Babel

May 5, 2003
Healed in body if not in spirit after the trauma of her last case (2002's Silvermeadow), Det. Sergeant Kathy Kolla is thinking of quitting Scotland Yard when murder intervenes in Maitland's assured fifth entry in this popular series. The shooting death of philosophy professor Max Springer on his London university campus in broad daylight is caught on security tape and witnessed by several bystanders. Since all the signs point to Islamic extremists, DCI David Brock fears his investigation will trigger accusations of police racism. He needs Kathy's particular style of interviewing, and she's unable to say no. As Kathy and Brock look into a longstanding enmity between Springer and Richard Haygill, director of a semi-autonomous unit at the university whose research on gene therapy is funded by Middle Eastern agents, they're led even deeper into the shadows of London's Muslim community. It will come as no surprise to the author's fans that the case is infinitely more complex than it first seems, and that serious questions of personal morality flow beneath the action. The issues the book raises are especially compelling given that it was written before 9/11, which makes its thoughtful presentation of simmering antagonism between Westerners and Middle Easterners, between Muslims and Christians, eerily prophetic and all the more moving. (June)FYI:Maitland has won the CWA of Australia's Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Fiction for
The Malcontenta.

June 1, 2003
After a leading British academic known for his aversion to Islamic extremism is murdered in front of a London university, Scotland Yard's Kathy Kolla and David Brock (The Chalon Heads) begin investigating the city's Arab community. Suspicion falls on a rival professor as well, an apparently unethical proponent of medical genetics. Another excellent police procedural.

Copyright 2003 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2003
David Brock and Kathy Kolla return for their sixth outing. Published in Great Britain in 2002 (and written before the events of September 11), the novel opens with the murder of a university professor known for his outspoken opinions on extremists committing acts of violence in the name of Islam. But was it really his views that got him killed? Brock, a detective chief inspector in Scotland Yard's Serious Crimes Branch, takes the lead in the investigation; Kolla, his partner, is still on leave, recovering from events detailed in "Silver Meadow "(2002). Recent history certainly gives an added level of realism and immediacy to the series, but Maitland is in no way guilty of producing a stereotypical "ripped-from-the-headlines" novel; rather, he offers a subtle exploration of the differences between cultures, framed as a ripping good mystery. Fans of the series will not be disappointed. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2003, American Library Association.)