Agatha Christie Meets Out of Africa?

 Annamaria, Happy Annamaria

I am rejoicing because today my Africa series is free at last.  It had seemed to be thriving when the third in series launched back in 2018.  But, by the end of that last pre-Covid year, the series was in the doldrums, quickly found itself in limbo, which soon turned into purgatory.  After years there, it began to look as if it was headed to hell.  (The difference between Purgatory and Hell, of course, is only one of timing.  Purgatory is temporary. Hell, we all know, is permanent.). As of today, the series is back!

The original publisher of Strange Gods then used the words of the title of my blog today to describe the first book and the entire planned series.  Dame Agatha's name works if it reads as code for a murder mystery.  But are the Vera and Tolliver books like Out of Africa?  My answer is, "Sort of."  Here's why:

Those familiar with Isak Dinesen/Karen Blixen's famous book or the movie loosely based on her life will easily recall that from a business point of view, Karen's coffee farm had its ups and downs.  Certainly, like Karen's farm, my Vera and Tolliver books started off quite well, but ran into trouble. My fondest hope is that the series will now depart from Karen's Out of Africa story. Her farm was ultimately a failure.  I am doing everything I can to avoid such a fate.  And I have the distinct advantage of not having to rely on the weather, which did in Karen's coffee.  For Vera and Tolliver, I cry "Onward and upward!" Excelsior, as we say in Latin.

The strongest correlation between the Out of Africa and V&T is the time in history and the place where the stories are set.  Almost equally equivalent is the cast of characters.  Karen herself does not arrive until the 4th book, because in real life, Karen did not arrive in BEA until 1914.  But, many of the real people she is going meet when she gets there are already in the books, including the man she will marry within hours of arriving: Bror von Blixen-Finecke.  In fact, Bror is here in volume one, giving evidence in Justin Tolliver's first murder investigation.

The film does not stick slavishly to every fact of Karen's existence, but it does follow pretty closely the general emotional arc of her life in BEA.  And to the extent that she shows up in the V&T series, she stays very close to the character and actions of the real Karen (who was played by Meryl Street).

Sydney Pollack’s brilliant film's credits and opening are, to me, some of the most engaging and beautiful ever.   

Today V&T return with Book 1.  This is the first in reviving the series and getting all the back-list books available asap.

You can order Strange Gods here.  I hope you will.  And also review it.  As my blog brother Jeff Siger and others of our mates have stated here, your on-line reviews are enormously important to the success of any book.  

The plan is to release new editions of V&T#s 2 and 3 in quick succession.  A Death on the Lord's Day V&T#4 has been waiting in the wings since May of 2018! It's release this coming Spring/Summer is the prize I have had my eyes on all this while.