Then enemy within - Mieke de Loof

--> In this book The enemy within by Mieke de Loof we meet again with the Jesuit/secret agent  Ignatz Ksaveri and Elisabeth in the period before World War one in Vienna. As in her other books, she has an elegant style, driving the story forward through the dialogs. The amount of research that goes into a historic crime novel is daunting. Vienna, its streets and quays, buildings and the flavor of the local lingo all comes to life within a realistically sketched historical frame. The hunger protests in 1911 against ‘predatory capitalism’ was violently squashed. Friends of the protagonists get killed. We get acquainted with the violent and non-violent scene of the anarchists. The killing of Franz Ferdinant and the beginning of WWI is announced. Emma Goldmann, alias E.G. Bradey, did read in Vienna during that period. The research into the traffic of weapons is impressive. Places she describes still exist. This historical crime novel became strangely contemporary with the Occupy movement and the Arab Spring... Serendipity. I enjoy how intelligently she weaves all the facts she researched into a fluid story one will want to finish in one sitting... Take your time and enjoy – Only available in Dutch for the time being.

Mieke de Loof is a philosopher, writer and sociologist. We're lucky: in total the Vienna Ignatz Ksaveri and Elisabeth series will consists of seven books

Cruel Beauty - Mieke De Loof

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MiekeDe Loof writes historical crime novels. The first one I read was ‘Duivels offer’ in 2004 situated in the Vienna of 1913. For this she was awarded the Hercule Poirot Prize. The latest novel Cruel Beauty plays in 1914 in Vienna's learned and moneyed circles filled with paintings, psychiatry, sacred texts and young girls and a predator on the prowl. It a sequel in a series which eventually will consist of seven books. The main characters Jesuit and spy Ignatz and his friend Elisabeth return. The city Vienna itself still is a marvelous backdrop creating atmosphere and giving a chance to inject a few historic or urbane facts into the story. In this book there is a serial killer on the loose. The murders are staged as paintings by Egon Schiele who is a minor yet very present character through which art and death become interwoven. I read the book in one day, intrigued and charmed. For a word nut it is also great to learn a new Dutch word ‘Altaardwaal’ the cloth surrounding the altar. Well, no I am not going to tell you  the story, just if you read Dutch: go get the book snuggle up on a cold night and you will have a great time. Mieke does great work.