The Mamur Zapt and the Night of the Dog

If there were leaflets there was organisation. And if there was organisation there was money. And if there was organisation and money, then there was design and planning. The incidents were not spontaneous. They were part of a pattern. He had hoped that the affair of the dog and the death of the Zikr were isolated instances, that with the death of those responsible the matter could end there.
It looked as if it was only the beginning.

This book is set in the Edwardian era, and its hero, Captain Owen, is the Mamur Zapt, the head of the Cairo secret police. Nominally he works for the Egyptian ruler, the Khedive, but in reality he reports to the British authorities who are actually running Egypt. The inhabitants of Cairo are a mixture of show more nationalities and religions, and the Mamur Zapt is tasked with keeping relations between the different communities from bubbling over. When a dead dog is dumped in a tomb in the Coptic cemetary, it is up to the Mamur Zapt to keep a lid on the conflict between the Moslems and Copts, since it could disrupt some delicate political negotiations that are under way.

I've read a couple of the other Mamur Zapt books before, and the Edwardian setting and political angle to the Mamur Zapt's work add interest to these enjoyable police procedurals. show less

Requirements to love the books in this series: you got to love historical mysteries and be amused by murky politics. The books are short, so you must also enjoy reading slowly. It is not like action flicks you can read in half an hour: you got to pay attention. Here is the context of this mystery series. No country has politics as hard to understand as,Egypt between 1900 and 1914. The Khedive was an Egyptian Vice-Roy, entirely dependent of the British occupant while the country was still officially under nominal Turkish control. The British were there of course to control Suez. The French retained a large influence, since Napoleon time, principally in legal matters. Every politician was trying to take advantage of the conflicts between show more Copts (Egyptian Christians) and Muslims. But what dominates the times is corruption at every level of society. The author, Michael Pearce is extremely at ease with all this complexity and plays it by discrete touches: it is a delight to read. The hero is the chief of police for political matters and he is Welsh, honest, and very smart. What is astonishing is that you read this as the memoirs of an insider of the time. We go from a dead dog to the nomination of a Copt minister following very thin political threads. If you are willing, this is a real delight. show less