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THE CORONER'S LUNCH
by Colin Cotterill
Soho Crime, November 2005
272 pages
$11.00
ISBN: 1569474184


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

What a find. I've heard that some publishers believe that American readers don't like to read about foreign places, and I sometimes get lost when I read mysteries set in unfamiliar countries, but the given wisdom would be wrong here.

Colin Cotterill's creation, Dr Siri, is spellbinding, fascinating, and smart. He's surrounded by an unlikely group of co-workers and allies and he figures he's got nothing to lose. At 72, he's the only remaining coroner in Laos and that means, he says, that he's 22 years past the average life expectancy, so what can anyone do to him?

He tries toeing the line, sometimes, when he's questioned about why he doesn't behave the right way -- why he wears sandals when China has, in its generosity, provided fine shoes for everyone? Because they're crappy vinyl painful shoes and no one in his right mind would wear them. Dr Siri isn't big on political nuance.

Siri is somewhat strange; he is apparently visited pretty regularly by the ghosts or spirits of the bodies he's examined. He doesn't accept it either, but there it is. His assistants at the morgue are a young woman who reads fan magazines from Thailand all day (but she wouldn't mind being given real work) and a long-time employee with Down Syndrome, a good-humored, helpful, meticulous man without whom Siri would never find anything.

At no time are these characters objects of humor in the book. This is not a loud "look at the weirdo people" laff riot. This is a smart story, with touches of wit, heart, courage and fascinating investigation. Had I read it when it first came out in 2004, it would have gone straight to my "best of" list. As it is, I'm reading what I can of the author's work to make up for lost time.

One remarkable thing about Siri is his sense of humor, his ability to maintain a lightness in a culture, a land which is full of paranoia, prying neighbors reporting on "wrong" behavior, re-education camps, conformity and fear. Siri's age, in part, ensures that he feels that he has little to risk.

It's a different sort of read from other mystery novels set in say Eastern Europe or China. I am a fan of such authors as Qia Xiaolong and Olen Steinhauer who very effectively give the reader the sense of claustrophobia and self-preservation someone needs to maintain sanity in a tough situation. This book was quite different; not better, just different.

I appreciated Siri's light touch as well as his concern for people. Three little girls lose their mother in an apparent bombing and Siri goes out of his way to reassure them; he works with and appreciates Geung, his assistant with Down Syndrome and while he objects to Dtui's 'blackmail' when she insists he train her seriously, he comes to respect her.

He's quite clear that he's lived a long time and has no patience with a lot of the nonsense he sees around him. He's required to report to a judge who is younger than he is, political, not very bright and very unsure of himself. At first, you see Siri getting around this, but later, he faces it head on, as he does most things.

One of his cases involves the death of the wife of an important man; despite the man's insistence that his wife caused her own demise, and despite a severe lack of resources -- chemicals, equipment, books and manuals, the coroner knows more than he lets on, and is capable of very sophisticated analysis using very few tools. 

As we've become enamored of televised and written portrayals of coroners and forensic specialists, we readers have, at times, I think, almost forgotten the value of brains, simple thinking, bouncing ideas of others in the flash and rush of science and technology. That's not exactly the lesson of THE CORONER'S LUNCH, but it is a message. This is a man worthy of our respect; things happen even that he doesn't understand, but he trusts his instincts. It's an excellent book and, I hope, the start of a long mystery-writing career for author Colin Cotterill.

Reviewed by Andi Shechter, December 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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