|
[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
The fifth case in a series about married Chicago police detective John Thinnes and his unlikely friend, the gay psychiatrist Jack Caleb, is another page-turner. It follows THE MAN WHO UNDERSTOOD CATS (1993), THE DEATH OF BLUE MOUNTAIN CAT (1996), INCENDIARY DESIGNS (1998), and THE FELINE FRIENDSHIP (2003). Despite the titles, none of the five has anything to do with cats. White Tiger is the English translation of Cop Trang, a mysterious figure -- perhaps Vietnamese, perhaps American -- who is behind the murder, execution style, of Hue Lee, a Vietnamese war refugee, and of Theo Ragland, a troubled African-American war veteran. Thinnes is early removed from the case because of an anonymous tip that he not only knew Hue in Vietnam but is also the father of her son. The unexpected allegation only spurs him to nose about on his own. He interviews various persons who had connections to the victims in Vietnam. One minor quibble: though more than 20 years have elapsed, it is amazing how many witnesses just happen to mention the key episode in Hue's and Theo's related past. Simultaneously, Thinnes continues, sub rosa, to advise his partner, Don Franchi, who now heads the case, how to proceed. She is the one, because of a chance remark made by Caleb, to put the pieces of the puzzle together at the showdown. For at its heart the case is actually a classic puzzle, and the astute reader can guess fairly early who the killer is. What makes the novel so rich and ultimately so satisfying, however, is that it contains other, more psychological mysteries to be solved. It might almost be titled Fathers and Sons. Thinnes has to grapple with the idea that he could have, unknowingly, fathered Tien Lee during a drunken blackout after Hue's marriage to Thinnes's best friend, who was castrated during the war. If so, what will the fact mean to his own marriage and to his teenage son, Rob, to whom he is growing closer? On his side, Caleb faces the death of his control-freak of a father from whom he has long been estranged. Also, Caleb continues his role as mentor to his lover's daughter, Linny Morgan, but their relationship is less fully developed than in the previous novel. Because of the case, both Thinnes and Caleb begin vividly to mine their memories about what occurred to them 'in country' and to contemplate once again the utter brutality of life and death in wartime. Thinnes was assigned to the military police. Caleb was a conscientious objector who served as a medic, but even he was goaded into killing. Their re-creation of a military operation falling apart and destroying the country it was meant to preserve provides as much interest as the police procedural, if indeed not more. The present-day for the novel is 1997 (not 2000, as the dustjacket says), when the only other major conflict for Americans has been the Gulf War. But it is, of course, impossible for a reader to avoid comparisons between what the two men show us about Vietnam in the 1970s and what we glimpse on the nightly news and in the papers about what is occurring in Iraq today. Caleb quotes a saying attributed to Edmund Burke: "All that's required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Vietnam was also the sphere in which both teenage men dealt with sexual longing. Thinnes fought to remain faithful to his fiancee, Rhonda, despite all the temptations. Caleb hesitantly embraced his sexuality. Little of that, however, spills over into the present. As Thinnes accepts that he may have slipped, Rhonda, who is quite important in earlier novels, curiously makes few appearances here. And of Caleb's lover, we are only told that Dr Martin Morgan is overextended and barely get a glimpse of him at Caleb's father's funeral. A character who is potentially very interesting (the last we saw of him a novel ago he still seems conflicted about his dissolved marriage) thus remains undeveloped. Is St. Martin's Press beginning to back away from supporting gay writing? Several of its seemingly successful gay mystery series certainly have disappeared, for whatever reason. One wonders if Dymmoch could thus be deliberately downplaying the gay element. All mention of Caleb's involvement with his AIDS clinic has long disappeared. Here he seems to have no life outside of a therapy group for veterans suffering from traumatic memories. While the novel's Chicago may be home to many ethnic minorities, Caleb is the only homosexual in sight. All five novels have exactly 69 chapters each. The finale to the murder case in WHITE TIGER builds with such tension that towards the end I felt the need to stop between chapters to decompress. On the other hand, the mystery of Tien Lee's parentage winds up a bit too quickly in chapter 69, conveniently solved via an unexpected letter. Simultaneously, a romantic interest that has been developing between Lee and Franchi suddenly shows deepening promise. And an impromptu attraction springs up between Rob and Linny. It is to Dymmoch's credit that her last-minute plot shenanigans whet the reader's appetite for the next installment of her series.
Reviewed by Drewey Wayne Gunn, December 2005
[ Top ]
QUICK SEARCH:
Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]
| 
