What I’m Reading: Stephen Tester
This summer, I’ve envied the skills of Robert Harris, whose WW2 thrillers Enigma and V2 provide refreshing portrayals of history-changing female protagonists. I admire how he threads the needle of giving main characters agency beyond their feminine wiles while still being authentic to the societal limitations of the time.
Courtroom dramas drew me into the legal profession, and I submit that Rogue Lawyer is John Grisham back to his best. The main character’s subversion of the legal system to champion the underdog has a freshness similar to my favourite Grisham novels from the early 90s.
What I love about historical crime fiction is that it takes me beyond the murder or heist to give me a window into another world. Michael Crichton’s The Great Train Robbery is a classic I’ll re-read time and again to experience the often-bizarre nuances of life in Victorian London, while Steven Saylor’s Roma Sub-Rosa detective series set in Ancient Rome is where I turn for light adult reading reminiscent of the Asterix comic books of my childhood.
For true-crime aficionados, The Disappearance of Lydia Harvey by Julia
Laite is literary non-fiction with a strong
New Zealand connection which gave me a fascinating insight into international sex trafficking before WW1. Similarly, Paul French’s City of Devils is crime noir which took me on an exciting ride through the nightlife of 1930s Shanghai.
Finally, from left field, I found The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis (reproduced in the Netflix series) to be eminently readable, even for someone who still refers to knights as horses.