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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
First-Rate Chinatown Noir, February 6, 2010
This review is from: City of Dragons (Hardcover)
Before I picked up Kelli Stanley's novel, I had never been to San Francisco and the only Chinatown I knew lay on Canal Street in New York City. Now that I've finished Kelli Stanley's novel, I feel as if I've been given a tour by the most sly and masterful of guides. That this tour took place in 1940 only made the experience stranger, richer, and all the more fabulous. The tour began with a drop-in on a Chinatown murder as witnessed by Miranda Corbie, a private investigator so hard-boiled she makes the Pinkertons look like scrambled eggs. But was even she steely enough to navigate the mobster politics of 1940s Chinatown, itself a violent microcosm of war-torn 1940s East Asia? It was such a pleasure going on this vibrant journey with her, watching her mettle be tested and watching the puzzle pieces be slowly assembled, all in an effort to solve a mysterious murder the police didn't want her to solve. And I've not even mentioned some of the memorable minor characters met along the way. In true noir fashion, they were both larger-than-life and almost always duplicitous. Take, for example, the son of an herbalist, who...but that would be telling. And then there were the allies, such as Inspector Gonzales, whose chivalrous nature and...well, you'll see. And I haven't even started on the pristine prose, not a sentence wasted, not a landmark ignored, not a flavor left untasted. I've now been to 1940s San Francisco, and I long to return.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Worth checking out, February 17, 2010
This review is from: City of Dragons (Hardcover)
The year is 1940 in San Francisco. Private investigator Miranda Corbie is attending the Rice Bowl in Chinatown. It is an event that celebrates the Chinese New Year. While attending, Miranda stumbles upon a body. The victim is identified as Eddie Takahashi. He was no good. The cops don't really have an interest in the case and close it. Miranda is the only one, who is out to seek the truth about Eddie's murder. Miranda better watch her back as the police may not be interested but someone is and they don't like Miranda sticking her nose in places where it doesn't belong. City of Dragons is a really good book. I started this book right before bed, which was a bad idea as I couldn't stop reading it. Miranda is a hard core, nose to the grind, blood hound, who doesn't give up till the case is solved. There were plenty of twists and turns to keep the mystery fan in my happy. All of the characters that Miranda encountered were intriguing as well as engaging. You could tell how much research and hard work the author did on Chinatown and what the place looked like back in the forties. It was like I could see everything through Miranda's eyes from...the vivid colors of the buildings to the smell of rotten beer and cigarettes. I only have one last comment to make and that is...I want more Kelli Stanley.
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10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
dark gritty historical female Noir, February 5, 2010
This review is from: City of Dragons (Hardcover)
In 1940 San Francisco, the Chinese are very much aware of what the Japanese are doing to their homeland. In a relief effort, leaders are putting on a Rice Bowl party to send aid to the beleaguered Chinese back home. Thirty-three year old private investigator Miranda Corbie is in Chinatown enjoying the gala when she sees a man lying in the street; she goes to help him, but is too late as he was shot to death. She learns the name of the victim is Eddie Takahashi and she intends to identify his killer. Although Miranda works hard on the case on spite of the police wanting it closed due to international implications, she makes little progress. Meanwhile the private investigator takes on another case; that of Helen Winters who wants to know whether her recently deceased husband allegedly died from a heart attack as the cops insist or murder as she believes. Corbie soon finds the last thing she expected, a link between her two inquiries through drug trafficking, but though obstinate and intrepid, she knows she will uncover the identity of the killer, but could do so as the third victim. This is a dark gritty historical female Noir starring a woman who is trying to make a life for herself following the death of her beloved in the Spanish Civil War (described in flashbacks by Corbie who was there too). Whereas the two crimes mirror what is happening in China with the Japanese invasion, readers will thoroughly enjoy this fabulous historical mystery especially those who appreciate a strong sense of the era even if at times Corbie's Noir voice feels too Chandlerish. Harriet Klausner
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