Alicia Giménez-Bartlett's Petra Delicado detective series has apparently garnered some acclaim and popularity in her native Spain, and she has won the Feminino Lumen Prize for best female writer as well in case there's any doubt as to her abilities. I hate it when American publishers publish detective novels out of order (which they frequently do). I prefer to get in on the ground floor so to speak when it comes to a series of books and see how characters develop and storylines progress. It was sheer luck then, when I chose Death Rites to read. It's the first Petra Delicado mystery, but the third to be published by Europa Editions.
I've never read any Spanish crime novels and was curious to see what this would be like. I tend to read a certain type of mystery over and over, so it's good to shake things up a bit and get an entirely new perspective sometimes. Reading more fiction in translation this year, mysteries included isn't a bad thing either. I thought Death Rites would be a fairly straightforward police procedural, and it was, but the mystery aspect didn't really kick in until almost two thirds of the way through the book. It's not surprising that Giménez-Bartlett would spend so much time concentrating on her main characters in a first novel. They are quirky and mismatched, but by the end of the story they have a rapport that's comfortable and entirely believable and the pair end up very likable for that matter.
Petra Delicado is a forty-something intellectual, twice divorced and trying to settle into her new home and life. Like her first husband, Hugo, she started out as a lawyer. They had a successful practice and a perfect lifestyle, but Petra would always take backseat to Hugo. Caring only for appearances and his own good name Hugo can't understand Petra's desire to be a police Inspector. Her second marriage was equally disastrous, though Pepe couldn't be more different than Hugo. Still somewhat dependent emotionally on Petra, Pepe is her junior in more ways than one, almost a little boy lost but altogether irresistible as well.
Petra has worked for months in a desk job in Documentation when a string of rapes occur and the department is short handed. She finally gets to try her hand at real investigative work and is paired with the portly Sgt. Fermín Garzón fresh from the Salamanca police force. They couldn't be more different. Fermín is far more apt to toe the line in his work, but is far more savvy when it comes to dealing with the seedier underside of Barcelona. Older and widowed Fermín lives in a boarding house but spends nearly all his waking hours either working or hanging out at The Ephemerides, a bar owned by Petra's ex, Pepe. It's also obvious he's uncomfortable working for a woman who's got fixed ideas on how to handle suspects and can be aggressive when she needs to be.
In trying to track down the rapist the two are dogged by a lack of witnesses, victims who are not forthcoming or helpful in any way, bosses who are ready to pull the pair off the case if they don't see results and a press hostile to Petra and willing to go to any extremes to get their story. The only real clue they have to work with is a circular floral pattern pressed into the victims forearms. Delicado and Garzón spend many hours hitting the pavement looking for their suspect and the device used to make the mark. This isn't a fly by the seat of your pants race to the finish line sort of story. It's far more about personalities and how they interact and getting just the right clue so that the rest falls into place, but the story does pick up momentum as it goes. I'm curious if the other two are similar, or if more attention is paid to actual detective work now that the groundwork has been laid. I'll be sure to find out as I plan on reading Dog Day at some point. And I have to mention that Europa Editions are lovely books and a pleasure to handle.