Why a Booktrail?
1990s: The first in the series of a unique and quirky private investigator in Thailand
Behind the Night Bazaar ( Jane Keeney #1)
What you need to know before your trail
Australian Jayne Keeney works as a PI in Bangkok. Needing a break from some tough cases and a life full of stress, she heads up to Chiang Mai to visit a good friend Didier.
They go to a gay bar in the city and the next morning there’s something in the newspaper about a brutal murder that happened in that exact bar last night! So, she throws herself into the investigation.
The Night Bazaar is just one of the clubs in the seedy belly of the city full of corrupt officials and dodgy guys who work and deal in these places.
One murder soon turns into a whole other kind of investigation into the sex trade and worse..
Travel Guide
Andrea Savage clearly knows and loves Thailand – she’s spent time working with the Red Cross in various areas of their work and so knows first hand the dangers and consequences of working in the sex industry.
The book shows the reality of this all too well – including sex tourism and pedophilia. Not to mention those making money from all of this and exploiting those who work there. Oh and there’s the police also benefitting from the trade too.
An unpleasant backdrop is however interesting for a story of this nature and such a secretive and enclosed world is fascinating especially when an expat PI is trying to investigate.
We felt as if we were learning alongside Jayne who may speak Thai and know a lot of Thai customs, but was obviously getting to know this part of the seedy underbelly which she hadn’t seen before.
The mix of crime fiction and the serious issues was an interesting way to learn just what is going on in this part of society. The locations are well away from the touristy sights and instead take us behind the sense of the neon lights, the flashy clubs and the glitter –
“A soi – one of the numbered streets that branched off Bangkok’s main roads”
“The jaded charm and polite anonymity of the Asian metropolis suited her, even the congestion on the roads worked in her favour – tailing someone was easy in a traffic jam.”
Where Next?
