What Book to Read?

Barry Maitland started writing detective fiction when he was Professor of Architecture at Newcastle University in New South Wales. He retired in 2000 and has been writing full time ever since. Having been born in England and lived there for more than forty years, it is not surprising that almost all his books are set there. Nor is it surprising that there is an architectural flavour to them all.

Chelsea Mansions (2011) is the eleventh in Maitland’s series featuring Kathy Kolla, who has now been promoted to Detective Inspector, and Detective Chief Inspector David Brock, who heads the Serious Crimes Branch of the Metropolitan Police. You don’t need to have read any of the others in the series; Maitland is good like that, though here there is an old score being settled. The story begins when an elderly American tourist who is staying at the slightly down-at-heel Chelsea Mansions Hotel is murdered. Chelsea Mansions is a row of adjoined six-storey Victorian terraces, all of which, except the hotel, are now owned by a rich Russian businessman. He has renovated his section of terraces – ‘its bulk enlivened by Dutch gables, decorative terracotta panels, white balcony trim and an impressive central portico’.  A few days after the first death, the Russian is found murdered. Is it a family matter? Could the Russian secret police be involved? Could these crimes possibly be connected? And what has the young Canadian who has just moved into the hotel got to do with it?

Maitland tells a good story, keeping up a fast, page turning pace. I enjoyed the suspense and found it a hard book to put down. There are crises, breakthroughs and disappointments, political interference and national security issues.  There is quite a lot of actual detecting. For most of the hunt, Brock is out of action, leaving Kathy to deal with the pressure. The police hierarchy want the uncomplicated answer. ‘Remember Occam’s razor, Brock – the simplest of two theories is to be preferred.’ ‘You’re never satisfied with the simple answer, you’ve always got to look for a more complicated explanation, a more interesting and original explanation. Well, you’re wrong.’ But is he?

But for all that I found most of the story engrossing, I was ultimately not satisfied. It isn’t the writing; Maitland has a good spare style perfectly appropriate to a police procedural. His characters are there for their role in the story rather than for any psychological insights, but again they are perfectly adequate. No, it’s the ending. I’m probably being my usual picky self here; at least one other friend enjoyed it without my reservations, and like most other of Maitland’s books, it received good reviews in the Australian press. (‘Maitland is a consummate plotter, steadily complicating an already complex narrative…’ The Age.) I like diversions and red herrings in a crime story as much as anyone else, but there is a major diversion in this story which seems to be a complication for complications sake. Not everything has to be tied in; in real life there aren’t any neat endings, and I’d rather have a messy conclusion to a book than one that is over-contrived. But here I think there is a sort of scatter-gun approach to the red herrings – a mixed metaphor if ever I wrote one – with the correct answer almost being randomly arrived at. Looking back you can see that there is the occasional hint about what is to come, but the resolution is rather too far fetched for my liking.

None of this is a reason not to read the story; as I said, other people have enjoyed it. But if you are new to Maitland, you might instead try his Silvermeadow (2000), which I think is the best of his books, making great use of not only his architectural insights, but also his sociological ones. His stand alone mystery with an Australian setting, Bright Air (2008) is also worth reading, and includes some interesting Australian architectural history.

Seven of his twelve books have been shortlisted for the annual Ned Kelly award for the best Australian crime novel, and he has won it once. You can read more about him and his work here.