This is Phillip Periman in Amarillo reviewing "The Bat" by Jo Nesbo for the High Plains Reader's Book Club. "How are ya, Mate?"
This Australian greeting is the first dialogue in this first of the Inspector Harry Hole mystery novels, NY Times bestsellers, written by this Norwegian man whose books have been translated into 50 different languages and sold over 50 million copies making Nesbo the most successful ever Norwegian author.
In this very first story Harry Hole has been dispatched from Oslo to Sydney, Australia to investigate the murder of a 23 y/o Norweigian blonde and attractive Inger Holter, who had become a minor Norwegian celebrity for hosting a children's broadcast. When her ratings dropped she had immigrated to Australia. Her body had been found dumped over a cliff into the sea after being raped and strangled to death.
Hole, who had never been in Australia, came as an observer with no responsibility for the inquiry. At the Sydney airport "Andrew Kensington, a black man wearing light blue jeans and a Hawaiian shirt, and with an unusually broad nose and dark, curly hair met the inspector. Hole surmised that Kensington was an Aboriginal and managed a very awkward start to his stay by saying "In Norway we call you Australian Negroes." Andrew quickly made the observation that his people were the original Australians, having occupied that continent for 40,000 years. Kensington was one of the very few Indigenous officers on the police force. He had a wealth of information about Australian culture and history with which during the course of the investigation he educates Inspector Hole and us, the readers.
Kensington tells Hole the Aborigines story of that titles this book. According to their myth, the first man was created "by Baiame, the uncreated, who was the beginning of everything, and who loved and took care of all living things." In their creation story there is a sacred tree and a beehive with honey which Ber-rook-boorn, the first man, and his wife are not to eat. However, the wife can't resist, climbs the tree, eats the honey, and then is driven off by Narahdarn the bat who symbolizes death which is now released into the world. As Kensington points out the Aborigines' creation story created without any contact with the western world, sounds much like the Adam and Eve saga.
We soon discover several murders of young blond women over a period of years that leads Inspector Harry Hole to surmise that for a long time an unrecognized serial killer has been afoot in Australia.
Even though this was Nesbo's first mystery novel, "The Bat" reads like the work of a mature, experienced writer. He makes character development psychologically interesting and his sense of place and his ability to put that into words remarkable. The reader is introduced to career detectives, pimps, prostitutes, bi-sexuals, boxers, drug dealers, and the Sydney aquarium with seamless ease.
This is a mystery with multiple criminals and many murders, but only one murderer whose identity provides a surprising ending. "The Bat" is an easy book to start and a hard book to put down as the action carries the reader from one venue to another, page by page with urgency and excitement Although I became entirely committed to Inspector Hole and his quest for the murderer, by the time I reached the end of the book his failings: his alcoholism, his inability to sustain a love relationship--- ruined the pleasure I had in reading what is clearly a well-told story with an intriguing and interesting plot. Okay for a serious novel, but for a mystery I would like to read on vacation not so good. For you the listener, I suggest you give "The Bat" a read. You will find the story gripping and compelling. Let me know if you decide to follow the Inspector into other venues and plots.
This has been Phillip Periman for the HPPR Radio Reader's Book Club.
