When the killer gets away with it

By S. Lee Manning

I discovered mysteries when I was at the University of Chicago, finishing an M.A. in English literature. Bored with literary novels and wondering why I thought I loved novels or thought I wanted to write one, I picked up an Agatha Christie mystery--and that was it. I loved reading novels again. I soon expanded to other mystery authors, then to suspense and thrillers, knowing that these weren't just what I wanted to read, but what I wanted to write.

I could even explain my fascination in literary terms to fellow students at UC. Mysteries and thrillers, like many great Shakespearean plays, portray a world that has descended into chaos that has to be returned to order. Example--Macbeth. He kills the kind old king, and Scotland is plunged into darkness, until Macbeth is killed and the proper world is restored. This is also the pattern I found reading mysteries.

Of course, what restoring order meant in Shakespeare's time and what it means in ours are two different things. Shakespeare believed in a natural, God-given order, where everyone had their place. In our world, restoring order means a reality where things are understandable, reasonably predictable, and where a certain level of fair play and respect for other people exists.

In our world, when a murder occurs, it indicates a loss of that reality. The detective, private or police or experienced knitter, arrives on the scene, to analyze the clues and find the murderer. The killer is uncovered and stopped. Justice prevails and order restored. There's a similar pattern in thrillers. The villain threatens to destroy the world, the hero or heroes prevent the evil, and the villain is stopped—killed or imprisoned.

Except when it doesn't happen. Because sometimes the killer gets away with it.

I'm not thinking of noir mysteries and thrillers, where the view of the world is bleak and pessimistic. In noir, chaos is the rule, not the exception. Killers often get away with it in noir, but then, it's not unexpected. The world of noir is depressing and dark, nothing is fair or just, and that bleak reality exists at the end of the story. Noir was never my cup of tea.

I've always liked thrillers, suspense novels, and mysteries when the good guys prevail and the bad guys don't. There is a satisfaction, a feeling of completion that I enjoy, and that I don't get from reading noir.

That doesn't mean that there isn't some darkness or some sadness at what has been lost.

It's what I usually have in my spy thrillers. The good guys win the day, and the bad guys are vanquished. But some of the good guys may have died. And even those who survive have suffered losses. But (hopefully) the reader still has that feeling of satisfaction and restoration; it's just bittersweet.

However, sometimes, even in those good-prevailing-over-evil-kind of books that I love, the killer doesn't wind up in jail or dead. Sometimes the killer gets away. And that upsets the world order. Or does it?

 Characters can kill with impunity and not disturb the world order—if they kill the right people for the right reason. Reacher in Lee Child's novels leaves a trail of bodies in every book, but the readers still finish with the feeling of all being right with the world. So whether the world remains in chaos or not when the book ends depends on who is doing the killing and why. And whether there actually is a world order to be restored before the killing takes place.

 In my last thriller, Bloody Soil, Lisette beheads a man in the beginning of the novel, poisons a man, tries to poison the protagonist, and shoots several people. Yet, at the end, she walks away. And, everyone is pleased that she gets away with it. She's a sympathetic character who witnessed her father's murder, and the people she kills are neo-Nazis who've killed others and plan to overthrow the German government. Moreover, the order of the world was already disrupted. Her killings, rather than creating disorder, restored the world that should exist.

 My latest thriller, Deadly Choice, also starts off with a murder. A doctor is held prisoner by Patricia in a chilling chapter where she describes her daughter and describes what she's going to do to the doctor. And then she kills him. The dead man is a good doctor with a wife and a son, and his murder leaves them bereft. Patricia has her sights on new targets, while being hunted by an investigator who hopes to catch her.

 The usual expectation would be that Patricia needs to be caught—for the restoration of order, even though she's a sympathetic character—her daughter died needlessly and she's acting out of grief. But as the story continues, the reader discovers that the good doctor sent Patricia's daughter home when she was bleeding from a miscarriage instead of providing the care that would have saved her life. And Patricia's other targets were complicit in her daughter's death.  

 So is the world of the novel in chaos because Patricia committed a murder, or was she acting against a reality where chaos existed? Would catching her restore order? Or further the disorder?   

 You'll have to read the book to find out.

 A retired attorney, S. Lee Manning is the award-winning author of the Kolya Petrov espionage series: Trojan Horse, Nerve Attack, and Bloody Soil. Her latest release, Deadly Choice, is a stand-alone (or maybe the first in a new series). She and her writer husband J.B. Manning have started a YouTube channel that they're calling A Killing Couple where they investigate intriguing people and places that have connections to books and writing. She and J.B. live in Vermont with their two talky cats, Xiao and Dmitri.

So, You Think You Know Kosher by S. Lee Manning

I write a series that features a rare kind of protagonist - a Russian Jewish immigrant who works for an American spy agency. Kolya Petrov may be Jewish, very smart, and a capable secret agent, but frankly, he's clueless when it comes to the extensive and sometimes confusing kosher rules followed by his fiancée’s orthodox family. In one of the early scenes of my soon to be released novel, Nerve Attack, he's digging through frozen kosher cookies in the freezer to find the vodka - and speculating about whether to use a glass for milk or plate for meat.

He's not the only one confused. Despite the recent portraits of orthodox or ultra-orthodox Jewish life on Netflix (by the way, the majority of Jews are either reform or secular), I'm betting that most non-Jews (and even some Jews) are equally clueless and wondering - what's this about milk glasses or meat plates?

 

So as a public service, I offer the following guide. Disclaimer: I am reform and don't keep kosher, although I have orthodox family, so I may get a few things wrong. Also, some things will be omitted because of space and time - there are literally volumes on kosher laws. And I will be offering side and sometimes snarky commentary, because - well, just because...

 

Permitted land animals: Most people know this. Kosher red meat only comes from mammals that chew the cud and have cloven hooves: cows, goats, and sheep are allowed. Almost any bird is allowed, except birds of prey.

 

Not allowed: Pigs (everyone knows this one), rabbits, snakes, frogs, snails, horses. (I'm okay with most of this. Bacon is tasty, but pigs are smart, affectionate animals - and I don't like to eat animals that respond to their names. Rabbits, not as smart, but cute. Horses, not that smart either, but I'm not eating Black Beauty. Snakes and frogs - yuck. Snails sound pretty nasty, until you have them as escargot in a French restaurant and then yum.)

 

Any meat, even from a permitted animal, must be prepared in a kosher manner from slaughter to table. I'm not going into the rules about kosher slaughter - because I don't want to. Once the meat is at the butcher shop, all the blood must be eliminated - by soaking in water multiple times. That’s why you will never get a rare steak at a kosher restaurant.

 

Permitted fish: Fins and scales required. Salmon, trout, flounder, cod, etc.

 

Not allowed: Dolphins, whales (See above on not eating smart animals.) Alligators, turtles. (Don't want to eat either.) Oysters, shrimp, lobster, clam, crabs. (I love shellfish - one reason I don't keep kosher. Other reasons are too complex for this blog. Another time.)

 

Alcohol: If made from sugar or grains and has no contact with any possible non-kosher ingredient (will get to that in a minute), most alcohol is fine. Whiskey, vodka (Kolya's favorite), gin, except during Passover when grains aren't allowed. Anything made from grapes or having any grape ingredients has to be kosher. How do you make wine kosher? Observant Jews must watch or personally handle the process from crushing the grapes to bottling the wine.

 

Milk and meat: Eating them together is forbidden. No cheeseburgers. No ice cream after a chicken dinner. No cheese on meat spaghetti sauce. Six hours must pass between eating meat and eating milk. Not as much time the other way unless you eat hard cheese. Cakes and pastries are dairy - or pareve - which can be eaten with either dairy or meat because pareve foods contain neither. Dairy tends to taste better. Just saying. But wait six hours to eat it after a hamburger.

 

Dishes: Observant Jews have four sets of dishes and four sets of silverware, four sets of pots and pans, because you can't eat meat from a plate that's had dairy or vice versa. Some strict orthodox have separate sets of glasses for milk and meat. It doesn't matter if you run dishes through the dishwasher in between. The spiritual aura of milk or meat clings to the plates. Don't ask. So, you do ask, why four sets? Because of Passover. (Below.)

 

Passover: The eight-day holiday in the spring when Jews remember the Exodus from Egypt. You probably know that bread is forbidden. So is cereal. In some communities, corn and beans, out. Crackers. Cake. Cookies. No. No. No. (Unless, made out of matzo meal and specifically kosher for Passover) Wine has to be kosher for Passover. So does Coke. So does EVERYTHING. Actually, if you keep kosher, you can't eat ANY foods that aren't specifically kosher for Passover.  You also scrub the house for any hint of breadcrumbs, store away the pots and pans and dishes from the rest of the year, and then bring out the stuff that's only used for Passover.

 

How do you know if something is kosher? For food to be kosher requires not only that kosher ingredients be used, but to ensure no cheating, the preparation of kosher food must be overseen by an orthodox rabbi. Packaged foods are marked to indicate whether they are kosher - with a K or a U inside an O. There are other symbols, including a Hebrew K - look them up. Foods that are pareve or dairy are marked, usually, and again pareve means that a food item can be eaten with meat or dairy. Fish are considered pareve. So are eggs. Don't ask.

 

Okay, so what have I left out? A lot. This was just meant as a rough guide. If you're interested in more in-depth knowledge, there are a lot of resources out there. Or contact me. I might not be able to answer your questions, but we can have a nice chat.

 

S. Lee Manning, a reformed attorney whose legal career spanned from Cravath, Swaine & Moore, a first tier New York law firm, to the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, to her own practice, now lives in Vermont and writes full time. In Nerve Attack, sequel to the award-winning Trojan Horse, former American intelligence operative Kolya Petrov, still struggling with the aftereffects of kidnapping and torture, is drawn back into the game when Dmitri, his childhood best friend, holds the key to stopping an attack by terrorists armed with a deadly nerve poison.

 

Nerve Attack is available for preorder on Amazon and through independent bookstores everywhere. The first chapter is available on her website. https://www.sleemanning.com

 

Perfect Villains by S. Lee Manning

 How do you create the perfect villain? I’m talking suspense and thrillers here, not real life, although   So what makes the perfect villain – at least in the world of international thrillers?

real life is full of villains, especially lately. Because it’s not enough to have a good protagonist or even a really good plot. You need a really good villain as well. It’s the Yin and Yang of the writing world – the balance of two opposing forces. The strong protagonist needs an equally strong villain for a truly compelling story.

I could write an essay on the topic. In fact, I tried to write an essay – and it was so boring I almost fell asleep typing. So, I decided to explore the topic in a new way – with an interview. Let me introduce Mihai Cuza. He’s Romanian, although educated in the United States, at University of Chicago, interested in classical music, likes birds and nature, enjoys horseback riding – and is the main villain of my debut novel Trojan Horse.

 

S. Lee: Say hello to everyone, Mihai.

M. Cuza: Hello. And I resent that description. I’m a patriot, not a villain.

S. Lee: Oh, come on. Do you want me to list all the villainous things you do? You impale people.

Mihai Cuza (sipping a cappuccino): Only when they deserve it. And I do it to make a statement – that Romania needs to be ruthless to become great, just as my ancestor, Vlad Tepes, had to be ruthless to protect Romania from Muslim invaders.

S. Lee: Yeah, but still, it’s not really acceptable behavior in the 21^st century.

M. Cuza: What is acceptable behavior? Is America having military bases in countries around the world acceptable? I want the United States out of Romania.

S. Lee: Yes, that’s an understandable position. But then there’s how you intend to get them out – by engineering nuclear power meltdowns. How many people are you going to kill?

M. Cuza (stirs his coffee): The point is not to kill people. The point is to demonstrate how unreliable nuclear power is – so that the candidate I want will be elected President. That people may die is regrettable, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made.

S. Lee: And bingo, you just labeled yourself a villain.

M. Cuza: The ends justify the means.

S. Lee: I don’t accept that.

M. Cuza: You might want to look into what American intelligence services do sometime.

S. Lee: Nevertheless. And anyway, your “ends” aren’t all that admirable either. The kind of Romania you want to build is unacceptable. You want to get rid of all the Jews and Romani in the country.

M. Cuza: I’d like to encourage them to emigrate. Peacefully. It’s not like there’s no place for them to go. And anyway, there’s not a lot of them who’d have to leave.

S. Lee: You mean – because the Nazis butchered most of them and their numbers have never come back.

M. Cuza (shrugging): I wasn’t alive then. I’m certainly not advocating gas chambers or mass shootings. But there’s nothing villainous about wanting a country for one’s own people. Trying to improve one’s country is an admirable goal.

S. Lee (restraining herself from hitting her head):  Not when you want to cleanse the country of minorities.

M. Cuza: We will agree to disagree. You wouldn’t happen to have a croissant, would you? It’s polite to offer food to guests.

S. Lee:  Um, sorry. And, as I recall, you starved your “guest.” Along with torturing him.

M. Cuza: That was his choice. And he would have done the same if our positions had been reversed.

S. Lee: Are you sure about that? I’m not.

M. Cuza: Then you’re naïve. That’s the thing about your book. You have this Russian Jew as the hero – when he’s not. When he kills people, too. But you write it from his point of view, and people get the impression that he’s better than I am. He’s not. I’m the hero, here.  I’m the one sacrificing for the cause. And I deserve to win. He doesn’t.

S. Lee: So I guess people will just have to read the book and decide for themselves if you’re the villain or the hero. Thank you, Mihai Cuza, for the interview, and please rinse out your coffee cup on the way out. 

 S. Lee Manning’s career as an attorney ranged from a top-tier New York law firm to working for the state of New Jersey to solo practice. Now a recovering attorney, she spends her days writing. In Trojan Horse, which debuts this month, Kolya Petrov, a Russian Jewish immigrant working for American intelligence is betrayed by his own agency in a devious plot to thwart possible terrorism by an anti-Semitic neo-Fascist Romanian. Manning, who is working on the second in the series, lives in Vermont with her husband and two cats. Trojan Horse is available through Encircle Publications https://encirclepub.com/product/trojanhorse/, on Amazon amzn.to/3fJdEDk, and through your local independent bookstore.