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In Turkey - Türkiye'de
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In Turkey - Türkiye'de
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First-Time Fiction-Writer Delivers
First-time author Jeanne Reeder's heroine is a forensic psychologist (and part time CIA operative) named Charly. As her name suggests, Charly is a thoroughly modern Western woman -- equipped mentally and physically to meet whatever life offers up, and then some. Raised in Alaska by a frontiersman-like father who taught survival as a matter of course, Charly learned to run, jump and shoot like a green beret at an early age. And it's a good thing too, because climactic events of this novel demand every bit of her rough-and-ready background. As the novel opens, Charly (now an attractive, full-blooded widow-of-a-certain-age) and her elderly female companion, Frances, are revisiting Turkey to relive old times, enjoy new ones -- and incidentally, as at first seems, to deliver a package. Delivery of that package (with its secretly encoded map-coordinates between tracks of an ethnic-Kurdish music CD) ultimately involves Charly in intrigue and terrorism (and romance) -- in a hell-bent-for-leather story that starts fast and never lets up. Insofar as intrigue and terrorism are concerned, Ms. Reeder's story rings true -- seeming to jump off the pages of this week's mainstream Turkish newspapers. For, at this level, Complicated Favors (CF) is a tale of Turkey's continuing struggle against PKK terrorists -- which leads our heroine inevitably and relentlessly from balmy autumn venues in Western Turkey to the snowy wilds of the Out there in the hinterlands, Charly's physical and mental skills are tested to their limits -- and she is even called upon, as an equal member of a multi-cultural anti-terrorist combat team, to kill PKK terrorists. But while the author never leaves the reader in doubt about the PKK's vicious terrorist reality, she also lends a sympathetic ear to the tribulations of ordinary Kurdish-Turks -- and to their understandable desire to celebrate their heritage. CF is not all 'blood and guts' action, though. Ms. Reeder's deft inclusion of Turkey's naturally lusty Romantic Ambiance (as a third, intangible main character) is also notable. That inclusion makes CF a thoroughly sexy (though never prurient) novel too -- as it follows the developing romance between Charly and Hakan, her Turkish counterpart and mission-buddy. And, when American flesh meets Turkish flesh, well, let's just say that...sparks fly. In fact, we only had two criticisms (that caused us minor distraction) while we read this otherwise entirely enjoyable novel. Our first criticism arose from the book's uneven spelling/parsing of Turkish words and names. For example, we first encountered 'Oscalan' (for the PKK's terrorist-founder Abdullah Öçalan) early in the book. Later the spelling of his name changed to 'Ocalan' -- closer but also incorrect due to the missing Turkish alphabetic characters, which are nowadays available to Western publishing houses... And there was also the spelling-and-mixed-case confusion caused by 'Your Hakanim' instead of 'Your Hakanın' which turned a romantic moment into light comedy, for those who noticed it. And so on. The author can ameliorate (if not eliminate) this sort of distraction before publishing a sequel (CF2?), by simply lining up a part-time native-Turkish proof-reader to authenticate the Turkish-usage... Our second criticism arose from our (chauvinistic?) need to 'suspend belief' from time to time, as regards Charly's wide range of abilities/capabilities. We thought the author could have provided an illustrative background-story or two (from an earlier time of Charly's life) to show us how, for example, she became such an experienced soldier -- and how she could learn to speak (and understand) Turkish (even some Kurdish) in such a short time.
In the author's defense, she does tell us, in a number of passages, that Charly is a rifle-marksman (It's rooted in her Alaskan upbringing, you see). And she does say that Charly keeps herself in good physical condition -- and speaks some Arabic (as if that would be much help in speed-learning Turkish or Kurdish). But telling and saying weren't quite enough to convince us that Charly was up to trekking through winter snows in the Eastern Turkish mountains on a combat mission, speaking and understanding colloquial Turkish/Kurdish along the way, and killing seasoned bad guys... as 'easily' as she did. Still, a few well-placed background stories in CF2, would cure that distraction for us too, quite effectively. In any case though, we didn't stay distracted for long because CF was such a damned good story. And we especially liked the way Ms. Reeder was able to capture the feeling of romance, which is ever-present in the Turkish air, and to show us convincingly of its effect on Charly. So, we've only one remaining question, Ms. Reeder...
Who've you got in mind for the roles of Charly and Hakan Jolie and Pitt? Related: |
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