The taboo of the spirits of the dead

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The Taboo of the Dead Spirits is the sixth in a series of crime novels by Tony Hillerman . Under the title The Ghostway he appeared in 1984 in English , in German for the first time in 1987 in the Rowohlt Verlag .

context

The taboo of the spirits of the dead is an ethno-thriller. The location of the action is on the one hand, as in the previous novels , the northeast of the US state Arizona and there the sparsely populated Navajo Nation Reservation . On the other hand, it is determined in Los Angeles . The central figure and investigator is the officer of the Navajo Tribal Police ( police of the Navajo Nation Reservation) "Officer Jim Chee" (warrior name: "Deep Thinker"), a member of the Navajo (also: Dinee, "people"). In the two previous novels, Death of the Moles and The Wind of Evil , he worked in the Crownpoint and Tuba City police stations , now in the small settlement of Shiprock .

The novel The Taboo of the Spirits of the Dead is also based on the conflict that arises from the encounter between “white” and Indian cultures. The crime is carried out of the “white” culture into the Indian world - similar to the previous novels, although not without the participation of Navajos, who are then largely uprooted from their culture.

The conflict between “white” and Indian culture is dealt with in the novel on two levels: On the one hand, through detective work by Jim Chee, which deals with the crime that moves from the “white” culture and the big city of Los Angeles to rural Navajo Nation reservation is carried into it and leads to murders there . On the other hand, in the person of Jim Chee himself, who is personally faced with the decision whether he can continue to live as a Navajo or have to switch to the world of whites for the woman he loves.

people

  • Officer Jim Chee
  • Captain Largo, Jim Chee's supervisor, at Window Rock Regional Police Department
  • Sharkey, FBI officer
  • Shaw, Los Angeles cop
  • Wells, Los Angeles cop
  • Upchurch, FBI officer in Los Angeles who was mysteriously killed.
  • Mary Landon, teacher and friend of Jim Chee
  • Hosteen Joseph Joe, an important witness
  • Brothers Albert and Leroy Gorman, Navajos and involved in serial car theft and car pushing in Los Angeles
  • Hosteen Ashie Begay, uncle of Albert and Leroy
  • Margaret Billy Sosi, granddaughter of Hosteen Ashie Begay
  • Bentwomen, great-great-grandmother of Margaret Billy Sosi
  • Grayson, one of the FBI as part of a witness protection program hidden witness
  • McNair, boss of the car dealers
  • Beno, Navajo and car sash
  • Lerner, a contract killer
  • Vaggan, debt collector and hit man
  • Jay Leonhard, talk show master and one of his victims
  • Mr. Berger, lives in a retirement home in Los Angeles

action

The criminal case

Albert Gorman searches the Navajo Nation Reservation for his brother Leroy Gorman, who has disappeared from Los Angeles. You belong to a Navajo family who mostly relocated to Los Angeles long ago. He shows Hosteen Joseph Joe a photo with something written on the back. Shortly thereafter, Albert Gorman is caught by the hit man Lerner and involved in a shootout in which he shoots Lerner, but is also seriously wounded himself. When the police then investigate the brothers' uncle, Hosteen Ashie Begay, they only find Albert's body, which is buried according to traditional Navajo rules, but the court (Hogan) of Hosteen Ashie Begay abandoned. Hosteen Ashie Begay himself has disappeared. A hole has broken in the north wall of the house, all other entrances are locked. In this way a building is only left if a person has died in it. It is now a dead hogan. It can then no longer be used and must not be entered under any circumstances because the dead man's chindie is permanently in it, the embodiment of all bad and evil that the dead person leaves behind. In this situation Jim Chee first noticed differences and inconsistencies compared to the traditional rules to be observed in such a situation.

Jim Chee meets Margaret Billy Sosi, granddaughter of Hosteen Ashie Begay, when he visits the abandoned Hogan for the second time. She broke the taboo and entered the Hogan. She is in possession of the photo because Hosteen Ashie Begay mailed it to her with a warning letter before it disappeared. Margaret Billy Sosi escapes access by Jim Chee, who then follows her to Los Angeles. The contact with his colleagues there reveals to him the background that Albert and Leroy worked in a car slider ring. His boss, McNair, was charged through investigations by the Upchurch police officer . But Upchurch died of a heart attack while driving, so the entire charge is now based solely on the key witness Leroy Gorman. So McNair has a significant interest in making the key witness disappear. Jim Chee locates Margaret Billy Sosi's great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother, Bentwoman, in Los Angeles. Bentwoman gives him an interesting clue about the disappearance of the hostess Ashie Begay. Shortly thereafter, Jim Chee is seriously injured when he saves Margaret Billy Sosi from the hit man Vaggan. The policeman is in hospital in Los Angeles for a few days.

Back in the Navajo Nation Reservation, he goes to the dead-hogan of Hosteen Ashie Begay for the third time. In order to be able to follow the clue from Bentwoman, he has to enter the Toten-Hogan and break the associated taboo, but can thereby clarify the actual events surrounding the Toten-Hogan. When he goes to a meeting of his family with the key witness "Leroy Gorman", a meeting that serves to ritually cleanse Margaret Billy Sosi of contact with the chindie in the Toten-Hogan, there is a showdown between the representatives of McNair and Jim Chee.

Jim Chee's personal conflict

The love story between Jim Jee and Mary Landon, which begins in the novel The Wind of Evil , was no longer mentioned in the following novel, Death of the Moles . Here, in The Taboo of the Spirits of the Dead , the relationship is resumed. It does this by keeping Jim Chee thinking about their relationship. He reflects scenes from the past, experiences he had with Mary Landon. Mary Landon and Jim Chee don't meet face-to-face throughout the novel, just talking on the phone while he's in the Los Angeles hospital.

She told him that their relationship - if only with regard to their children - will only have a future if they both leave the Navajo Nation Reservation . He still has an offer to join the FBI, so he could do that. On the other hand, he would have to give up his life as a Navajo. Is there a compromise? He wanted to become Yaatalii , someone who masters the ritual chants that are used when a person no longer lives in harmony with himself and his environment and therefore falls ill. It is now very difficult to find another Yaatalii , many of the chants have already been lost. He has already given up on pursuing his goal and is determined to give in to Mary Landon's wishes. In addition, he entered the dead hogan of Hosteen Ashie Begay for his investigation, broke the associated taboo and thus already left the world of the Navajo. In this situation he receives a letter from Mary Landon. The novel closes with this letter. She writes that she doesn't want to force him to live like a white man, takes a break and goes to see her parents. Both want to rethink their relationship.

Relation to other works

The mystery novels of Tony Hillerman build up to Indian culture. With Das Tabu der Totengeister he continues the series that he began with five previous ethno crime novels. From the fourth of these novels, Jim Chee is the central figure and investigator. The sequel to the series is the crime novel The Night of the Skinwalkers ( Skinwalkers ).

expenditure

Remarks

  1. ↑ Wolf without a track , Shots from the Stone Age , The Labyrinth of Spirits , Death of the Moles , The Wind of Evil .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Harper & Row , New York 1984. ISBN 0-06-015396-2
  2. ^ Reference in the catalog of the German National Library .
  3. ↑ Information according to the catalog of the German National Library.