Chasing the Dragon

By Mark Wightman https://www.markwightmanauthor.com/ @mark_wightman

Published by Hobeck Books https://www.hobeck.net @HobeckBooks

309 pages ISBN 9781915817174

Publication date 12 September 2023

Chasing the Dragon is the second novel in the Inspector Betancourt Mysteries series.

The first novel in the series Waking the Tiger was shortlisted for the CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger 2022, finalist for the Ngaio Marsh Awards Best First Novel award 2022, longlisted for the Bloody Scotland McIlvanney Prize for for Scottish Crime Book of the Year 2021 and shortlisted for the Scottish Crime Debut of the Year 2021.

I was sent an electronic copy in exchange for a fair review.  I would like to thank Rebecca at Hobeck Books and the Author for the invitation to participate in the Blog Tour.

The Cover

What a beautiful and clever cover. First thing that jumps out is a magnificent Chinese-style almost snake-like dragon, then you notice the junks at the waterfront. Then finally, at least as I took it all in, you realise that the rich red colour scheme is actually a poppy, which then leaves you in no doubt regarding the title.

From the blurb

A local fisherman finds the body of a missing American archaeologist.

Detective Inspector Betancourt of the Singapore Marine Police is first on the scene. Something doesn’t quite add up. He finds out that the archaeologist, Richard Fulbright, was close to deciphering the previously untranslatable script on a pre-colonial relic known as the Singapore Stone. This was no accidental drowning.

Is there more to this case than archaeological rivalries?

Betancourt also discovers that Fulbright had been having an affair. He is sure he is onto something bigger than just academic infighting.

A government opium factory draws criminal interest.

In his investigations into the death, Betancourt finds that his own life in danger, and now he has also put himself on the wrong side of British Military Intelligence, and he is unsure which set of opponents he fears the most…

My thoughts

For me a successful historical crime needs two key elements, an interesting or exotic location and momentous timing. Chasing the Dragon has both. The novel is set in Singapore, an island city state with a rich maritime history that has been a cultural melting pot for over two hundred years. Now one the most modern of modern cities, it was under British colonial rule until the 1960s and has totally transformed itself since independence. The story itself is set in 1940 a key moment in its history, some might say a key turning point.

My father did his National Service (in the news again recently) in the jungle of Malaya and spent time off in Singapore, so I was brought up on tales of visits to the Raffles Hotel and the fading colonial splendour on offer. It was only natural that I would be drawn to the place in a novel.

The story starts with a poor subsistence fisherman partaking of an activity we all do daily (though rarely mentioned in fiction) through a hole cut in the floor of his kelong (fishing platform) when he discovers a body wrapped up in a fishing net. He does the right thing, at the risk of creating trouble for himself, by calling the police and taking the body ashore. The timing of this coincides with the unloading of the prized but foul-smelling durian crop. When the body is uncovered, they realise it is a white man so something must be done. These simple tasks capture the time, the sights, sounds and smells of the Singapore dockside perfectly. We see the native poor, the coolies, rickshaw men, labourers and former sepoy, expendable labour, expendable lives. If it had been a Malay in the net the bare minimum would be done. At the other end of the scale the white colonial powers, for whom nothing is too much and some never enough. The structural and institutional racism of the time must have been shocking compared to modern enlightened thought.

Our police inspector, Max Betancourt, is conveniently or sometimes inconveniently somewhere between the two. Betancourt is Kristang in origin, a mixed-race Portuguese-Malay people, which places him with a foot in each camp, allowing him insider and outsider perspectives, though for some people he will never be enough of one or the other. Through his dealings with and treatment of the non-Europeans we see the kindness and humanity of the man. He is also able to rub shoulders with the elite of the colony as well the fly, dodgy characters on the racecourse.

There is one black cloud over Betancourt’s life, his missing wife. His wife disappeared without a trace after a car crash which killed her driver. Initially he thought a criminal gang was involved but having heard nothing he is no longer sure. He has searched for her and is conflicted, not wanting to the abandon the search prevents him from moving on with his life, something even his daughter believes her should. She can see the chemistry between him and police surgeon Evelyn, the potential love interest, and believes in carpe diem but Evelyn might have given up waiting. This relationship is one that bubbles through the storyline, and promises to bring more joy in future instalments.

The timing is perfect in demonstrating the over confidence and sheer arrogance of the powers of the time. The Second World War is in the ‘phoney’ war period, with Germany and Japan making territorial gains but the British are convinced that Singapore will be safe. They underestimate the ‘inferior’ Japanese military and believe the garrison too strong, but when the attack came, they held out for merely a week. In just a few paragraphs this palpable contempt is laid bare, with hard lessons to be learned in the future.

From the title and cover of the novel it is obvious that opium is going to play its part and I suspect for many readers what is revealed will come as something of a shock. Some will be aware of the opium wars but regard those as the distant past, but to think that as recently as 1940, opium consumption was controlled and taxed by authorities, much as alcohol or tobacco is now, is truly mind blowing. A shameful period of our past laid bare, warts and all, well researched and convincingly covered.

The story gradually builds up, with regular injections of action and intrigue, before danger packed conclusion which will have readers enthralled. Throughout the story there are incidents revealing glimpses of ordinary life there across the class and race spectrum which add to the fascination of the place so perfectly captured in the prose.  Betancourt may ride a motorcycle, but he is not a stereotypical action man, far from it, he does place himself in risky situations, but when there is a fight, he invariably comes off second best. He is lucky to have the lovely Evelyn to minister to his needs.   

The first book in the series Waking the Tiger received multiple prize nominations and I fully expect this one to follow suit and perhaps even go one better.

Chasing the Dragon is likely to be the most enlightening, engaging and entertaining historical crime thriller I’ll read all year.

Chasing the Dragon can be purchased direct from the publisher here

The author

Mark Wightman was born in Edinburgh before growing up in the Far East, first in Hong Kong and then in Singapore. He is fascinated by exploring the elements of history that lie at the margins, where the recorded facts have either faded or been hidden. After a successful career in media technology, Mark completed master’s degrees in Creative Writing at the Universities of Edinburgh and East Anglia, where he received a distinction for his debut novel Waking the Tiger. Mark was the winner of the Pitch Perfect event at the Bloody Scotland Crime Festival, also for Waking the Tiger, and was selected to be one of the seventeen UNESCO City of Literature Story Shop emerging writers at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. He lives in Scotland.

Source: Amazon profile

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