BODIES IN THE WATER - Book review

A.J. Aberford’s debut novel Bodies in the Water (2022) is very impressive and can stand up against many accomplished best-sellers such as Gerald Seymour and Ken Follett.

For me, he’s covering a lot of familiar ground, setting his story primarily in Malta, where I lived for almost two years.

Neatly structured, it has a prologue and epilogue which features two Nigerian youths, Abeao and Mobo. The tale begins when a body is found floating in the Grand Harbour of Valletta. Police inspector George Zammit is tasked with investigating the death – which is soon established to be murder.

Several scene changes take us to Libya where a certain people smuggler Abdullah Belkacem is intent on expanding his business, notably with links to Malta.

Another protagonist is Englishman Nick Walker who is working for a Sicilian company, the business being a front for money laundering. ‘By the time he began to suspect what he was really involved in, he also knew that walking away was no longer an option’ (p25).

George’s nemesis is Assistant Commissioner Gerald Camilleri, an influential unprincipled man who has little respect for Inspector Zammit.

Added to the mix are Marco Bonnici and his daughter Natasha, both involved with the Sicilian Family and not averse to law-breaking.

All of these different characters are linked. The threads draw together as we experience militia fighting in Libya, the treacherous illegal crossings of the Mediterranean, and the political blackmailing by powerful people in both Italy and Malta.

Aberford has clearly done his research, and this gives us an insight into the conditions in the different lands. There is humour, especially with George’s domestic existence, and also friendships are established. The book and characters cry out for another outing – which is all right, since there are now five Zammit books in the series!

Recommended. 

'Lives in suspension'

Illegal immigration across the Mediterranean has been an issue for a long time. Yesterday, I mentioned a pile of Traveller magazines I was browsing through prior to disposal.  In the May-June 2005 issue, there’s a photo-article by Matias Costa showing the plight of migrants entering Italy illegally by boat. Here are a few passages selected from the article:

Immigrants packed into a tiny vessel travel under cover of darkness…

Landed at Lampedusa before going to a reception centre in Palermo…

The sea crossing is so fraught that Italian newspapers have described the stretch of water between Africa and Sicily as a huge underwater graveyard.

Sound familiar? Ten years ago!

In the same piece, also:

George Alagiah, BBC News Presenter: ‘If water is a force of nature, then migration is a force of history. The challenge is not to try to stop it but how to manage it.’

Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General: ‘For millions of refugees and displaced people around the world, ‘home’ is a place they have fled from in fear of their lives, in a desperate attempt to find safety.’

Angelina Jolie, UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador: ‘Statistics tell only part of the story – behind the figures are families struggling to survive… all those lives in suspension for years and years.’

 

Brunson McKinley, Director of the International Organization for Migration: ‘Migration will be one of the major policy concerns of the twenty-first century.’

Then, the UN estimated there were more than 17 million asylum seekers and refugees worldwide. And that was before the appalling fighting and displacement in the Middle East and North Africa in the last few years, and the rise of the medieval so-called IS.

The writing was on the wall ten years ago.  And what has happened? It’s now much worse.

Until the continent of Africa is deemed safe from terror, the ‘great escape’ will continue.

Halloween-3 – become sacred dust

I got fed up waiting for a publisher to grab this book after it was out-of-print, despite the good reviews, so have self-published it as a paperback and e-book under the new title Chill of the Shadow. (amendment: 27/10/2017)

 In this partial chapter excerpt from Death is Another Life, we meet Maria’s antagonist – or will it be fellow protagonist? Unlikely, considering his behaviour. Still, vampires are known to mesmerize those they would seduce…

CHAPTER 2: An urgent hunger

A month ago

Zondadari never ceased to be filled with dread anticipation before the transformation.

            In the privacy of his secluded Maltese villa he stood on the stone balcony, dressed in black leather, his shoulders draped with a cloak of the same colour and material. Very theatrical, but appropriate. As the pains filled his chest and raked across his back, he hunched forward, his fingers grasping the stone hand-rail for support. Mediterranean fir-pine trees cast their deep velvet shadows onto the balcony, concealing most of the pale yellow moon. Shadows were his friend.
            Slowly the organic material of his clothing pressed against him, even into him, taking on the contours of his large muscular body. A straying wild bird flew over and shrilled and then darted away quickly, discouraged by the unholy smell that emanated from him during his change.
            One day, he feared, his heart wouldn’t hold out against the battering it took.
            Coherent thought shimmered. He started seeing double; then multiples of everything. Disoriented, he lowered himself down on one knee. It would be a few minutes more before he would be able to control the numerous images.
            Small gaping flesh-red mouths, with razor-sharp teeth, appeared on the surface of his body. Disproportionately large furry ears flicked out at all angles and black beady eyes glistened all over him, like a constellation of the devil.
            Five minutes of harrowing pain passed and already he was separating, literally coming apart. With an unpleasant sucking sound, dark shapes peeled off from the form that had been a man. But he was a man no longer.
            With a flick of thin yet deceptively strong leathery wings, the freed bats broke away from each other and landed on the balustrade.
            The shape-shifting was complete. His mind was the sum of these forty-six creatures. He could see through the eyes of a single animal or perceive separate images through all of them. They did his bidding – because they were him in every sense. Every sense.
            The hunger was upon him again.
            As one, the bats flew up into the night sky.

* * * *

His body aching in every bone, he straightened in the front pew and rubbed his strained eyes. Recovery from each transformation was the same: excruciating.
            He remembered his pains with a shiver; then gulped the revitalizing warm blood from the church’s golden chalice and licked red dribbles from fleshy lips.
            Ever so slowly, the draught would do its arcane work and heal the agonizing ache and give him new life. Not for the first time, Zondadari cursed Theresa. Still, there were compensations: and blood-lusting Desiree was just one of many.
            He turned in the high-backed wooden seat to eye Father Pont, sprawled lifeless at the base of the choir stalls. The fool’s vacant eyes reflected no beatitude at abruptly and prematurely meeting his Maker and perhaps because of this they stared at him accusingly. And with good reason. The poor man’s heart must have stopped for a fleeting second as he saw a cloud of bats swoop down from the belfry. Father Pont’s eyes were almost extended on stalks as he viewed the creatures in front of him clustering together, as if purposefully forming into a seemingly pain-racked leather-clad man. Suffused with agonizing pain, the man glared and then smiled, grabbing the nearest piece of silver to hand. The priest stayed rooted to the stone flags, an easy target. No wonder his eyes stared accusingly.
            Zondadari shrugged. Even after all these years, he wondered how he could have been taken in by such an empty religion. Of course, in those distant days, superstition reigned supreme.
            He stood and hung the plastic crucifix round his neck.
            In a moment he would drag the dead priest down to the catacombs to join his ancient brethren. With great will-power, Zondadari refrained from draining the blood from the priest; he would return for the rest later, a cool libation, after which the body would moulder and become sacred dust.
            Taking his time – of which he had plenty – he donned the dead priest’s round-brimmed hat. He paused to check his reflection in the shining silver ciborium, its rim smeared with blood and hair where he had clubbed the kappillan.
            He lifted his head, accentuating the line of his aquiline nose. His steely grey eyes shone mischievously. Quite the local vicar, he mused, but he still preferred to see himself in his ancient knight’s helmet.
            Licking the silver clean, he smiled. Today, he would have a little amusement.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN...!

This book is now out of print - until further notice...

NB – Kappillan is Maltese for parish-priest. I can recommend Nicholas Monsarrat’s The Kappillan of Malta.