The Second Death of Goodluck Tinubu

March 30, 2009
In Stanley's fine second mystery to feature Botswana police detective David Bengu (after 2008's A Carrion Death
), Bengu, an overweight gourmet aptly nicknamed Kubu (Setswana for hippopotamus), investigates the murders of two male guests at an isolated bush camp. One victim was a black South African tourist; the other, according to his fingerprints, was Goodluck Tinubu, supposedly killed 29 years earlier in the Rhodesian civil war. A third camp guest, who's disappeared, becomes the prime suspect. While the local police want to blame the country's lucrative drug trade for the murders, Bengu believes the key lies in Goodluck's background, though many people, including Bengu's father, knew Goodluck as a thoughtful, devoted teacher. The story runs on a little too long, as though Stanley, the South African writing team of Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip, couldn't bear to leave this evocative setting. Readers will feel the same way.