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You know how you feel when you read a really bad book and wonder how it got published? Here's the balancing event. When I read the first book by Ken Wishnia, I wondered what was wrong with the publishers who had turned down this book in the series some amazing number of times. Wishnia self-published his first Buscarsela mystery, which later garnered an Edgar nomination for Best First Novel. RED HOUSE brings us to the newest chapter in the life and work of Filomena Buscarsela. A former cop, she's going through the work required to get a private investigator's license by hiring on with an agency. She's a low level employee, but with her savvy and experience as a cop, she's very valuable to the firm. Filomena's life is a bit more settled now; she has a real salary, such as it is, has found a decent place to live with her daughter and has a cool guy in her life. But she's still the tough, extremely smart woman who'd rather help the poor than the corporate client. Filomena is so darn smart; she knows things I don't want to know. This can come as a surprise, only because she hasn't exactly had a "normal" life; raised in Ecuador, she's hasn't had a lot of opportunity for education. She's a single mother, fighting to raise her kid well in New York without a lot of money. She goes to try and help a family and learns that there is far more wrong with the building they're squatting in. She's intimidating, not just to bad guys but, I think, to readers; she knows so many things, she's fearless (with some reason - she's been through experiences most of us can't imagine) and she doesn't back down. If someone can't get food stamps, she knows how to connect them with the right people. She knows that they can't deny you the right to apply. She's savvy enough to recognize a set-up when she's looking at a new apartment, and helps snag three thieves who among them, share nineteen felony warrants and are wanted in four other cities. She's well-informed enough to recognize that a guy who pulls a gun in front of a line of cops has something more going on than, say, stupidity. Without question, this is a person you want on your side. She won't give up, and she cares. The books are complicated stories, but the major mystery is well-drawn and is resolved. Buscarsela can hold her own with any of the best of the genre's private eyes and she's a helluva lot more interesting than some. This is a series that merits a lot of attention. What were those editors thinking when they turned down Wishnia's first book?
Reviewed by Andi Shechter, January 2002
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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