A very nice police procedural set in Kuala Lumpur…
I’m a fan of police procedurals, and also of mysteries set in interesting locations. So I was glad to receive an advance review copy of 21 Immortals, which is set in Kuala Lumpur (KL), Malaysia, and features Major Crimes Inspector Mislan Latif. And I liked this book a lot. When I’m reading a good procedural, I have fun imagining whether I could follow the clues and make the same deductions that the investigators do. And it’s also fun to enjoy, along with the investigators, those moments when things seem to fall into place, even if I didn’t figure it all out myself. This book let me do both. Without giving anything away, I especially liked the way that Inspector Mislan figured out where and how the initial murders took place – which was not an easy task.
I also liked the descriptions of KL, which gave me a sense of the city that I didn’t have before, having visited it only once in the past, for a few brief hours, on a business trip. Given the unusual (to me) locale, I was a bit taken aback by how similar the investigation process, and also the politics of the investigation, were to what I could imagine taking place in my home country, the US. So, I actually googled the author, Rozlan Mohd Noor, to see whether he should, in fact, know what he’s talking about. What I found is that he is an ex- police officer in the Malaysian police force, who worked as an Investigation Officer for 11 years. So I guess he really is writing what he knows!
Please note that I tend to be pretty conservative in awarding stars, only giving five stars to maybe one in thirty or forty books. So four stars is a great rating from me and means I really recommend a book. I’ve noticed that there are a few more titles in this series available in paper format, so I hope more will be made available as e-books soon! And my thanks again to the publisher, Arcade Crimewise, and to Edelweiss, for the review copy.
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