A Death in Denmark - Amulya Malladi

 

That A Death in Denmark had so much potential going for it compared to what it actually delivers is what makes this book so disappointing to me. The basic premise of the novel is that an ex-Copenhagen policeman, as a personal favor to someone once close to him, agrees to look into the case of an Iraqi refugee who has been convicted of the murder of a prominent right-wing Danish politician. It's true that the man had every reason to hate the dead woman and that no one could much blame him for killing her if he had, but Yousef Ahmed's family is convinced that he was framed, and they want someone to prove it so that he can come home. There was so much promise here, so many directions this one could have gone that would have offered insight into the mass migration experience that is happening all over the world today. 

But it didn't come close to delivering on all that potential. 

Instead, Malladi decided to snatch characteristics of just about every successful fictional detective of the last few decades and combine them into P.I. Gabriel Praest - a walking, talking cliché of massive proportions if there ever was one. You know the drill: jazz lover, wine and liquor connoisseur, now single and living alone but father of a young adult daughter, struggling ex-smoker, ex-cop because he caused his bosses too many problems, surprisingly sophisticated taste and opinions when it comes to clothing, cars, and art...and on and on. Praest could have been a believable enough character if he had shared only a couple of these characteristics, but claiming all of them is just pushing it. 

Even then, I think A Death in Denmark, what with its dive into the history of Danish collaboration with the country's Nazi occupiers during World War II and how that history could still be damaging to those whose family wealth is based on how greatly they profited from their collaboration, could have been quite a thriller. But then, Malladi decided to out Stephen-King, Stephen King by taking "product placement" to an even more absurd level than King sometimes takes it himself. At one point, I had to re-read an entire half page to make sure that Malladi had not slipped an actual beer commercial into her manuscript. That was the chuckle-out-loud material that forever doomed the book for me because it made me realize how many times I had already had to read catalog-like descriptions of shirts, suits, wines, art, shoes, etc. Even at the point that Praest gets shot by a Russian mafia thug, he is more concerned about the hole in his designer jacket than the hole in his body. 

I see that lots of readers do praise A Death in Denmark, and that mine is a minority opinion, so maybe I've just already read too many detective novels and thrillers to enjoy a knockoff character like Praest. I'm always looking for original characters, especially those tasked with carrying a series of books; Gabriel Praest is just not that guy.