Customer Reviews

Rampart Street (Valentin St. Cyr Mysteries)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The third installment in the Valentine St. Cyr mystery series set in the early 1900s in New Orleans, "Rampart Street" proved to be very engrossing and compelling read, full of moody, vivid imagery, with an almost gritty feel one has come to expect from authors like Dashiel Hammett. All in all, this was a truly wonderful read, and I'm glad that I picked it up.

After a long absence, Valentine St. Cyr is back again in the historic red-light district of Storyville, New Orleans. But St. Cyr seems to be strangely apathetic and listless; so much so that when Alderman Alphonse Badel requests the unofficial "King of Storyville's," Tom Anderson, in recruiting St. Cyr to investigate the murder of a rich white man (John Benedict) found murdered on the seedy Rampart Street, Andersen cannot but wonder if St. Cyr is up to the job. However, when what seems to be a routine investigation as to what Benedict was doing on Rampart Street and why he was murdered soon turns into something much more tantalizing that could involve some rather powerful New Orleans movers and shakers, who in turn start pressuring St. Cyr to give up the investigation, St. Cyr finds himself intrigued almost against his will. And when a good friend gets murdered because of this case, things become personal as well. Now nothing will stop St. Cyr from discovering why Benedict was murdered and why so many powerful men are in a lather to stop this investigation....

I have always meant to pickup this series, but somehow never got around to it. Needless to say, when I finally did get around to reading a Valentine St. Cyr mystery novel, it would be the latest in the series and not the first. Not that this was a problem -- one needn't worry about having to play catch-up with "Rampart Street." No, for me the problem lay in that the mystery did get off to a bit of a slow start; and then there was the problem that I found myself automatically comparing it to Barbara Hambly's Benjamin January mystery series, also set in New Orleans, except that that one is set before the American Civil War, and found "Rampart Street" to lack much of the lyrical beauty that Hambly had successfully imbued her Benjamin January books with. However, this was just an initial reaction: about a few chapters into the book, I found myself to be so deeply engrossed in "Rampart Street" that I couldn't bare the put the book down! And while I didn't think that David Fulmer's prose style wasn't quite as lyrical or as poetical as Barbara Hambly's, I did think that he had done a successful job of imbuing the book with that moody, melancholic air that coloured the imagery as well as the attitudes and feelings of the characters he brilliantly brought to life. The storyline was a very intriguing and tantalising one, and David Fulmer did a wonderful job of maintaining the suspense and tension -- even if things slowed down a little towards the end of the book. All in all, in spite of certain shortcomings, I found "Rampart Street" to be a very well plotted and wrought novel, worthy of a 5 star rating.

I came across David Fulmer's book Chasing the Devil's Tail when it was new in paperback. At first glance the premise was interesting: a detective who was friends with the founder of jazz, and who was a colored Creole, in New Orleans about a hundred years ago. The story and especially the writing were good enough to carry the book through to its conclusion, and the sequel, Jass, was as good if not a bit better. This third entry is even a bit better than that, as Fulmer continues to grow as a writer, getting familiar and comfortable with his characters and plots.

In this current outing, the main character, Valentin St. Cyr, returns to New Orleans after spending 15 months wandering the country recovering from the way the previous book, Jass, ended. He's been in town for only a few weeks when a prominent businessman is killed, shot to death in Storyville, the rather raucous speakeasy neighborhood that St. Cyr patrols. St Cyr's old boss, Mr. Anderson, asks if he would be willing to look into the crime on behalf of the family. At first St. Cyr is reluctant, but he's soon persuaded to do what Mr. Anderson wants, and he begins to look into the crime. The investigation progresses, a second victim emerges, and it turns out that the prime witness in the second killing is a guy named George Reynolds. It turns out George is "seeing" Justine, St. Cyr's old girlfriend, who now works in a "house" as what amounts to a high-class prostitute. This of course complicates things greatly.

This is an interesting, multi-layered, complex book. The author doesn't hesitate to do things like kill of characters who've figured in previous books, have characters change, and have a backstory that's interesting and at times even unique working. It's a wonderful novel, and frankly I can't wait to see what happens next.

Fulmer's melancholy but intriguing Valentin St. Cyr, a detective of Creole descent with obvious regrets, returns to New Orleans in Rampart Street, to solve the murder of a well-to-do man found dead in the seediest part of town.

While poking his nose in the affairs of the wealthy and the wild in his search for the truth, St. Cyr unravels a plot by a racist mover-and-shaker who is none too happy at the Creole's intrusions.

As the detective gets closer and closer to uncovering the truth, other men in the loop wind up dead, and even St. Cyr finds himself a marked man.

The New Orleans setting for Rampart Street is poignantly timed--as Fulmer's wonderful turn-of-the-century descriptions of this famed city, battle against with what we know happened there during the 2005 hurricane season.

Indeed, the strength of the story is in its detailed descriptions and multi-layered characterizations--the only hitches here being the occasional, current-day expletives, which seem to yank the reader back to the present each time they are used. The pace is an easy one, not driving and yet not sluggish and the point-of-view transitions are fluid and seamless.

Armchair Interviews says: Rampart Street will appeal to mystery lovers who are comfortable with a tale that doesn't spare them the aspects of life in a troubled red-light district, where tensions are often high, morals are often low and men wind up dead.

Valentin St. Cyr is back in a new Storyville mystery, a welcome character who navigates the streets of The District, an intimate connection to place calling him to reclaim his history. The story begins with a murder, a wealthy shipping magnate, John Benedict, shot down just off Rampart Street in Storyville, the infamous twenty blocks of sin and decadence, gambling, sporting women and the birth of jass, the new music that is now raging across the country. Usually a murder like this is hushed up quietly to avoid unnecessary embarrassment for the family, but Benedict's daughter, Anne Marie, hires the moody and enterprising detective to pursue the matter courtesy of Tom Anderson, the King of Storyville: "Every time Valentin was turned loose on a case, the same thing happened... pandemonium." Thinking to do only what he can and move on, St. Cyr is emotionally distracted by the last series of murders he solved, with no intention of embracing his former life in Storyville, but as the bodies fall it gets personal and the detective takes on a mission of his own. Tapping into the power structure of New Orleans' wealthy, this mystery reaches beyond the familiar confines of the District, into a world more subtle and deadly than the obvious vice of Storyville. This puzzle will lead Valentin into unfamiliar territory, where his natural talents prove no advantage.

Life in Storyville is about dirty little secrets, who knows them, who keeps them and who pays to keep them quiet. The corruption is endemic, from the poverty-riddled shotgun shacks where everything is for sale to the uptown mansions, where racism, greed and ambition lurk beneath the sheen of gentility. Human nature being what it is, no one is exempt from temptation or tragedy, the characters as varied and eccentric as the unique streets of Storyville: charlatans, curmudgeonly drunks, hustlers, musicians who live for the jass that fills the night air, greedy madams, arrogant politicians, corrupt cops, sporting women looking for a way to get by, maids who see all and say nothing, the sheer insanity of cutthroat criminals tempered by the occasional kindness of strangers and Valentin St. Cyr, the Creole detective, incapable of refusing a cry for help no matter the consequences. It is the new players who confuse the case, people who make their own rules: Anne Marie Benedict, daughter of the murdered man, with her own agenda and an eye for St. Cyr; Maurice Delouche, the Benedict family attorney; Charles Kane, another murdered shipping magnate; and Henry Harris, a robber baron with aspirations to the U.S. Senate, riding his touted racial intolerance to Washington. Into the mix comes the exotic Justine Mancarre, the sporting woman Valentin saved from a serial killer but left behind when he walked away from the deaths that left him despairing for the city he loved. Justine has stories to tell, secrets her white paramours have shared.

Fulmer perfectly captures the cauldron of discontent that rules the dark streets and alleys of the night and the elegant houses where the wealthy indulge in legalized sin and its twin, corruption, where danger is held at bay by Pinkertons, a society that favors the well-heeled while detesting the downtrodden. There are endless tales in Storyville and through the able St. Cyr, Fulmer writes them with a deft touch, each successive novel revealing a complex social structure, the men and women who carve their occupations out of greed, graft and sin and the noble souls who rise above the fray, soothed by the chaotic strains of jass that imbue this world with its wild energy and dreamy lethargy. The author has found his métier, each St. Cyr mystery better than the last, leaving this reader anxious for another Valentin St. Cyr/ Storyville fix. Luan Gaines/ 2006.

If you read my review of Jass, you know I was anxiously awaiting Rampart Street. In fact, I read this novel twice before offering a review. For me, it just doesn't stack up to the gritty, music-filled previous Valentin St. Cyr novels. Maybe Fulmer fears being pulled from high school libraries. For the structure of the plot: multiple murders, interractial sex, prostitution, and scandal, there isn't a lot of, well, "dirt" here. The two previous novels left me feeling as if I'd spent a week in the New Orleans of the 'teens: sweaty, dirty, hungry, tired, and musically enthralled. Rampart Street left me feeling like I'd just sanitized with Purell. Valentin seems "removed" from his actions throughout. There isn't enough of the Little Charlie Jackson character to compete with the Buddy Bolden or Jelly Roll Morton of the previous. Justine, so essential to the other two novels, seems to just lurk in the shadows of Storyville waiting for Fulmer to give her something to do. For an initially intriguing plot, Rampart Street seemed rather slow and a bit dull.

I truly hope Fulmer gets his "mojo" back for the next St. Cyr novel.

This is a terrific mystery set in the back streets and alleys of New Orleans in 1910. Mr. Fulmer captures the flavor of the time and city extremely well.

The novel starts with the murder of an affluent New Orleans businessman on Rampart Street - heart of the red light district of the City. The mounting of tension is immediate as a dark figure is seen taking a ring off the corpse. He is about to cut the ring finger off so he can also get the victim's wedding ring when he is scared off. The kingpin of the District then is asked to bring in Valentin St. Cyr, a part mulatto part black investigator to look into the crime. Later, the victim's daughter retains him since she knows the police have arrested the first convenient scapegoat.

St. Cyr has to cross back and forth between the worlds of the City's underbelly and the upper crust - no mean feat for a "colored". Traversing those worlds meand dealing with the color difference as well as the socio-economic disparities. The race issue is presented as the matter of fact that it was at the time. Mr. Fulmer presents an historical novel without proselitizing - the race issue is there and dealt with by all the characters. There are no characters on social missions. The City is presented as it was in 1910 with the prejudices and attitudes of the time. In this respect, it is a more honest presentation than if all the characters were bucking the status quo.

St. Cyr is a compelling character with depth. The supporting cast is also very good. Each also has depth and uniqueness. This is the first book in the series that I have read. It is obvious that there is a past worth knowing. The book stands alone, even though there are frequent references to two crimes that Mr. St. Cyr solved in the past, the latter of which had obviously caused him consternation. Knowledge of the prior books is not necessary but St. Cyr is such a good character that he drew me in and I will look for the prior books.

This is a very good historical mystery. It is top of the class in that genre. Strongly recommended.

Fulmer does a wonderful job of conveying the complex and multilayered social and political structure of life in New Orleans and Storyville during the early 1900s. His characters are rich and dimensional, his sense of place exacting. There's a feeling of melancholy to the story so that even scenes during the day feel muted and gritty. The pace and narrative of the story bring you into the story and keep you there from the first page to the last. This is a character-driven mystery and St. Cyr is a fascinating character; one about whom you care. Rampart Street accentuates hypocrisy and greed born from power. Fulmer has maintained the quality of this series with each book and, although this book stands well along, should recommend starting from the beginning.

Author David Fulmer has given us a most solid character in the person of Creole detective Valentin St. Cyr, who travels among the brothels and bars of Storyville and other venues in search of a killer. Although the plot is fairly predictible -- as the story progresses there is little mystery as to how it will end --the book is still a worthy read for the strength of the characters and the descriptions of life in New Orleans during the time when jazz (or "jass" as it was known then) was being born. This is the third book in the St. Cyr series and it's a keeper. I look forward to reading more adventures in the this irrestible character and his equally irrestible city.

Rampart Street is the third in Fulmer's Valentin St. Cyr (Creole detective) series, which are set in early 1900's New Orleans. Fulmer's forte is writing professionally about music, which has played a smaller part in each successive book. But I'm glad to say that that's not a problem - Fulmer continues to effectively evoke the place and era. The first book (Chasing the Devil's Tail) remains my favorite, but this book is still a worthwhile read.

This is third book in David Fulmer's Valentin St. Cyr's detective series. In this book we find a changed man in St. Cyr and at the beginning of the book question ourselves as to the writer's methodology. As usual, the reader has to go through a series of murders. BUT - the book builds like a relentless crescendo. The ending comes as a surprise as our detective - through self examination and outside help - discovers his mistakes and plots the cases's outcome! In Mr. Fulmer's narrative, New Orleans of the early twentieth century once again comes alive in the theatre of the mind. Enjoy it. I did.