Customer Reviews

The Wailing Wind

5 star:		(42)
4 star:		(32)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Tony Hillerman finds his stride again after the stumbling in <i>Hunting Badger</i>. A mystery that entangles lost gold mines, wailing ghosts, Navajo sacred places, infidelity and confidence games, <i>The Wailing WInd</i> brings Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee together again. Leaphorn is retired but insatiably curious about a murder and disappearance that seem to be linked to a new killing. Chee and his new (and let us hope permanent) love interest, Officer Bernadette Manuelito, sift through the clues to find a killer and, incidentally, a basis for their own relationship.

The novel is fast and fun. Hillerman includes his tradmark ethnic insights, such as the hilarious scene when Jim and Bernie stumble into an interview between a Navajo singer and the FBI agent in charge. Chee weaves his own simultaneous interview of the medicine man into the fabric of the "technical assistance" he is providing to the FBI's inept translator.

If the last few pages get a bit blurry about motivations and character, that is a quibble no more germane than complaining about the meandering pace of a sweet old uncle who is a great storyteller. The twists and turns of the plot are a pleasure, anticipated or not.

Non-fans may not enjoy this one. If you haven't read any of the Chee or Leaphorn books, read <I>Skinwalkers</I> and <I>A Thief of Time</I>, to get a sense of the context and power of the series. (And do not miss the PBS Mystery Theatre dramatization of <I>Skinwalkers</I> this fall.)

Hillerman fans will cheer for Bernie Manuelito, chuckle over Joe's discreet intimacy with his "friend" Louise Bourbonette, and enjoy this new visit to a place--imaginary or not--where Anglo and Indian co-exist in harmony if not without conflict, the best of both races operating with mutual respect, and a crowd of people, men and women, we have learned to admire, respect, and love.

Tony Hillerman's new mystery, "The Wailing Wind" is like an old friend in that its the 15th novel set on the Navajo Reservation and includes Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn. Like all his previous books, I enjoyed reading this one as soon as it was published.

However, I felt that the storyline was a bit flat and the main characters seemed one-dimensional in this particular book. The new characters for this story were barely developed. The plot was transparent and didn't have much of a "mystery"

I just felt that something was missing. Kind of like looking at the map of Navajo Land that is printed inside the cover. A careful look reveals that Crownpoint is missing.

Was it worth the money? Yes, any Tony Hillerman story is worth both my money and my time but this one is less than average, based on my reading the entire series.

It is one of those accidents of a reviewer's fate that both of the mysteries I just finished reading turn on events in the past, rather than current mysteries. Each deals with this differently (the other was Laurie King's "Justice Hall"), but the reader knows from the beginning that it is the unfolding of a past tragedy that holds the keys to a puzzle taking place in the present. In Hillerman's tale, the past is recovered in fragmentary moments until it becomes a grim intruder in the present.

In the present, Officer Bernadette Manuelito finds a man curled up dead on a truck seat in the desert. Mistakenly assuming it was an accidental drunken death she inadvertently mishandles what turns out to be a crime scene and finds herself in trouble. And so, Sgt. Jim Chee and Lt. Joe Leaphorn enter the case partly to help Bernadette, and partly to carry out agendas of their own. Chee because he dislikes the FBI and likes Bernadette, and Leaphorn because evidence in this case reminds him of another one where Wiley Denton killed a swindler, and Wiley's wife vanished without a trace.

There is a Navaho legend of a Wailing Woman seeking in the desert for a lost child. Years ago, when Denton made his kill in self-defense, several students heard a woman's cries out in the nearly deserted bunkers of Fort Wingate. But it was Halloween, and the police filed the report away, more interested in the killing they could see. Years later Leaphorn is still haunted by that story and has never stopped wondering where Mrs. Linda Denton had gone.

The three investigators pursue the case separately and together, until the threads begin to point to a set of conclusions that will both surprise and please the reader. One cannot help but enjoy a tale which mixes Indian ways with police work, where lore provides just as many clues as the forensic specialists do. Hillerman paints with a fine light brush, never using too many words where few will do, but never being so sparse that believability suffers.

The characters, of course, are treasures. Waitresses and professors, shamans and tycoons all develop enough presence to remain memorable. No one appears by accident, whether they provide clues or comic relief. Leaphorn's relationship with Louisa Bourbonette developed with dry wisdom, and the chemistry between Jim Chee and Officer Manuelito intensifies, providing some interesting counterpoint to the story at hand. This is something like the fifteenth of Hillerman's tales of the Southwestern reservations, and he shows no sign of slacking off.

Reading Tony Hillerman's latest Leaphorn/Chee mystery is like sitting around a campfire with old friends. It's wonderful to catch up on each other's lives, share a few chuckes, and recall why you enjoy being together. But it's not the best way to meet new people.

Hillerman's books have always been more about Navajo lore and the vanishing-point vistas of a lightly populated land than about solving crimes. In the process, we've come to really care about Leaphorn and Chee, and the people and places that define their lives. This book has the feel of being the penultimate in the series--not quite the end, but close to it. The real question isn't who killed the gold miner whose body is discovered in the opening chapter; it's whether Chee will ever be truly happy, and whether Leaphorn will settle gracefully into retirement. Nor does Hillerman really have anything new to say about the Navajos; he's said it beautifully in more than a dozen prior books.

If you already love Leaphorn and Chee and the Southwest, you don't need my urging to read this book. If you're new to Hillerman, start with an earlier book in the series. Then come back for a nice campfire chat with your new, old friends.

If you have enjoyed any of Tony Hillerman's previous novels set in the "Four Corners", you will surely enjoy reading "The Wailing Wind". As before, Mr. Hillerman brings together the legendary Joe Leaphorn with younger Sergeant Jim Chee. Together they work to solve a recent murder as well as reopen an old homicide investigation that seemed to everyone to be an open and shut case, to everyone but "Lieutenant" Leaphorn. With the addition of Officer Bernie Manuelito and Leaphorn's lady Professor (introduced in 'Coyote Waits'), the new foursome make an odd, but compelling quartet. As always, there are fascinating bits of Navajo mythology expertly weaved into the tale.
My thanks to Mr. Hillerman for another fine mystery that keeps you interested until the final chapter, and hungry for the next book!

When rookie Navajo police officer Bernadette Manuelito discovers a white man curled in his pickup in a remote gulch and puts her hand on his ankle to assure herself he is dead, she sets in motion a chain of events that reverberates through a murder investigation, rocks her promising future and ratchets up the tension in her budding romance with Sergeant Jim Chee.

Manuelito, spooked by the Navajo taboo against contact with the dead, not only misses the bullet hole in his back, but fills the long wait for the ambulance by making a botanical survey of the area, depositing her seed collection in an old tobacco tin she finds lying on the ground. The FBI throws a fit at her mishandling of the crime scene - and they don't even know about the tobacco tin. Manuelito turned it over to Chee after finding some gold dust in with her seeds.

Chee goes to his old boss, retired Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn, whose interest is already piqued by the dead man's collection of papers relating to a mythical gold mine which harks back to an old case. Wealthy Wiley Denton, obsessed by that gold mine, shot a con man who tried to rob him when his con went bad. Open-and-shut save for one thing. Denton's young wife went missing the same day. People said she was in league with the dead con man, but to Leaphorn it never quite fit.

Manuelito figures prominently in Hillerman's well-constructed plot, as she, Chee and Leaphorn each follow separate threads. Especially elegant is the convergence of Manuelito's tribal sourcing and Chee's police work; their complementary methods dovetailing to further the plot, their own complex individuality and their romantic attraction. But the case isn't solved until Leaphorn unravels the mystery of the ghost wailing heard on the night of the original shooting by some kids trespassing on the spooky abandoned ordnance depot where it all builds to an atmospheric, suspenseful and chilling climax. This is award-winning Hillerman at his best.

The Wailing Wind
Tony Hillerman
ISBN 0-06-019444-8

Tony Hillerman's novels featuring Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee of the Navajo police have familiarized people around the world with the culture of the Navajo and the desert Southwest in which they live. Last year, while browsing in a bookstore in a medieval town in Germany, I came across a German language edition of one of Hillerman's books.

To those whose primary interest in Hillerman's work relates to his use of the Navajo culture in his stories, "The Wailing Wind" does not disappoint. In this book, as an example, one finds that Officer Bernadette Manuelito's adherence to the Navajo belief of avoiding contact with the dead leads her to blunder in an investigation. But she re-establishes her credibility by using information from her uncle, who is a shaman with a unique knowledge of native plants.

It is interesting how Hillerman constructs the characters of Chee and Leaphorn. Both men are effective policemen, but they are very different men. Chee is younger, more impetuous, more error-prone, and less sure of himself. In one passage, Chee pretends to study the menu carefully in the Navajo Inn, to preserve his pride, because in the end he always orders a hamburger. Chee is also more a traditional Navajo than Leaphorn, who has earned a master's degree in Anthropology at Arizona State University. But Chee, who has studied with his uncle to become a chaman in earlier books uses that knowledge here to predict a suspect's likely behavior. Leaphorn is older, retired, more self-confident, steadier, and exhibits the deductive reasoning powers of a Navajo Sherlock Holmes. For example, when Chee is giving Leaphorn some information about a crime, he notes that one never has to explain the ramifications of a set of circumstances to Leaphorn. He always sees them.

Those who have followed the vicissitudes of Jim Chee's love life through several novels, with two earlier girlfriends, may take interest in the emergence in this book of Bernadette Manuelito as his new, would-be love interest. Leaphorn, the Legendary Lieutenant, on the other hand, remains aloof. His friendship with Professor Louisa Bourbonette seems destined to stay platonic. Leaphorn still remembers little things about his Navajo wife who died some years before.

In "The Wailing Wind", Hillerman, as always, utilizes his considerable skill in constructing a plot of seemingly unrelated, intriguing threads of events that he adroitly weaves together at the end. This book features a lost gold mine, a beautiful, vanished wife, a Halloween story of the supernatural, and two murders. The construction of this plot is certainly the equal of most in Hillerman's books, though its resolution is probably not the equal of his best. In the conclusion, Leaphorn seems to make some uncharacteristic mistakes. But it is good to read about Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee again. This book takes one further into the development of these well-drawn characters, and about such characters one always wants to read more.

...--to find Tony Hillerman, easily one of America's more popular writers, back in full form and fashion with "The Wailing Wind."

Hillerman, following the last two or three works that seemed to have been disappointments (somewhat) even to his most ardent followers, takes this one and demonstrates that after 14 previous novels featuring Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee and the Navajo tribal world he can still spin a tale.

Drawing from a previous incident in an earlier work, Hillerman opens "The Wailing Wind" with officer Bernadette Manuelito discovering a body in an abandoned pickup truck. In addition to reporting the scene, of course, she makes some procedural mistakes and Hillerman is off and running. Besides Officer Manuelito taking a larger role in Hillerman's works, the fusion and relationship between Leaphorn and Chee is never better and the chemistry continues to work well. Chee's young--and sometimes hasty--ways are always tempered by Leaphorn's experience and older judgment. What a team!

Hillerman's revelations and plot summations are not always so complicated and involved, as in this case, but his devotion to great character development, presentation of landscape, atmosphere, native American culture and history, and sound logic in thought and deed make "The Wailing Wind" one of his best works. This is a relief, of course, to his readers, who are always one breath away of thinking that the last one's the last one! So far so good.

In "The Wailing Wind," murder, greed, jealousy, and a bit of madness play into the darker side of the book's development. Fortunately, Hillerman is sound in his delivery of good and just practices and human beings. Here, while the book may not leave the reader mesmerized from page to page to the extent you can't put it down, the author takes control of all developments and his pacing and nuance never let the story get away from him.

Perhaps more than anything, his works are about relationships rather than "who done it." Either way, Hillerman's a man/author of the Southwest whose appeal seems universal. "The Wailing Wind" is worth the time and effort. In fact, it's a pleasure.
...

I am a long-time Hillerman fan who was deeply disappointed in the 3 books preceding The Wailing Wind. I found the language and characters so simplistic, Tony's usual poetic description so non-existent, and facts so inconsistent with those in prior novels that I truly thought (and still think!) those novels were ghost-written. (Or perhaps I should say, "Chindi-written"?)

Under the circumstances, I was reluctant to even begin reading The Wailing Wind, but there I was, at the car wash, with only this novel available. . . .my reaction? Relief! Okay, this is NOT a great mystery, but the glorious descriptive touches have returned, as has Hillerman's ability to present his characters through their actions and reflections, rather than via the curt authorial explication which characterized the three novels that came before this.

That being said, this book definitely has its faults. The ending is disappointing and lacks the complexity that the situation requires. Of course, it's difficult to tie up all the loose ends when you've made the mistake of having TOO MANY DETECTIVES: Joe Leaphorn, Jim Chee, AND Bernie Manuelito?? To resolve all of their visions and theories is just too cumbersome. The books that featured Jim Chee OR Joe Leaphorn exclusively were much more satisfying and concise.

What I found most troubling, however, were the contextual inconsistencies: Janet Pete's being described as a "perfect beauty", and the inference that she's an Anglo. The earlier novels make it quite clear that she's a Navajo, and is "classy" rather than beautiful. More puzzling, Chee's First love, Mary Landon, is described as being from Wisconsin, while the earlier novels clearly establish that she hails from New England.
Has Hillerman decided to change the background of these characters? Has he simply forgotten his first descriptions? (Okay, we're all entitled to our "senior moments", but aren't his editors susposed to guard against blatant contradictions in fact?)

I sincerely hope these flaws can be explained away by forgetfulness on the author's part or by editorial error, because I truly want to believe that the Tony Hillerman I knew has returned in The Wailing Wind.

Hillerman has three great virtues:

He understands the rhythm and concerns of the Navajo and Hopi people in the southwest;
He tells very good stories about people you rapidly come to care about;
His "mysteries" are genuinely mysterious.

These capacities make Hillerman one of the most consistently interesting and enjoyable detective writers of our time.

Wailing Wind is another example of excellence in story telling. The humanity of the characters (including a retired policeman from earlier novels who was a young man when Hillerman started writing, a young police man and woman who are falling for each other, and the people involved in the murder and the tragedy of their lives) is well expressed. The result is a world and cast that you genuinely come to care about.

The simplicity and the tragedy of the story as it finally unfolds will remind you that doing evil often has side effects and consequences unimaginable when the act is first contemplated.

This is a fine novel.