Rebecca Pawel

I read [a:Rebecca Pawel|8108|Rebecca Pawel|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg]'s all-too-brief series out of order as they became available to me. Talk about your odd couple; a detective who's a Franco fascist and his love interest, a much more liberal intellectual. Each brings insights to the crimes they solve, and their relationship deepens most satisfactorily. I have never bought a book from Soho Press that wasn't good, so the publisher alone should tell you show more something. The setting at the end of the Spanish Civil War and the beginning of World War II is also one of my favorite time periods, so I was primed to like these books from the beginning, and the writing is excellent also. Highly recommended. show less

As a Spaniard living in far away Alaska I took "The Watcher in the Pine" with a little bit of incredulity. I couldn't picture somebody from a different culture being able to portrait accurately the day to day life of a small town in the Picos de Europa. Moreover the time period is one of political unrest and strong division in the country.
Also, I lived for a number of years in Oviedo, the capital of one of the provinces divided by the Picos de Europa. So it was a pleasant surprise when I show more started to recognize pretty accurate portraits of local types. The bar tender, the priest, the guardias themselves, have an air of authenticity. Not only that, he landscape is true to the area. It was with a certain familiarity that I read the encounter of Tejada with the priest, who's fishing on the river. The time of day, the scenery, even the repetitive casting while talking, were something I have experienced myself, and that I only got exposed to once I started living in that area.
From the point of view of the story, the unraveling of the plot seems flawless and not over predictable, which is a problem that I find in many whodonnits.
If you like the stile of Donna Leon or Andrea Camilleri, you'll probably find "The Watcher in the Pine" interesting at the very least. show less

Excellent period piece. Not so good as a mystery but there is enough of one for the book to hang together. Well written, good characterization, moves along nicely. The ending does come as a surprise on multiple levels, which is good. Most unusual in that it has a Falangist POV character and manages to make him human and believable. Given the degree to which the world chattering classes are still all on the Republican side this many decades later, that is in and of itself a near miracle. One show more of the best portrayals of a conquered city I have read. show less

Word is that this is the last in the series of four books about a Spanish fascist policeman in the early post-Civil War period (the Spanish one that is) and his much more liberal wife. It's a pity if so, they are all excellent books. I do feel it was not quite up to the standard of the first three; however, meeting the protagonist's aristocratic family alone is worth the reading.