Black Sun Rising
Soon after an anarchist detonates a bomb in a Barcelona café, British private investigator Harry Lawton is hired to investigate a suspicious financial transaction made by one of the victims days before. Schooled, if rusty, in Spanish because of his Chilean/Mapuche heritage and experienced as a former police detective sergeant, war veteran, and fist fighter, Lawton seems ideally suited for the assignment. Complicating his work, however, are his sudden and unexpected seizures and disturbing recollections of brutalities he witnessed during the Boer War.
Black Sun Rising recalls Barcelona’s La Semana Tragica (The Tragic Week) that pitted anarchists, republicans, and socialists against the Spanish army in violent confrontations between July 26 and August 2, 1909. The novel also features principal players in the conflict: journalist Alejandro Lerroux, inspector Manuel Bravo Portillo, and anarchist/educator Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia.
Fictional storylines plant seeds of the Aryanism, eugenics, and racial stereotyping that will explode decades later in WWII and advancements in medical science that eventually make blood transfusions a standard part of surgical treatment.
This is the second novel by Carr, whose first, The Devils of Cardona, was a New York Times Editors’ Choice in 2016. The plot is weighty, as circuitous as the dingy and winding streets of the Raval section of Barcelona and overlaid by contrasting political philosophies; tantalizing as Lawton finds clues in the black sun runic symbols displayed by mesmerists and signs of the Templar Cross; and thoroughly but satisfyingly shocking. Este libro es también muy bueno.
