Synopses & Reviews
“Kemal Kayankaya is the ultimate outsider among hard-boiled private eyes.”
—Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review
To rescue a kidnapped prostitute, Kemal Kayankaya must face some of Germany’s most depraved and dangerous criminals. Fortunately, some of them are his friends...
Love is never easy—especially when your girlfriend is an illegal Thai prostitute who has been kidnapped (again) by a gang of sex traffickers. Fortunately for the hapless fiancé, wisecracking gumshoe Kemal Kayankaya is on the case. The son of a Turkish garbage collector, he knows a thing or two about living in the ethnic fringes of the ugliest German city of them all: Frankfurt.
Kayankaya plunges into the city’s underbelly, where the police don’t care if you live or die, and the powerful view an illegal alien as just another paycheck. One Man, One Murder populates its pages with unforgettable characters, whip-smart dialogue, and a connoisseur’s collection of grim details. But it is Arjouni’s dead-on description of contemporary Europe’s racial politics, vacuous nationalism, and so- cial injustice that make his novels rise above the rest.
Synopsis
"Kemal Kayankaya is the ultimate outsider among hard-boiled private eyes."
--Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review OVER 1 MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE
To rescue a kidnapped prostitute, Kemal Kayankaya must face some of Germany's most depraved and dangerous criminals. Fortunately, some of them are his friends...
Love is never easy--especially when your girlfriend is an illegal Thai prostitute who has been kidnapped (again) by a gang of sex traffickers. Fortunately for the hapless fiancé, wisecracking gumshoe Kemal Kayankaya is on the case. The son of a Turkish garbage collector, he knows a thing or two about living in the ethnic fringes of the ugliest German city of them all: Frankfurt.
Kayankaya plunges into the city's underbelly, where the police don't care if you live or die, and the powerful view an illegal alien as just another paycheck. One Man, One Murder populates its pages with unforgettable characters, whip-smart dialogue, and a connoisseur's collection of grim details. But it is Arjouni's dead-on description of contemporary Europe's racial politics, vacuous nationalism, and so- cial injustice that make his novels rise above the rest.
About the Author
JAKOB ARJOUNI was born in Frankfurt, Germany in 1964, the son of acclaimed German playwright Hans Gunter Michelson. He wrote numerous books, including the novels
Chez Max and
Magic Hoffmann, which was shortlisted for the IMPAC Award. But it is for his series of five mysteries featuring the Turkish immigrant detective Kemal Kayankaya for which he became best known. Bestsellers throughout Europe and the winner of the German Thriller Prize, they have also been turend into wildly popular movies in his home country. Arjouni died from pancreatic cancer at age forty-eight in January 2013.
Anselm Hollo is the author of more than thirty books, most recently the essay collection Caws & Causeries and Notes on the Possibilities and Attractions of Existence: New and Selected Poems 1965-2000, which received the San Francisco Poetry Center's Book Award for 2001. His translation of Pentii Saarikoski's Trilogy received the 2004 Harold Morton Landon Translation Award from the Academy of American Poets.