A Beautiful Place to Die
- 418pagine
- 15 ore di lettura
In 1950s South Africa, the colour of a killer's skin matters more than justice . . .
Viaggia nel Sudafrica del 1952 e immergiti nelle indagini del Detective Sergente Emmanuel Cooper. Questa serie approfondisce il complesso clima sociale e politico dell'epoca attraverso avvincenti casi criminali. I lettori possono aspettarsi indagini suggestive che scoprono gli aspetti più oscuri della società e della natura umana. Ogni puntata offre uno sguardo avvincente al passato attraverso la lente del lavoro investigativo.
In 1950s South Africa, the colour of a killer's skin matters more than justice . . .
The second in a crime series set in 1950's South Africa when apartheid laws were first introduced.DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA, 1953. Forced to resign from his position of Detective Sergeant and re-classified as 'mixed race' after an incident involving a young black woman, Emmanuel Cooper winds up powerless and alone in the tough coastal city of Durban, mixing labouring with surveillance work for his old boss, Major van Nickerk. Patrolling the freight yards one night, he stumbles upon the body of a young white boy and the detective in him cannot, or will not, walk away. When two more bodies - this time an older English woman and her maid - are discovered at his boarding house, he unwittingly becomes the prime suspect in a triple murder case.
"Emmanuel Cooper's life is finally back on track when a request comes from Colonel van Niekerk on the eve of his wedding and Cooper, with Shabalala, must report to the local police station in Balgowan, a small trading post in the Natal Midlands. There has been an anonymous phone tip claiming that "something bad" has happened on Little Flint Farm. Emmanuel knows that his boss would not send two city detectives into isolated farm country without good cause. Something has to be up. Cooper and Shabalala head into the Midlands where horse stables and cultivated fields dot the wide valleys. The Station Sergeant's books are clean, except for a minor matter: the disappearance of an adolescent Zulu girl from her family kraal in the wild foothills of the Drakensberg. Who is this she, this fifteen-year-old named "Amahle," the beautiful one? Where has she gone and why is the local Sergeant so reluctant to search for her? Fuelled by the instinctive knowledge that something "bad" really has happened out on Little Flint Farm, Cooper and Shabalala plunge into the class driven world of transplanted English aristocrats and the tradition bound world of the old Zulu chiefs. Together, Cooper and Shabalala must break the silence of the opposing communities and dig through buried secrets until they find out what happened to the girl, and why... no matter the cost"--
Set in the corrupt, unforgiving world of apartheid South Africa, this novel in the Detective Emmanuel Cooper series follows Cooper as he faces a test of loyalty and friendship. Five days before Christmas, Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper sits at his desk at the Johannesburg major crimes squad, ready for his holiday in Mozambique. A call comes in: a respectable white couple has been assaulted and left for dead in their bedroom. The couple’s teenage daughter identifies the attacker as Aaron Shabalala— the youngest son of Zulu Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala—Cooper’s best friend and a man to whom he owes his life. The Detective Branch isn’t interested in evidence that might contradict their star witness’s story, especially so close to the holidays. Determined to ensure justice for Aaron, Cooper, Shabalala, and their trusted friend Dr. Daniel Zweigman hunt for the truth. Their investigation uncovers a violent world of Sophiatown gangs, thieves, and corrupt government officials who will do anything to keep their dark world intact.