Kingdom of Strangers

Starred review from April 16, 2012
The discovery of 19 female bodies with their hands cut off in the desert outside Jeddah propels Ferraris’s beautifully crafted third mystery featuring Saudi forensic technician Katya Hijazi (after 2010’s City of Veils). Lt. Col. Insp. Ibrahim Zahrani, who takes charge of the serial killer case, turns to Katya for help with a personal matter. Ibrahim’s illegal Filipino mistress, Sabria, has disappeared, and he can neither investigate freely nor make his queries official for fear of harsh public punishment. Eager to move beyond her limited role in the female-only police lab, Katya agrees to visit the clothing boutique where Sabria worked in a women’s shopping mall. Katya also faces her own personal crisis—whether to marry the traditional Nayir, who’s uneasy with her unconventional behavior. By the end, the two cases change both Ibrahim’s and Katya’s lives dramatically. With intelligence, patience, and meticulous detail, Ferraris evokes a complex culture profoundly ambivalent about female power. Agent: Julie Barer, Barer Literary.

June 1, 2012
In the third of a series, a Saudi Arabian detective hunts a serial killer as his career teeters on the brink. In the desert outside Jeddah, a Bedouin herder has discovered a shallow grave in the sand. Called to investigate, Ibrahim, a senior inspector for the Jeddah police, makes a grim discovery: 19 bodies are buried at the site, all women of Asian origin. All have had hands amputated, and three hands are buried at the grisly scene. Ibrahim and his team at first assume that the victims were all immigrants, brought into the country to work as domestics and in other menial jobs. Since many such employees are actually enslaved, their employers seldom report them missing when they run away. Without passports or resources, such women are easy marks for a killer who preys on those no one is looking for. Ibrahim is aided in his investigation by Katya, who is eager to escape her cloistered job as a lab tech and work in the field, a challenge in a gender-segregated police department. Virtue laws, requiring women to be shrouded in public, also forbid them to drive--they must be chauffeured by males, preferably relatives. When a Saudi housewife takes a taxi and disappears, Ibrahim immediately suspects that she is the first Saudi victim of the so-called Angel killer, particularly when her severed hand is left for police to find. The killer defies even the profiling expertise of American FBI consultant Charlie (a woman, much to the consternation of Ibrahim's colleagues). Ibrahim's chaotic home, shared by three generations and ruled by his tyrannical wife, Jamila, is no refuge. And his mistress, former undercover agent Sabria, is missing. Ibrahim faces a terrible dilemma--if word of his affair leaks out, he could be condemned to death for adultery. However Sabria's disappearance could also be the Angel's work. Only a woman--Katya--can help. Accomplished prose, an intricate mystery and insider Saudi scoop make for an unusual and winning combination.

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January 1, 2012

In this third novel from the author of the Los Angeles Times Book Award winner Finding Nouf, lead inspector Ibrahim Zahrani has a new case--the discovery of a desert grave containing the bodies of 19 women, suggesting that a serial killer is at work--and an unfortunate complication--his mistress has gone missing, something he can't report because in Saudi Arabia adultery is punishable by death.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from May 15, 2012
Ferraris (City of Veils, 2010) offers another fascinating mystery that provides insight into the lives of women in Saudi Arabia and exposes the plight of migrant workers there. When a mass grave containing the remains of 19 women is discovered in the desert outside Jeddah, the police realize that a serial killer has been at work in the area for more than 10 years. Ibrahim Zahrani, the lead detective on the case, may be in over his head, but he also has a big problem distracting him. His mistress has suddenly disappeared, and he cannot report it because adultery is a capital crime in Saudi Arabia. In desperation, he asks Katya, one of the few women working in the police department, to investigate off the books. Katya has her own secret that cannot be exposed. The combination of an exotic locale with a closed culture and first-rate psychological suspense makes this a compelling page-turner. Recommend Ferraris to readers who enjoyed Rajaa Alsanea's literary novel Girls of Riyadh (2007).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)