James Church, Corpse in the Koryo

Corpse in the Koryo

James Church

Dunne, Oct 2006, $23.95

ISBN 0312352085

In North Korea, his superior Chief Inspector Pak assigns him to take a picture of the car when it drives by. Inspector O waits on the road when the black Mercedes arrives; he takes out the state issued camera, clicks, and nothing happens as the battery is dead with no replacement in sight. It did not matter anyway as the vehicle had no license plate as the driver honked the horn speeding past O.

O comes in knowing no tea awaits him since they lost the kettle. Joint Headquarters Captain Kim is obviously unhappy with the surveillance bungling, but is more outraged that O is not wearing a picture of either great Leader. Also in the room listening more than interrogating is Central Committee Deputy Director Kang. By the tone of the inquiry, O concludes these two alien outsiders are adversaries as they interrupt one another. He also realizes that the military and intelligence competition needs a fall guy though he is not sure why or how the Mercedes fits into his being the accused. Stoic, O seeks the truth while Pak suffers anxiety to the nth degree and the aliens continue to war over who bungled though O wonders what.

Inspector O is a terrific character who understands the State quite well as he knows someone must be held accountable for errors, but s**t rolls downhill to people like him not bigwigs like the two aliens who make the blunders. Still he tries to his job properly in a closed society that does not share his values. His actions, even with the not so subtle threats of enemy combatants, Kim and Kang make for a superb hard boiled police procedural in which North Korea is the star.

Harriet Klausner