Englischsprachige Literatur

Ferraris Zoe

Kingdom of Strangers

Little, Brown Book Group, London 2012

Galbraith3

 In her third novel about Katya and Nayir Ferraris is just doing too much. There has to be a serial killer who murders young women from Asia and cuts off their hands. The graves of 19 of them are found in the desert.

Katya is officially  only allowed to do her job as pathologist, but, of course, she starts investigating on her own, the more so when Ibrahim, chief inspector, asks her to find out what has happened to his Asian lover, a former undercover agent. Ferraris switches her focus from one conflict to the other, so none of them takes centre stage. When the mass murderer is finally found, the solution is anticlimactic.

It is all very weird, and for once Ferraris has great difficulties developing a convincing plot. She cannot bring her contrasting intentions together: accusing the paranoid sex-obsessed Saudi society and writing a story of suspense. Even Katya and Nayir appear superficial in their actions.