Wife of the Gods by Kwei Quartey is both unique and engrossing. With the exotic setting of Ghana in West Africa, a young, beautiful women murdered, strong family passions, and a main character who is both clever and compassionate yet has issues of his own.

Inspector Darko Dawson is sent to a rural town to investigate the murder of a young medical student who perhaps ran afoul of the local fetish priest. He speaks the language of the district as he has family there, it is also the town from which his mother disappeared 20 years ago. Working at cross purposes the local police seem to be railroading a young man into confessing to the murder.

Contrasting the old ways of Africa with the emergence of the new and modern, this novel tells us a lot about Africa and it’s culture today, while still delivering a very good mystery story. ( )

This is a very attractive book. I like the cover design. I was interested in selecting this book from the Early Reviewers program because I thought it might be similar to the #1 Ladies' Detective Agency series. I look forward to reading it.

When I first saw mention of Kwei Quartey’s Wife of the Gods, I knew I had to read it. I can’t resist a crime fiction novel, especially one set in a country other than my own. I get to learn about another country and culture while at the same time settling in with the comfort of the familiar format of a mystery.

Kwei Quartey’s protagonist, Darko Dawson is the kind of detective I would want investigating my murder. He has a dogged determination and a strong sense of right and wrong—at least where others are concerned. Righteous is the word that comes to mind, but not in an arrogant or overbearing way. Darko is anything but perfect though. He has a weakness for marijuana and a bit of a temper which lands him in plenty of trouble.

The novel is set in the beautiful country of Ghana. Quartey paints a portrait of a complex society, one that straddles the old traditions and the new. In a community where witchcraft is feared and superstitions are commonplace, science is still trying to find a foothold. Detective Inspector Darko Dawson is a modern man. He trusts in science and facts to solve his cases. When he is assigned to Ketanu, a small out of the way community, to aid in the murder investigation of a volunteer AIDS worker, he comes face to face with the very superstitions he disdains.

The Chief Inspector of Ketanu has his eyes set on a particular young man as his suspect, but Darko isn’t convinced. He sets out on his own investigation, determined to solve the murder.

Darko’s mother disappeared after a visit to Ketanu over twenty years before while visiting her sister who lived in the town. Perhaps he can look into her disappearance while there as well. It’s a long shot after so many years, but he at least wants to give it a try.

I have seen this book compared to Alexander McCall Smith’s The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, and I have to disagree. Smith’s series is not much of a crime fiction series at all—and if you go into those books expecting a mystery, you may well be disappointed. With Quartey’s book, on the other hand, a mystery is exactly what you get. It’s also a bit darker in some respects, than Smith’s series.

There was so much I liked about this series, including the various interesting characters, the flashbacks into Darko’s past and the unfolding of the mystery of his mother’s disappearance as well as the murder of that young volunteer. There was a moment early on in the book when I thought one story thread might get lost in other, but fortunately that did not happen.

Another aspect that especially caught my attention was the health department and volunteers like the murdered woman who struggle to reach a population of people who are very entrenched in the old ways. The misinformation and superstitions surrounding AIDS is frightening. Add to that the issue of fetish priests and the practice of families marrying off their teenage daughters to them in hopes of turning around bad luck or getting rid of a curse. Quartey offers both sides of these issues to some extent, but it is clear which side Darko falls on.

Wife of the Gods is a promising start for a new series. There are many characters, including Armah, Darko’s inspiration and mentor, that I hope I can visit again. And I do hope I haven’t seen the last of Elizabeth Mensah. She’s an admirable and strong woman. Kwei Quartey is definitely an author to watch. ( )

Darko Dawson is a Detective Inspector living in Accra, the capital city of Ghana. Though he has the career that he has longed for as a child, a loving wife, and an adorable six-year-old son, Darko is still plagued by questions concerning his mother’s disappearance in her hometown of Ketanu, just over twenty years ago. Darko and his brother visited Ketanu once as children, yet after their mother’s tragic and mysterious disappearance neither of them has ever gone back. When Gladys Mensah, a young female medical student working to educate the local village women on contraception and AIDS, is murdered and left in a field in Ketanu, Darko must return not only to investigate the shocking crime but to finally face the past that he has been uneasily avoiding.

Darko is uniquely qualified to assist in the investigation since he is the only one on the force able to speak Ewe (pronounced eh-way), the language of his mother’s village. Reluctant to leave his wife and ailing son, Darko nevertheless packs up and relocates temporarily to Ketanu to reconnect with family he has met only once and to oversee the murder investigation. Gladys Mensah, the young medical student found strangled in the fields of Ketanu, had a strong relationship with the women of the community that she served, but as it turns out she was often at odd with the polygamous priests of village as well as the local tribal doctor-a man with whom Darko has troubling past associations.

Already, Wife of the Gods has been compared favorably to Alexander McCall Smith’s No. 1 Detective Agency series, and while I recently acquired a copy of the first book in that series, I have yet to read it, which made it easy for me to immerse myself in Wife of the Gods without having any distracting comparisons rattling around in my head. I have to say that this book definitely is able to stand on its own as a solid beginning to an intriguing mystery series. Darko Dawson (I keep wanting to call him Donnie Darko) is an interesting character- complex, flawed and not wholly likable- at least not so that you are completely comfortable with liking him. He definitely does some things that make you raise your eyebrows, and issues he needs to work on- anger management being chief among them. You wonder how he manages to keep his job. With a penchant for smoking marijuana that he scores from one of his police informants, and a violent and barely leashed temper, I sometimes questioned his ability to carry out his duties effectively, but at the same time I was drawn in by how much he took an interest in the lives of the people he encountered and his deep need to help the young man who has been, Darko believes, wrongfully accused of Gladys Mensah’s murder.

Supporting the detective story is the wonderful background of the city of Accra and Ketanu where we are able to vividly see the way the the old world customs conflict and struggle to survive the new. The traditional medicines and remedies are much different than the modern ones, and even the cause of basic diseases are not the same. Quartey is able to weave a lot of the details of the culture in with the narrative and I was very taken with reading about the different foods, vocabulary and opposing modern and traditional medical approaches. A fine balance is drawn between moving the story along and briefly introducing characters who will likely play key roles as the series develops- of course his family, but also with his mentor and his mostly estranged brother. I think one of the most fascinating things of all will see how Darko will handle the demons that are plaguing him and what choices he will make not only in his career but within his marriage.

Both mysteries, of Darko’s mother and Gladys Mensah, unfolded at a suspenseful pace and I alternately wanted to go back to whichever section I had last been reading to learn more about what was going on. I enjoyed trying to solve each of the mysteries and I definitely think that if you pay attention you will formulate an uneasy guess at “whodunnit” before it becomes obvious. It’ll be uneasy because, well…you just never know. I am not much of a series reader- they are just way too complicated for me in trying to determine the order, and waiting around for the new book to come out, etc. I am so glad that I was able to read the first of this series because I would love to check up on Darko and see how he gets along. ( )

Here’s a police murder mystery dressed in fresh African colors. We meet flawed but sympathetic Inspector Darko Dawson of the Ghanaian police in his first fictional outing. Darko is a loving husband and father who can let his temper get the upper hand.

He’s investigating the murder of a young medical student and local AIDs worker in the small Ghanaian village where his own mother disappeared years ago. The local cop thinks he has the case sewn up when he arrests a ne’er-do-well boy, although Darko is not so sure. Perhaps it was really the traditional healer or the victim’s boss at the health ministry? And does Darko’s long vanished mother fit into this mystery?

The plot delivers a solid mystery while exploring contemporary Ghanaian issues. The evolving status of women is a key theme. Darko is incensed when a man hits (one of) his wives but the local police officer won’t intervene because “a man can beat his wife if he wants”. At the same time, some women are taking new roles and demanding (and sometimes getting) more equal treatment. The murder victim’s unmarried aunt runs a business, uncowed by local ruffians who try crying witch to distract attention from their own misdeeds. There’s also an interesting subplot centering on the tension between traditional healing practices and western medicine. Quartey’s Ghana is not all pretty vistas and quaint folk customs. The old ways—both the colorful and the repressive—live cheek-to-jowl with new.

Quartey’s strong characters enmeshed in complex relationships remain vividly in mind. He gives us are real people with human motivations and emotions. All in all a satisfying read. I’ll look for future Darko mysteries. ( )