes to discover some of our darkest truths and to save their lives into the bargain.
When Detective Maier stumbles onto the kind of evidence that can bring down men, companies and even governments to their knees - he finds himself a hunted man. The image that falls into his hands makes Maier and his colleague Mikhail instant targets. They don't know who to trust or who is part of the extensive viper nest.
The Monsoon Ghost Image can be crass, violent and at times graphic, however it is done without a lot of detail. You get the gist without being confronted with overly explicit scenes per se, which means the author gives the reader the intended noirish and hardcore vibe, but in a way that is approachable for the majority of readers.
Vater has clear strengths when it comes to political and historical finesse, which is especially evident in the first few chapters of the story. He makes an excellent point about media reporting and how society argued about issues prior to and post 9/11. 'The truth was becoming just another story.' Never has a truer sentence been written, and it describes the factless based, propaganda driven reporting and passing on of information in our era perfectly.
Personally I would like to see a more literary side to his work, less adventure and more fact-based meanderings, as opposed to flashy and impulsive characters who like rolling in and with the dregs of humanity.
Unfortunately society does have monsters like this, who enjoy killing for the sake of it, and the pain of others does bring them pleasure. It's perhaps best not to dwell on the monsters hidden by titles of power, walls of money and behind the facade of respectability.
This story is a a spy thriller come adventure mixed with the harsh reality of modern crime, fraud and betrayal, and topped off with a vicious and noirish vibe.
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Publisher: Crime Wave Press; pub date 31 Oct. 2018
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