Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
Book Title: A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE
Author: Malla Nunn
Publisher: Pan MacMillan Australia
Copyright: 2008
ISBN: 978-1-4050-3877-5
No of Pages: 399
Book Synopsis:
In 1950s South Africa, the colour of a killer's skin matters more than justice.
When Captain Willem Pretorius, an Afrikaner police officer, is brutally murdered in the tiny backwater of Jacob's Rest, Detective Emmanuel Cooper is sent to investigate.
The local Afrikaners and the dead man's prominent family view Cooper, an 'English' South African, with suspicion. Soon, the powerful police Security Branch take over the investigation. But Cooper isn't interested in political expediency, or making friends in high places - he just wants the killer behind bars. As he pursues his own inquiry, he discovers the violence, secrets and desire behind the picture-perfect facade of Jacob's Rest.
Book Review:
One thing that will strike readers of A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE firmly between the eyes is how an apartheid society is so incredibly foreign from the ways in which others of us live. That's not to say that there is an overtly "political" agenda in this book, rather the book does not take a step backwards in depicting South Africa under Racial Segregation laws. It also starkly draws a picture of the various societies within that - the 'English' South African's, the Afrikaner South African's and the native South African's. It is not a particularly pretty picture, and it's delivered vividly.
Jacob's Rest is a very small town in the South African veldt. The prejudice, petty jealousy, intrigues, secrets and isolation of small town living are overlaid by the racial situation - the kaffir path that runs behind the town's houses is the only way around for the towns coloured population, and it's that situation that allows it to be used for more sinister purposes. Captain Pretorius and his family of big, strong sons, have stood sway over Jacob's Rest with a born to rule superiority that can only come from an unwavering belief that their way is the only way. So when the Captain is found in a river with a bullet in his head, his sons are convinced that the coloured community holds the key. Detective Cooper gets the case mostly by accident and he has been placed in a dangerous and difficult position, particularly when the very heavy handed (and overtly political) Security Branch muscle in. Cooper finds himself relegated to investigating previous claims of a peeping tom using the kaffir path, whilst he tries to keep out of the way of the thuggish Security Branch (and the sons of the dead man).
Nearly all of the observations and viewpoints in this book come from the young Detective Emmanuel Cooper. He is a man who is not comfortable with Racial Segregation and he's not at all comfortable with the way that life is divided up in Jacob's Rest. His natural inclination is towards time spent with Constable Shabalala - the part-Zulu man who was an offsider of the dead Captain Pretorius, and Zweigman, the German Jewish shopkeeper - who is really a doctor but part of the secondary class of society. It is these three who are the key to the unwinding of a long tale of secrets and misuse of influence, and to hefty doses of corruption and cover-up.
More than a message book, A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE is really an extremely good thriller, with lots of twists and turns in the story, which happens to be set in a society totally foreign to this reader at least. Having said that, there are elements which are familiar - the locked room (closed in village); elements of police procedure, albeit somewhat strained by the remoteness of the location and so on. The underlying message of the book is heavy handed, but it is done in an illustrative way - rather than a smack over the head job. The way that the investigation has to proceed within the society structure is profoundly shocking. The revelations of the way that the Security Branch operates; the secrets in families throughout the town - which aren't really all that shocking or dreadful, but nonetheless need to be secrets is profoundly discomforting; and the way that people's lives were so fundamentally affected by something as minor as the colour of their skin is really very sobering indeed.
The ending is undoubtedly a tiny bit sentimental, but after the previous hammering that the characters have endured, it's forgivable. In fact that's probably the only small criticism I could come up with, the book could easily have finished with no need for the gentle let down, I'd have fretted over Constable Cooper just as happily. I do hope, however, that the ending is hinting at another book beginning though.
Author: Malla Nunn
Publisher: Pan MacMillan Australia
Copyright: 2008
ISBN: 978-1-4050-3877-5
No of Pages: 399
Book Synopsis:
In 1950s South Africa, the colour of a killer's skin matters more than justice.
When Captain Willem Pretorius, an Afrikaner police officer, is brutally murdered in the tiny backwater of Jacob's Rest, Detective Emmanuel Cooper is sent to investigate.
The local Afrikaners and the dead man's prominent family view Cooper, an 'English' South African, with suspicion. Soon, the powerful police Security Branch take over the investigation. But Cooper isn't interested in political expediency, or making friends in high places - he just wants the killer behind bars. As he pursues his own inquiry, he discovers the violence, secrets and desire behind the picture-perfect facade of Jacob's Rest.
Book Review:
One thing that will strike readers of A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE firmly between the eyes is how an apartheid society is so incredibly foreign from the ways in which others of us live. That's not to say that there is an overtly "political" agenda in this book, rather the book does not take a step backwards in depicting South Africa under Racial Segregation laws. It also starkly draws a picture of the various societies within that - the 'English' South African's, the Afrikaner South African's and the native South African's. It is not a particularly pretty picture, and it's delivered vividly.
Jacob's Rest is a very small town in the South African veldt. The prejudice, petty jealousy, intrigues, secrets and isolation of small town living are overlaid by the racial situation - the kaffir path that runs behind the town's houses is the only way around for the towns coloured population, and it's that situation that allows it to be used for more sinister purposes. Captain Pretorius and his family of big, strong sons, have stood sway over Jacob's Rest with a born to rule superiority that can only come from an unwavering belief that their way is the only way. So when the Captain is found in a river with a bullet in his head, his sons are convinced that the coloured community holds the key. Detective Cooper gets the case mostly by accident and he has been placed in a dangerous and difficult position, particularly when the very heavy handed (and overtly political) Security Branch muscle in. Cooper finds himself relegated to investigating previous claims of a peeping tom using the kaffir path, whilst he tries to keep out of the way of the thuggish Security Branch (and the sons of the dead man).
Nearly all of the observations and viewpoints in this book come from the young Detective Emmanuel Cooper. He is a man who is not comfortable with Racial Segregation and he's not at all comfortable with the way that life is divided up in Jacob's Rest. His natural inclination is towards time spent with Constable Shabalala - the part-Zulu man who was an offsider of the dead Captain Pretorius, and Zweigman, the German Jewish shopkeeper - who is really a doctor but part of the secondary class of society. It is these three who are the key to the unwinding of a long tale of secrets and misuse of influence, and to hefty doses of corruption and cover-up.
More than a message book, A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE is really an extremely good thriller, with lots of twists and turns in the story, which happens to be set in a society totally foreign to this reader at least. Having said that, there are elements which are familiar - the locked room (closed in village); elements of police procedure, albeit somewhat strained by the remoteness of the location and so on. The underlying message of the book is heavy handed, but it is done in an illustrative way - rather than a smack over the head job. The way that the investigation has to proceed within the society structure is profoundly shocking. The revelations of the way that the Security Branch operates; the secrets in families throughout the town - which aren't really all that shocking or dreadful, but nonetheless need to be secrets is profoundly discomforting; and the way that people's lives were so fundamentally affected by something as minor as the colour of their skin is really very sobering indeed.
The ending is undoubtedly a tiny bit sentimental, but after the previous hammering that the characters have endured, it's forgivable. In fact that's probably the only small criticism I could come up with, the book could easily have finished with no need for the gentle let down, I'd have fretted over Constable Cooper just as happily. I do hope, however, that the ending is hinting at another book beginning though.
At first I was excited to find this book, which is set in 1950s S. Africa, at the beginning of apartheid. The murder victim is an Afrikaner policeman in the boonies. But there were so, so many stereotypes, I got sick of it. Despite the fact that the author is at least part black, judging from her picture, I found her portrayals of black women offensive. And the plot was too complicated (a common flaw in first mystery novels). So in the end it was rather a disappointment.
This is a good novel. It tells a complex mystery based around race, family, and honor. Set in the 50s in South Africa, adding to the historical complexity of the story. Will be reading more in this series.
[b:A Beautiful Place to Die|2991868|A Beautiful Place to Die (Detective Emmanuel Cooper, #1)|Malla Nunn|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1348474222s/2991868.jpg|3022332] is a cracker of a novel. In the book we see 1950s South Africa through the eyes of Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper, sent to investigate the death of an Afrikaner police captain in the small town of Jacob’s Rest near the border with Mozambique.
Emmanuel reminds me of [a:Henning Mankell|22339|Henning Mankell|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1336761478p2/22339.jpg]'s Kurt Wallander, polite, neither unkind nor easily intimidated, resigned to his lot of long days and headaches, and wearily facing down human cruelty in all its petty, pathetic and monstrous guises.
Nunn has the ability to skewer a character to the page with one phrase: “the tight-lipped constable”, “the shy brown mouse”, a “dapper peacock of a manner”, “a woman with fire in her eyes and ice in her heart”.
She loves a good metaphor, does not waste words, and has what I like to think of as a dry Australian sense of humour, put to excellent use in one priceless scene where two nuns witness a crucial piece of evidence.
The question of what motivates each of these characters and who they really are beneath the surface drives the plot relentlessly forward so that for the reader it becomes almost impossible to put the book down.
Beneath the compelling, cinematic, beautifully written, tight as a drum story, Nunn is telling us what happens when we demand of people what is impossible and deny to them what is necessary. Just after I finished this book I came across a reference, in [b:The Mother Dance|162750|The Mother Dance How Children Change Your Life|Harriet Lerner|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347298552s/162750.jpg|2731116] by Harriet Lerner (p85), to something Alice Walker said in a radio interview:
It’s a message not only relevant to 1950s South Africa, or the years of slavery in the United States.
Emmanuel reminds me of [a:Henning Mankell|22339|Henning Mankell|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1336761478p2/22339.jpg]'s Kurt Wallander, polite, neither unkind nor easily intimidated, resigned to his lot of long days and headaches, and wearily facing down human cruelty in all its petty, pathetic and monstrous guises.
Nunn has the ability to skewer a character to the page with one phrase: “the tight-lipped constable”, “the shy brown mouse”, a “dapper peacock of a manner”, “a woman with fire in her eyes and ice in her heart”.
She loves a good metaphor, does not waste words, and has what I like to think of as a dry Australian sense of humour, put to excellent use in one priceless scene where two nuns witness a crucial piece of evidence.
The question of what motivates each of these characters and who they really are beneath the surface drives the plot relentlessly forward so that for the reader it becomes almost impossible to put the book down.
Beneath the compelling, cinematic, beautifully written, tight as a drum story, Nunn is telling us what happens when we demand of people what is impossible and deny to them what is necessary. Just after I finished this book I came across a reference, in [b:The Mother Dance|162750|The Mother Dance How Children Change Your Life|Harriet Lerner|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347298552s/162750.jpg|2731116] by Harriet Lerner (p85), to something Alice Walker said in a radio interview:
…one outcome of racism is that a mother may think things are just fine because she can provide her children with a good life and education, while across the tracks other people’s children have no access to either. It’s a myth, Walker reminds us, that the two worlds of these children can be kept separate for very long. The children who have little or nothing will always be wanting what the other children have. The children of privilege will always be trying to protect what’s theirs and to justify that inequality.
It’s a message not only relevant to 1950s South Africa, or the years of slavery in the United States.
A Beautiful Place To Die by Malla Nunn is a great look into South Africa in the 50s. Reading a good novel where the locale is character in and of itself is always a treat. Added to that is the time frame in which there are explosive race relations and all the different sects make every interaction between characters brim with tension. I can't imagine living through this time period and location but Nunn makes it feel tangible. The main protagonist reminds me of one of my favorite literary characters, Arkady Renko by Martin Cruz Smith. My only complaint was that the final "jam" the protagonist gets into is too easily remedied. Overall, a very good mystery with fantastic characters and scenery.
Not as good as the third in the series. However, I do love the setting: mid-century South Africa, just as Apartheid is taking hold. There is great diversity in the characters and the plot is somewhat complex. The main character, Emmanuel Cooper, is intelligent as he reveals the ironies that seem to be an endemic feature of Apartheid and racism, in general. However, the title itself suggests great beauty in the landscape. Unfortunately, the author provided only brief glimpses of the surrounding landscapes. Overall, Malla Nunn writes great mysteries.
Beautifully written, with an unexpected twist at the end. Emmanuel Cooper is a strong and complex protagonist - add in murder and the setting of 1950s South Africa, and you have worthy read.
well written mystery with a good social commentary of a very complex society. the story weaves itself with many twists and turns and just when you think you got it, it takes you elsewhere. some "on the edge of your seat" moments.
unfortunately, that era was laden with violence, and the author does not spare us that. it is part of the story.
curious where the next book might take the hero.
unfortunately, that era was laden with violence, and the author does not spare us that. it is part of the story.
curious where the next book might take the hero.
I'm sort of in two minds about this book. I liked the style of writing and Emmanuel Cooper, the protagonist and detective in this story. The story itself was a little less exciting, and, at times, downright confusing. There was a lot of talk of sex and at times it felt very graphic and unpleasant, as well as a rather unnecessary amount of violence and gore. I know this story was meant to give the reader a glimpse of South Africa in the 50s, and maybe the author painted an accurate picture, I suppose I just hope she didn't. We all know of the apartheid, so obviously, there were tremendous racial tensions at that time, in that sense, Nunn is probably trying to give us a greater understanding of the degree of discord and fear everyday people lived with, and the fact that a white policeman would naturally be viewed with suspicion, in light of this situation.
So that was my little confused ramble...;-) All in all, I did think this was a good book, particularly as the main character is so strong and frankly, quite likeable. I can see myself picking up the next ones in the series, once I have read something a bit lighter.
If you enjoy Bryce Courtenay, this might also appeal.
Find more reviews and bookish fun at http://www.princessandpen.com
So that was my little confused ramble...;-) All in all, I did think this was a good book, particularly as the main character is so strong and frankly, quite likeable. I can see myself picking up the next ones in the series, once I have read something a bit lighter.
If you enjoy Bryce Courtenay, this might also appeal.
Find more reviews and bookish fun at http://www.princessandpen.com
Based in 1950s South Africa where new apartheid rules have recently been put in place. When a small town white cop is killed and Detective Cooper finds himself in charge of an investigation he never asked for. While he tries to solve the murder he has to carefully navigate the racial tension, and once the Security Branch catches wind and tries to take over, he has to jump through even more hoops to ensure justice is served!
This is the first in the series based around Detective Emmanuel Cooper. If you're a fan of detective novels, and lots of twists, this one is for you!
This isn't my favorite genre, but I enjoy reading books set in Africa, which is what led me to pick it up. Not sure if I'll continue on the series though.
This is the first in the series based around Detective Emmanuel Cooper. If you're a fan of detective novels, and lots of twists, this one is for you!
This isn't my favorite genre, but I enjoy reading books set in Africa, which is what led me to pick it up. Not sure if I'll continue on the series though.