Praise for The Wandering Ghost
“A winner . . . Altogether engaging.”
—The Washington Post Book World
“Vivid . . . Limón’s crisp prose evokes a world that is at once exotic, dangerous and forlorn.”
—The Seattle Times
“Martin Limón does what the best storytellers do: take you away to a brand new world. The Wandering Ghost is that world, a fully engrossing story that pins you to your seat until the last page is turned.”
—Michael Connelly
“Easily the best military mysteries in print today.”
—Lee Child
“Setting the standard for military crime fiction, Limón’s compelling stories of murder, greed, and abuse of power are set off by the Korean culture and the 1970s atmosphere.”
—Library Journal, Starred Review
“Martin Limón has crafted some of the finest military mysteries on offer, and The Wandering Ghost will only enhance his reputation.”
—BookPage
“Combines a vivid recreation of recent history with admirable local color.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A fine military mystery.”
—Publishers Weekly
"Throughout this critically acclaimed series, Limón has displayed a remarkable talent for weaving his background knowledge of the country into his plots."
—Booklist
The main attractions in this fifth of a series are the investigators, lawyerly George Sueno and impulsive Ernie Bascom. They are both plucky and good-humored, and they tiptoe around or cheerfully bulldoze army rules they consider silly.
—The Washington Post
The turbulent Korean peninsula provides the backdrop to this fine military mystery, the fifth (after 2005's The Door to Bitterness) to feature U.S. Army criminal investigation agents George Sueño and Ernie Bascom. A crack combat unit stationed near the strife-torn demilitarized zone proves strangely uncooperative when a military policewoman disappears. The missing soldier had made herself unpopular with her chain of command when she attempted to testify against two GIs who accidentally killed a Korean schoolgirl while speeding. As Sueño and Bascom dig past the obfuscation, they uncover an unsavory mix of black marketeering, sexual harassment, corruption, rape and murder, risking disgrace in their quest to find their fellow cop before it's too late. Limón, a veteran who spent 10 years stationed in the Republic of Korea, captures precisely the experience and atmosphere of the tension that exists between the American military and South Korean society, two vastly different worlds bound together only by realpolitik. (Nov.)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information
After the only female military police officer assigned to a U.S. base in the Korean DMZ disappears and another officer dies in what is ruled an accident, Eighth Army cops Ernie Bascom and George Sueño (The Door to Bitterness) are sent from army headquarters in Seoul to investigate. But someone tries to kill them, and the officers in charge of C Division are sabotaging all efforts to find the missing soldier. Setting the standard for military crime fiction, Limón's compelling stories of murder, greed, and abuse of power are set off by the Korean culture and the 1970s atmosphere. [See Prepub Mystery, LJ7/07; for another view of Korea, see the review of James Church's Hidden Moon, p. 112.-Ed.]
—Jo Ann Vicarel
The search for a missing MP uncovers other felonies and blows the lid off a cover-up. Army CID agents Ernie Bascom and George Sue-o are sent to South Korea's DMZ, 20 miles north of Seoul, to investigate the disappearance of Corporal Jill Matthewson, the first female MP ever assigned to the 2nd Division. It's 1973, but even during a 20-year-old ceasefire, this is still considered a combat zone. From the get-go, the sneering disrespect Sue-o and Bascom encounter from the entrenched military intensifies narrator Sue-o's resolve and Bascom's desire to bust heads. MP investigators have no clues after three weeks. But Sue-o and Bascom quickly learn that Jill had recently taken an apartment in Seoul, that she's involved in some way with Korean "business girls" and, according to her roommate Anne Korvachek, that she was disgusted with the crude come-ons she got from every man in sight. The recent suicide of Private Marvin Druwood, who had a crush on Jill, is of particular interest. Nosing around in the morgue, Sue-o discovers cement dust on the body of Druwood, who supposedly jumped to his death on a grassy obstacle field. As the duo follow in Jill's footsteps, more grim revelations ensue. Despite some repetition, Lim-n's fifth Bascom/Sue-o mystery (The Door to Bitterness, 2005, etc.) combines a vivid recreation of recent history with admirable local color.
