Spirit Play
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A Malaysian Miss Marple examines a suspicious death following an exorcism in this mystery by the author of Shadow Play for fans of Alexander McCall Smith.
Mak Chik Maryam is by profession a market-trader: She sells the exquisite, hand-made fabrics for which her village is well known. But her true calling is as the Miss Marple of rural Malaysia, where her skills are badly needed. While the police-chief is a nice boy, everyone knows that no man can match a village “auntie” for coaxing out the gossip and separating rumor from the truth that shines like Maryam’s good gold jewelry. That discerning eye will come in particularly handy when one of Maryam’s fellow traders is murdered after a main puteri ceremony—essentially a ritual exorcism. Intoxicated by the “spirit play,” the villagers are eager to blame supernatural powers, but Maryam, ever the pragmatist, suspects some forces a little nearer at hand.
“For lovers of armchair tourism and detective stories, Barbara Ismail has created a winner in her series about Mak Chik Maryam.” —The Straits Times (Malaysia)
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Although cloth vendor Mak Cik Maryam swore off amateur detecting after almost losing her life in 2017's Shadow Play, she allows her friend Osman, the police chief of Kota Bharu, a town in the Malaysian state of Kelantan, to take on a new case in this so-so sequel. Maryam lives close enough to Jamillah, who has a stall in the Kota Bharu market, to hear the chanting when the woman undergoes an exorcism arranged by her family to cure her of minor ills. The morning after the ritual, Jamillah is found dead in her bed with signs that she was smothered. Given that none of her relatives at the scene reported hearing anything, suspicion attaches first to her husband, who was sleeping next to her. Since Osman is unfamiliar with the local dialect, Maryam agrees to help with the questioning. She goes on to take a more active role in the investigation, at some risk to herself. Maryam, whose thinking isn't always logical, doesn't impress as a sleuth. This entry works better as an introduction to the region's culture and cuisine than as a mystery.
