Phantoms of Breslau

September 22, 2014
Set in 1919, Krajewski's second Eberhard Mock mystery (after 2013's The End of the World in Breslau) finds Mock, who's assigned to the Breslau Police Praesidium's vice department, transferred to the Murder Commission to assist with a strange case. Some schoolboys on an island discover the corpses of four men, naked except for sailor's hats and leather pouches over their genitals, with their eyes gouged out and limbs broken. The suspicion that the victims may be gay leads Mock's superiors to believe that his experience with the Breslau sexual underworld might be of use. The autopsies reveal that their killer probably broke their arms and legs by jumping up and down on them. A note threatening more "gouged eyes" if Mock does not admit a past mistake raises the stakes. Krajewski does his usual solid job of establishing mood while setting the stage appropriately for a grim and disturbing resolution.

February 1, 2014
Thirty-six-year-old cop Eberhard Mock is a mess. Home in Breslau from WWI's eastern front, he's living, unhappily, with his father, drinking heavily and wracked by nightmares. The savage murder of four sailors wearing only leather jockstraps becomes his obsession, not least because a note found with the bodies requires that Mock admit to past mistakes in order to avert further murders. But as he pursues the case, people Mock interrogates suffer similar fates, their corpses accompanied by similar notes. He's ordered off the case, but the ever-imperious Mock blackmails his superior and continues, adding to the body count. Set in 1919, Phantoms of Breslau lacks some of the bizarre brio found in Krajewski's The End of the World in Breslau (2013). This one has libidinous baronesses, male prostitutes, political foment, and other elements of life in Krajewski's amazing depiction of the city, but Mock's war traumas dominate the narrative. Even so, aficionados of sophisticated international crime fiction will find much to savor.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)