Cambodia,
An ancient Kingdom of Wonder. After the devastation of the Khmer Rouge regime,
hundreds of thousands of refugees – victims and Khmer Rouge soldiers – flee
into Thailand as the Vietnamese invade Cambodian in 1979. In the disorder of
one refugee camp, a killer targets young women. But with so much chaos in the
camps, nothing is done and no one seems to care. With many refugees expatriated
to France, the killer is among them, and continues to strike, in Paris and
across Europe. Three decades later, and two murders in Phnom Penh have the same
modus operandi as those previous deaths. Could it be the same killer? Can
Brigadier General Chamreun and Lieutenant Sophie Chang discover the murderer's
identity before they claim another victim?
Angkor Cloth Angkor Gold
(Murder Mystery)
By Steven W. Palmer
Saraswati Publishing Cambodia
ASIN # B07K6MF5YT
Price $5.99 (Kindle)
196 Pages
Rating 5-Stars
Cambodia, 2017: The Minister
calls in Brigadier General Hoen Chamreun, a young military man, and introduces
him to young police officer, Sopheak Chang. They are being assigned to a recent
murder case that may involve the killer of the Minister’s sister four decades
earlier. The killer is targeting young Khmer prostitutes, and the modus
operandi matches murders committed in Cambodia, Thailand refugee camps, France,
and Italy. The minister’s sister was not a prostitute, but also killed by the
same person. And he wants closure, and the murderer brought to justice.
This was an interesting case,
both a current homicide and a cold case investigation, and the investigators
dig into the background of the old murders, hoping to find some clue that will
tie the person to the current murders. Chamreun is an experienced soldier who
has made a name for himself and his unit, and now working with Sophie, a
Cambodian that was raised in America and trained as a homicide detective before
returning to Cambodia. Both are experienced and want to bring the case to a
close.
Readers are cautioned to pay
attention to the dates. I didn’t and was confused through half the story until
I decided to go back and look at the dates. The investigators bring in Sue
Chapman from Interpol, plus use a computer hacker to help uncover records not
easily obtainable, and correlate lists of names into a possible list of
suspects. The narrative has two main POVs, that of the murderer, and that of
Chamreun, but head hop a few times to Sophie and Sue Chapman. I’ve read
numerous murder stories set in Cambodia and Thailand, all set in the sex
industry, but this novel is more in-depth than mere sex. It goes deeper into
the criminal mind and why the killer is targeting prostitutes. The title gives us
a clue, but I won’t go into that. Too much detail could give the story away.
There is a nice twist at the end of the story. Highly recommended.
Tom Johnson
Author of THE MAN IN THE BLACK FEDORA
