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HOLY CITY
by Guillermo Orsi and Nick Caistor, trans.
Maclehose Press, March 2012
320 pages
18.99 GBP
ISBN: 0857050621


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Buenos Aires lawyer Veronica Berutti is appointed to investigate the Riachuelo market - an open-air emporium of smuggled and stolen goods - a job that generates threats against her and her assigned bodyguard. She is also asked for help by Ana Torrente, aka 'Miss Bolivia', whose boyfriend has been murdered by the local mafia boss they were double-crossing. On top of this, ex-boyfriends of Ana's start turning up with their heads missing.

Veronica's sometime boyfriend, Pacogoya, is a tour guide on a cruise liner that runs aground in the muddy Rio de la Plata. During the unavoidable delay, passengers make tours of the city, and three couples, including a Colombian drug baron and his girlfriend, fall victim to kidnap for ransom. Two main powers compete for the spoils, local mafia and a senior member of the federal police. Walter Carroza, possibly the only honest cop in the city, takes an interest in events and in particular, Veronica's safety, which may just be sufficient to keep her alive.

HOLY CITY is a novel packed with feverish action and interacting plot lines. Although Veronica is the focus of events at the start of the book and at the conclusion, in the interim the story of the kidnapping takes over as the most interesting and significant. The wealth of the victims means the kidnappings have an international dimension, and the reaction of the governments in Argentina and abroad, and the reliance on police resources known to be so fallible, is interesting. The two sub-plots are less so. Veronica's market 'investigation' is puzzling: it is difficult to see what purpose this could serve. She is pressed to undertake it by a magistrate who seems desperate she should do so, and then makes himself unavailable to render assistance when required. The story of Miss Bolivia and the headless bodies contributes a macabre note to a book full of killings for more straightforward motives, but after much tantalising detail about the perpetrator, the final revelations are not very convincing.

The atmosphere of HOLY CITY is very dark from start to finish, encompassing endemic corruption at all levels of police and government, manipulated by hidden holders of real power including powerful mafia, and at the personal level, with all the key characters tormented by events in their past. Lawless as Buenos Aires and Argentina generally is represented, the influx of Colombian drug lords and Bolivian Indians impose even further strains on the civil liberties and safety of citizens. Truly a vision to confirm all your worst fears about South America: if you like peering at the hidden underbelly of the beast, this is for you.

§ Chris Roberts is a retired manager of shopping centres in Hong Kong, and now lives in Bristol, primarily reading.

Reviewed by Chris Roberts, April 2012

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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