3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
No atmosphere and unconvincing characters, August 11, 2009
The premise of this book is promising: a British investigator is sent to Barcelona in 1912 to probe the death of a fellow-countryman who has been a go-between in procuring the Royal Navy precious oil reserves as it transforms its fleet from coal to oil power.
The city is seething. Two years before in "Tragic Week" the Spanish authorities violently crushed a Catalan uprising. The city is also a major stronghold for anarchists while Arab immigrants pursue their own lives in its shadows. The murdered Brit was caught up in all of these separate groups.
Despite the juicy set-up, I have to report the book is a major disappointment. There is no period detail in this book, no sense of being transported back to 1912. The city does not come to life, in fact the only location regularly evoked is the pedestrian street, Las Ramblas. We don't see how people dress or live; we don't smell the city which at the time was in the midst of a major economic boom that gave birth to its unique architecture (this is just the time when Gaudi was active).
The other location the author uses is Gibraltar but here there is even less detail -- no rock, no descriptions at all.
Worse, the characters, whether they be Spanish or Catalan or Arab, all come across as terribly proper Englishmen and women. The main character is in the midst of a passionate affair with an exotic woman from Tangiers. It has all the passion of a cucumber sandwich. They don't kiss, or hug, or speak to one another, or profess love or do anything at all.
The author has also a weird way of handling dialogue. He has characters recount page after page of conversations they had with other people verbatim. At other times, characters manage to overhear long passages of incriminating dialogue.
There is a solution to the murder but by the end one scarcely cares because nothing seems to be at stake.
I was expecting something rich and pungent. Instead I got weak tea.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
excellent pre-WWI thriller, December 6, 2008
In 1910 riots broke out in Barcelona when reservist units refused to be deployed in Spanish Morocco. During the deadly confrontation that left many dead and more in jail, someone murders English businessman Sam Lockhart while he was locked in a prison.
Two years later Scotland Yard sends Special Branch Detective Sandor Seymour to Spain to investigate the homicide of the English citizen during "Tragic Week". The background information is sketchy at best starting with why the Gibraltar based business man was in Barcelona and the lack of a motive makes it even more difficult. Still not understanding the terrain especially the local populace who have deep qualms about strangers and police, and needing to move around freely, Seymour hooks up with his girlfriend Chantale de Lissac, who is half-Arab and half-French. As they investigate, the case takes strange twists through a city still living in fear.
The latest "Dead Man in" pre-WWI thriller (see A DEAD MAN IN ISTANBUL, A DEAD MAN IN ATHENS and A DEAD MAN IN TANGIER) once again provides the audience a deep look at a new location, this time Barcelona just after riots devastated the city. The story line is action-packed and never slows down as Sandor conducts his investigation into the cold case homicide of the English citizen. Although the whodunit is clever and well written, as is the case in all of Michael Pearce's tales (see also the Mamur Zapt Egyptian historical saga), the sense of time and place is outstanding.
Harriet Klausner
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5.0 out of 5 stars
A Wry Adventure, February 5, 2010
This review is from: Dead Man in Barcelona (Paperback)
Pearce does it again with his engaging hero journeying to a new city to solve a crime. This is a worthy successor to the other volumes in this series and a fine diversion from the excellent Mamur Zapt series. In particular, the view of pre-war Barcelona is interesting as a fine portrayal of a lost world complete with its foreshadowings of the Spanish Civil War. Well worth a read.
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