Autumn of the Phantoms [Paperback]

Yasmina Khadra (Author), Aubrey Botsford (Translator)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Khadra's third Inspector Llob mystery (after 2005's Double Blank) searingly portrays present-day Algeria's brutal realities. Llob faces expulsion and death threats after writing—under the pen name Yasmina Khadra—a series of books detailing Algeria's civil war and corruption from the inside out. This narrative doubling, which might seem overly postmodern in another story, deepens the menace hanging over Llob. Following the funeral of one of Llob's oldest friends, killed by the radical Islamists who are waging war on the Algerian government, Llob lives through bombings, terrorist attacks and waves of threats from superiors who could have him killed without the slightest repercussion. Like an existential novel, Llob's book aims to speak hard truths in simple language, and there's more than a touch of Camus in its bleak view of a society in which power and cruelty are synonymous. Khadra is the pseudonym of Mohammed Moulessehoul, an Algerian now exiled in France and best known as the author of The Swallows of Kabul (2004). (Feb.)
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From Booklist

Unlike Morituri (2003) and Double Blank (2004), the third book featuring Algiers police superintendent Brahim Llob isn't a detective story. It's a story about a detective who has reached the end of the line emotionally as well as, it seems from the second chapter, professionally. Llob is back in his hometown for the burial of an old friend murdered as a warning--"Hi, we're back!"--by Islamic fundamentalist freebooters, and to console the victim's broken brother, one of Algeria's greatest painters. He returns to work in Algiers only to find that he has been "retired" because of that book he wrote under a woman's name (Morituri). For the rest of this book, friends and not-exactly-friends commiserate with him, he encounters gloating superiors and at least one wealthy shitheel he once grilled, a goon tails him, and he survives a bomb blast. Llob's despair over what fundamentalism has made of Algeria keens throughout, and readers hoping for a continuing series are bluntly disabused in the end. Powerful, anguished, and anguishing stuff. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Paperback: 220 pages
• Publisher: Toby Press; Tra edition (March 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1592641431
• ISBN-13: 978-1592641437
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,996,344 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Depressing, very depressing, May 22, 2006

By 

David W. Nicholas (Van Nuys, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Autumn of the Phantoms (Paperback)

Yasmina Khadra is the pseudonymous author of a trio of Superintendant Llob mysteries (of which this is the third volume) and The Swallows of Kabul. In reality he's an exiled Algerian army officer who now lives in France. The first two Llob books were sort of an Algerian version of a cross between Raymond Chandler and Mickey Spillane. Both of the books are very strong on atmosphere and character, and rather weak on plot. This third book basically disposes with the plot completely, and the atmosphere is so leaden it's downright oppressive. Basically, Llob gets fired (for writing the first book in the series) and the rest of the story is him dealing with being out of work, and his depression.

I enjoyed all three of the books in some ways, but frankly this is the sort of thing that I'm sure plays better among Algerians than it does on this side of the pond. Without a plot, this third book isn't as good as the first too. I repeat my original observation: if they'd released the three books together, it would have made a volume of about 400 pages, at most, and would have a larger circulation.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent addition to all mystery buff reading lists, April 5, 2006

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Autumn of the Phantoms (Paperback)

Autumn Of The Phantoms by Yasmina Khadra is the enthralling tale of an Algerian policeman-turned-detective and writer who, as a result of his latest book, losses his well established job. Main character, Brahim Llob, after publishing his latest book, is confronted with his peers condemnation and consideration of his dishonor, causing his visit to his hometown which results in an attack from GIA commando. Autumn Of The Phantoms is a page-turning complex and educational novel, mixing truths of the harsh realities faced in Algeria and quasi-autobiographical for the exiled author. Highly recommended, Autumn Of The Phantoms is an excellent addition to all mystery buff reading lists.

5.0 out of 5 stars Refuse to Allow These Monsters to Be Forgiven, February 28, 2011

By 

Sam Sattler (Spring, Texas) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Autumn of the Phantoms (Paperback)

Yasmina Khadra (pseudonym of Algerian author Mohammed Moulessehoul) closes the circle on his Superintendent Brahim Llob series with this third book in the series, Autumn of the Phantoms. Superintendent Llob's tendency to speak his mind as bluntly with his superiors as with the criminals he chases has made him a marked man in present-day Algeria. Not only does he have to worry about Muslim terrorists wanting to assassinate him; he has to fear the same from those in power inside his own police department. Llob knows too much, talks too much about it, and is determined to go down swinging if he has to go down at all.

Now, it seems, his superiors have the perfect excuse to push Llob out the door: his novel, Morituri, in which the Superintendent exposed the corruptness of practically everyone with any power or influence in Algiers, including the police. First fired, and then allowed to retire (with one of the most surreal retirement tributes imaginable), Superintendent Llob now has to decide what to do with the rest of his life. Common sense dictates that he move to the countryside with his wife where, hopefully, he will no longer be a likely target for assassination. But first, Llob must attend the funeral of one of his oldest friends, a man tortured and killed by those who want to do the same to Llob. What happens after the funeral - to Llob and the local villagers, terrible as it is, is typical of what happened all over Algeria during the worst of the country's so-called civil war.

Yasmina Khadra captures the paranoia and terror of Algeria's recent religiously inspired bloodletting to such a degree that those already familiar with its details will cringe as they read the author's account of what happened on a nightly basis to those unable to protect themselves from the terrorists - and from the soldiers and policemen charged with protecting them. As one character put it as life went on and the carnage was ignored: "Here, young girls are raped and beheaded, children are maimed by bombs, whole families are hacked to pieces every night, and we behave as if nothing's going on."

Criminals and religious fanatics thrive in this opportunity to rape, murder, steal, and run wild in ways almost unimaginable. The army and the police are so overwhelmed that many in their ranks grow to be as vicious as those they are supposed to control. Civilians are the most unfortunate because they can trust neither the "bad guys" nor the supposed "good guys."

Perhaps, as one of Superintendent Llob's friends reflects, what hurts most is the realization that all the violence comes from fellow Algerians. He said:

"We've been taught to hate ever since we came into the world; we were turned from the Truth. We're taught hatred of the Other, hatred of the Absent and the Foreign - a manufactured hatred, in short. And look, Brahim, just look. Who's burning our schools today, who's killing our brothers and neighbors who's beheading our intellectuals, who's putting our land to fire and the sword? Aliens? Malaysians? Animists? Christians? ... They're Algerians, just Algerians, who not so long ago were belting out the national anthem in our stadiums, who rushed in the thousands to help the victims of disasters and mobilized impressively for every telethon. And now look. Do you recognize yourself in them? - I don't, not at all...My race of people, Brahim, are all those who, from one end of the world to the other, refuse to allow these monsters to be forgiven."

I was fortunate to spend several years working in Algeria. What I read in Algerian newspapers (and what my Algerian friends told me) about the slaughter of whole villages in one bloody night, the beheadings of men in front of their families, the hijacking of buses filled with men who would be murdered on their way to work, and the beheadings of foreign workers, is even worse than what Khadra describes in Autumn of the Phantoms. I do believe that there are thousands of Algerians that "refuse to allow these monsters to be forgiven." Pray that they survive long enough to get back their country.