Jeffrey Siger

A fun Kaldis mystery that sees protegee Yianni Kouros take the lead in a case that gets personal in Greece's storied Mani region--the finger of the Peloponnese jutting into the sea south of Sparta. The solution to this case is elusive until the very end as we don't get any narration or insights from the murderer's perspective until after the answer is known (which is not regularly the case in these stories). It was great to see a different part of Greece, outside of Kaldis's usual stomping grounds of Aegean islands and Athens. The Teacher loose end of the previous installment is not invoked here (at least not directly?) while a future case, perhaps on Crete is nicely teased while justice is exacted here without our police protagonists being any the wiser. How could it not be the case in Greece's version of the wild west?… (meer)

Kaldis finally runs up against (sort of) a villain that will get away from him. With this installment of the Kaldis mysteries we have a murder that needs solving on Mykonos--which of course brings us our friend Tassos Stamatos, chief of homicide investigations for the Cyclades. The mysterious Teacher weaves a web of murder and deceit over decadent Mykonos, alone in Greece in the middle of the financial crisis but feeling the pressures from the outside like never before. Kaldis and company can only get on the edges of the bigger threat in this one before settling for the smaller fish. This installment promises to bring forth a recurring challenge as Teacher's network of criminal activity continues to intrude into the purview and life of Greece's most honest, principled, and relentless cop.… (meer)