The night of the Skinwalkers

Skinwalker's Night is the seventh detective novel in a series by Tony Hillerman . Under the title Skinwalkers he published in 1986 in English , in German for the first time in 1988 at the Rowohlt Verlag .

context

The Night of the Skinwalkers is an ethnic crime thriller. The action takes place in the northeast of the US state of Arizona and the sparsely populated Navajo Nation Reservation there . Central figures and investigators are three police officers from the Navajo Tribal Police ( Police of the Navajo Nation Reservation).

In this novel, Tony Hillerman brings together the two investigators of his first six ethnic crime thrillers, Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee

people

Officer ( Officer ) Jim Chee (warrior name: "Deep Thinker"), a member of the Navajo (also: Dinee, "people"). He is stationed in the small settlement of Shiprock . He is also 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. He is waiting for someone to hire him to celebrate such a ritual chant.
Lieutenant ( Lieutenant ) Joe Leaphorn , his temporary boss, also a member of the Navajo, stioniert in Window Rock .
Captain ( captain ) Largo , head of the Navajo Tribal Police , stationed in the police department Shiprock.
Emma, wife of Joe Leaphorn. It shows symptoms of the onset of Alzheimer's disease .
Mary Landon, teacher and friend of Jim Chee
Janet Pete, lawyer
Irma Onesalt, social worker ("Welfare Woman") and first murder victim
Dugai Endocheeney, shepherd and second murder victim
Wilson Sam, road worker and third murder victim
Jay Kennedy, FBI officer
Dr. Bahe Yellowhorse, head of the Badwater clinic
Roosvelt Bistie is suspected of murdering Dugai Endocheeney.
A woman whose baby is anencephalic and dying.
A cat that Jim Chee ran into.

action

The criminal case

In contrast to the previous six detective novels in the series, Tony Hillerman dispenses with an introductory chapter in The Night of the Skinwalkers in which the crime, the perpetrator to be investigated, or the finding of the corpse is described.

Joe Leaphorn has three unsolved murders on the table. Victims are very different people and they were committed in three completely different ways. Since murders are extremely rare in the reservation, however, he suspects that they could somehow be connected - but there is no evidence of it. In this situation, the camper in which Jim Chee lives is shot at at night . And specifically on the spot behind which his sleeping place is. It is only by chance that the policeman escapes the attack. His supervisor, Joe Leaphorn, puts him on the three unsolved murders because they were committed in a very remote area and Chee seems to be safer there.

In the course of the investigation, there is a growing body of evidence that suggests that the murders and the attack on Chee are related. Some of this evidence points to magical practices related to traditional Navajo ideas about damaging spells.

Subplots

The love story between Jim Chee and Mary Landon, which begins in the novel The Wind of Evil , is included in two of the following novels. She went to Wisconsin to study and - contrary to an earlier promise - does not come back to visit during the semester break. After receiving a letter from her, Jim Chee assumes that the relationship will end. After a violent argument, however, Jim Chee and lawyer Janet Pete seem to be getting closer.

Emma, Joe Leaphorn's wife, is showing increasing symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. Joe Leaphorn is always concerned with that. Eventually he goes to a clinic with her to get a diagnosis .

Relation to other works

The mystery novels of Tony Hillerman build up to Indian culture. While the crime in the previous novels is usually carried out of the “white” culture into the Indian world, the basic construction in The Night of the Skinwalkers is based on the fact that on both sides, the investigator as well as the “bad guys”, the Actors are rooted in different depths and reflectively in the Indian culture and the ideas about sorcery that are based on it. This creates the opportunity and opportunity to commit the crimes, while the motive is ultimately purely economic.

expenditure

First edition in English : Skinwalkers . New York 1986. ISBN 0-06-015695-3
German-language editions: The Night of the Skinwalkers
- Rowohlt Publishing House . Reinbek near Hamburg 1988. ISBN 978-3-499-42846-3
- ibid, new edition 1997. ISBN 978-3-499-43270-5
- ibid, new edition 2003. ISBN 978-3-499-23571-9
- ibid, new edition 2017. ISBN 978-3-688-10148-1
- ibid, 2017. ISBN 978-3-688-10149-8 (electronic resource of all four previous editions).

Individual evidence

↑ Harper & Row , New York 1986. ISBN 0-06-015695-3
^ Reference in the catalog of the German National Library .
↑ He determined in the first three novels: 1. Wolf without a track , 2. Shots from the Stone Age , 3. The labyrinth of spirits .
↑ He determined in the following three novels: 4. Death of the moles , 5. The wind of evil , 6. The taboo of the dead spirits .
↑ Information according to the catalog of the German National Library .

[1] Harper & Row , New York 1986. ISBN 0-06-015695-3

[2] Reference in the catalog of the German National Library .

[3] He determined in the first three novels: 1. Wolf without a track , 2. Shots from the Stone Age , 3. The labyrinth of spirits .

[4] He determined in the following three novels: 4. Death of the moles , 5. The wind of evil , 6. The taboo of the dead spirits .

[5] Information according to the catalog of the German National Library .