Dying to Live

Starred review from August 21, 2017
David “Kubu” Bengu, an assistant superintendent in the Botswana CID, investigates a particularly baffling murder in his sixth, and best, outing (after 2015’s A Death in the Family). Ian McGregor, the pathologist for the Botswana Police Service in Gaborone, discovers some striking anomalies when he performs an autopsy on the body of a Bushman discovered in a game preserve: the youthful internal organs don’t match the victim’s aged exterior, and an old bullet inside him has no apparent means of entry. Soon afterward, the corpse is stolen from the morgue, strongly suggesting that it held secrets someone wanted kept hidden. Clues are hard to come by, but Kubu is interested to learn that the dead man, identified by acquaintances as Heiseb, recently met with anthropologist Christopher Collins, a researcher from the University of Minnesota. Collins, who has gone missing, was studying the Bushmen’s oral traditions, which included a mode of storytelling in which the narrator pretends to have been present at events that predated his birth. Stanley (the pseudonym of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip) keeps the intriguing plot twists coming. Agent: Jacques de Spoelberch, J. de S. Associates.

August 15, 2017
A detective with the Botswana CID tackles two baffling cases while managing his growing department and dealing with family issues.An elderly Bushman found dead in the Kalahari is more of a nuisance than a mystery to Botswana DS Batwe Segodi. That is, until an autopsy reveals that the internal organs of the dead man place his age at about 40. Though the man died of a broken neck, the coroner also finds a bullet in his body, dating back several decades. Assistant Superintendent David Bengu, nicknamed Kubu ("hippo" in the Setswana language) for his size, has little patience for the paradoxical, but he does take notice when the corpse is stolen from the morgue in Gaborone, Botswana's capital. Though thefts like this are not uncommon, usually to harvest organs, here the Bushman's was the only corpse taken. Meanwhile, Kubu's first female detective, Samantha Khama, is following up on the disappearance of famous witch doctor Botlele Ramala while also battling sexism in the department. For her part, Kubu's wife, Joy, has little use for old-fashioned witch doctors. Kubu's investigation of the Bushman takes him to a professor in Minnesota; Samantha finds blood evidence in a home in Gaborone. Could the two cases be related? An additional disappearance adds credence to this theory. On the home front, an illness rocks Kubu's world. The sixth installment in Stanley's franchise (A Death in the Family, 2015, etc.) is the best yet, with both an ingenious mystery and a deeper and more textured depiction of modern Botswana and Kubu's piece of it.

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October 1, 2017

In this sixth Botswana-set title (after A Death in the Family), Assistant Supt. David ("Kubu") Bengu is called to investigate the baffling death of Heiseb, a Bushman--one of the San people of southern Africa--who is found dead near the Central Kalahari Game Reserve. The case becomes more perplexing when peculiar details about Heiseb's physiology emerge and the Bushman's body is stolen from the morgue. Kubu uncovers a connection to a missing anthropologist who was studying the oral traditions of the Bushmen as well as a link to the case of a missing witch doctor that Det. Samantha Kharma is probing while contending with departmental sexism. VERDICT Stanley, the pseudonym of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip, once again mixes strongly developed characters, puzzling plot twists, and a textured African setting in an international police procedural with heart and soul that will appeal to fans of Kwei Quartey and Alexander McCall Smith. [See Prepub Alert, 4/17/17.]--ACT

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2017
Desire for immortality spawns murder and corruption fueled by greed in modern Botswana. Things are quiet for David Kubu Bengu, assistant superintendent of the Botswana Criminal Investigation Department, when he learns that the murder of ancient bushman Heiseb has raised unusual questions. While Heiseb's skin, hair, and bones are old, his organs are those of a younger man; then his corpse and all autopsy evidence are stolen from the morgue. Next a prominent traditional healer (or witch doctor, in the mind of Detective Samantha Khama) goes missing, as does an American professor who's studying the bushman oral tradition. Rejecting coincidence, Kubu searches the links that connect these separate cases, closely aided by Khama, who shines here, and a resourceful local constable. Kubu also has problems at home: his young daughter, Nono, is no longer responding to her HIV antiviral medication, and his wife, Joy, will try anything to help her child. The sixth in this fine series by South Africans Stanley Trollip and Michael Sears again features strong characterizations, a vivid sense of place, and a complex, fast-moving, and compelling plot.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)