Happy Birthday, Turk! by Jakob Arjouni

First published in German in 1987; published in translation by Melville House on February 15, 2011

The Ergün family is troubled.  Vasif Ergün emigrated to Germany from Turkey and worked as a garbage collector before he became involved with some shady characters.  After his death, his son-in-law, Ahmed Hamul, followed in Vasif’s questionable footsteps.  Vasif’s wife is the backbone of the family.  Vasif's son Yilmaz is bitter that his father preferred the company of Hamul.  Vasif’s daughter Ayse has problems of her own, problems that other family members try to hide.

Now Hamul has been stabbed to death, his corpse unceremoniously dumped behind a brother.  The police aren’t excited about the death of a Turk, so Hamul’s widow, Ilter, turns to private investigator Kemal Kayankaya to find her husband’s killers.  Kayankaya’s investigation is hampered by uncooperative family members, unhelpful police officers, and sinister figures who threaten his welfare.

Happy Birthday, Turk!, the first of Jakob Arjouni’s Kayankaya novels, is a fine example of German noir.  Kayankaya is a hard-drinking, easily angered outcast, an orphaned Turk who, although raised as a German citizen, endures the daily bigotry of Germans who don’t like his dark skin and non-Aryan features.  Kayankaya’s intelligence and biting wit do nothing to ingratiate him with his fellow Germans -- not that he tries to win friends.  More often, he tries to win fights with his powerful fists.

The plot of Happy Birthday, Turk! is tight and filled with twists that are interesting if not entirely surprising.  The pace is swift.  I admire writers of crime fiction who don’t waste words.  Arjouni captures people and locations (and food) in a few perfect sentences.  A waiter:  “He reminded me of a gay hippopotamus.”  A living room:  “All it needed was an open drain, and the place could have been cleaned with a garden hose.”  Arjouni isn’t Raymond Chandler, but he has his own distinctive style.  Happy Birthday, Turk! isn’t my favorite Kayankaya novel, but it is a strong start to an excellent (if short-lived) series.

RECOMMENDED

More Beer by Jakob Arjouni

 

First published in Germany in 1987; published in US by Melville House on June 7, 2011

There is more story in this short (176 page) novel than you'll find in most 400 page thrillers. That's because Jakob Arjouni doesn't waste words. Using language that is both efficient and precise, Arjouni manages to set evocative scenes, create convincing characters, and tell a story that is lively, meaningful, and entertaining.

The Ecological Front put an end to the pollution emitted from a chemical company's waste pipe by blowing it up. The four people involved deny responsibility for the contemporaneous shooting death of the company's owner, Friedrich Böllig. Böllig's death is fortunate news for the rival chemical companies that want to demonize the Greens but it also seems to benefit Böllig's young wife. The lawyer defending the four activists believes there was a fifth participant in the sabotage who might have been involved in the shooting but his clients won't betray their colleague. The lawyer hires private investigator Kemal Kayankaya to find the missing culprit. Spanning only three days, Kayankaya's investigation is impeded by violent hoodlums, corrupt (and equally violent) police officers, an unethical doctor, a reporter, and Böllig's family, among others. As Kayankaya continues to dig (in between incidents of getting his head bashed in), he discovers that the circumstances surrounding Böllig's death are ... complicated.

The story is entertaining but it is the main character that makes More Beer worth reading. Kayankaya is a Turk by birth and, despite having lived his entire life in Germany, he is regarded as an undesirable outsider. His fellow Germans expect him to be uncouth, sexist, and odoriferous. Instead, he's cantankerous, tenacious, and a bit philosophical. As the German-Turk version of the hard-drinking noir detective, Kayankaya is at once familiar and strange.

More Beer was first published in Germany in 1987. It is the second of four Kayankaya novels. Kayankaya meets a character in More Beer who shows up again in the next novel -- One Man, One Murder -- but Arjouni doesn't engage in the sort of novel-to-novel character development that makes it necessary to read the series in order. I don't think More Beer is quite as good as One Man, One Murder, but it's nonetheless a quick, engaging read. Readers who enjoy international mysteries and those who want to sample a different shade of noir should give Arjouni's Kayankaya novels a try.

RECOMMENDED

One Man, One Murder by Jakob Arjouni

Frist published in Germany in 1991; published in English by Melville House on June 7, 2011

Wikipedia tells me that Jakob Arjouni is a German writer and that One Man, One Murder (originally published in 1991 as Ein Mann, ein Mord) is the third of four novels featuring the Frankfurt detective Kemal Kayankaya. I haven't read the first two but I don't think my lack of familiarity with the series hindered my enjoyment of this one.

The story takes place in 1989. In the tradition of noir private eyes, Kayankaya is wondering how to pay the rent on his ratty office when a client walks through the door. Manuel Weidenbusch has fallen in love with a Thai woman, has paid her debt to release her from the "club" that employs her, and has paid an additional sum for a forged passport to keep her in the country after her visa expires. The phony passport purveyor has apparently kidnapped Sri Dao Rakdee; hence Weidenbusch's need for Kayankaya's services.

Kayankaya's investigation takes him to the brothel where Sri Dao Rakdee was working off her debt, to unhelpful immigration authorities, to a refugee organization, to a cabaret, to jail, and to a dead body. Before bringing the investigation to a satisfying conclusion, Kayankaya encounters, and makes fun of, a number of racial purists who view the good old days of German nationalism with nostalgia. Although he's a German citizen, Kayankaya's parents are Turks and he's viewed with suspicion by many of his fellow Germans. Kayankaya has a cheeky, anti-authoritarian attitude that shines when he confronts police officers, immigration officials, and paper-pushers in the civil service.

The novel delivers an intelligent take on illegal immigration in Germany without being preachy. Some readers object to political discussions in novels; those readers might want to give this one a pass. Politics is overshadowed by plot, however, and although he's an advocate for the underdog and takes care of his friends, Kayankaya isn't what you'd call a liberal do-gooder. He fits the mold of the anti-hero: he's irreverent and hard-headed and doesn't have any great belief in justice (at least, not of the law-and-order variety), yet he has his own kind of honor, a dogged determination to dig up the unpleasant truths that corrupt officials and illicit businessmen would prefer to keep buried.

Lesser writers should take lessons from Arjouni. His prose is efficient; no words are wasted in this brief novel. He avoids clichés and his dialog is both realistic and acid-tinged. Still, Arjouni isn't so minimalist that he forgets the necessities of good fiction: he creates atmosphere by painting colorful images of a drab city, and he gives his characters personality without resorting to stereotypes. He keeps his intelligent plot moving at a brisk pace. Arjouni reminds me of Joe Gores, an American writer of detective fiction whose work exhibits the same admirable qualities. Arjouni adds a bit of social realism to the mix, giving One Man, One Murder an added dimension that I appreciated. Fans of hard-boiled detective fiction should enjoy this novel as much as I did.

RECOMMENDED