Evil in the Land Without by Colin Cotterill

by Colin Cotterill

Detective John Jessel works on paedophile cases in Surrey, England. He's good at his job, but on the downhill slide as booze claims his body and his lonely life. His latest case is out of control. Postcards signed "The Paw" have taken credit for the murders of several children. But "The Paw" also knows too much about John and his family. There are threats, and he is forced to hide them while he follows every scarce clue. Dr. Shirley Heigh is a Karen intern returning from the USA to work on the Burmese border. But her intentions are not wholly ethical. There is a great wrong that she intends to right. The evil that haunts her is the same evil that haunts John's present. An evil that began in the Karen homeland of Kawthoolei and spread through Africa before homing in on the Jessel family. Heading in the same direction, hunting and being hunted by the same prey, it's only a matter of time before the paths of Dr. Shirley and John Jessel cross. Together they solve parts of the puzzle, but they are up against a foe who orchestrates their every move. To that foe, it's a game he can win whenever he pleases.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Asia

Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Colin Cotterill was born in London and trained as a teacher and set off on a world tour that didn't ever come to an end. He worked as a Physical Education instructor in Israel, a primary school teacher in Australia, a counselor for educationally handicapped adults in the US, and a university lecturer in Japan. But the greater part of his latter years has been spent in Southeast Asia. Colin has taught and trained teachers in Thailand and on the Burmese border. He spent several years in Laos, initially with UNESCO and wrote and produced a forty-programme language teaching series; English By Accident, for Thai national television.

Ten years ago, Colin became involved in child protection in the region and set up an NGO in Phuket which he ran for the first two years. After two more years of study in child abuse issues, and one more stint in Phuket, he moved on to ECPAT, an international organization combating child prostitution and pornography. He established their training program for caregivers.

All the while, Colin continued with his two other passions; cartooning and writing. He contributed regular columns for the Bangkok Post but had little time to write. It wasn't until his work with trafficked children that he found himself sufficiently stimulated to put together his first novel, The Night Bastard (Suk's Editions. 2000).

The reaction to that first attempt was so positive that Colin decided to take time off and write full-time. Since October 2001 he has written nine more novels. Two of these are child-protection based: Evil in the Land Without (Asia Books December 03), and Pool and Its Role in Asian Communism (Asia Books, Dec 05). These were followed by The Coroner’s Lunch (Soho Press. Dec 04), Thirty Three Teeth (Aug 05), Disco for the Departed (Aug 06), Anarchy and Old Dogs (Aug 07), and Curse of the Pogo Stick (Aug 08), The Merry Misogynist (Aug 09), Love Songs from a Shallow Grave (Aug 10) these last seven are set in Laos in the 1970’s.

On June 15, 2009 Colin Cotterill received the Crime Writers' Association Dagger in the Library award for being "the author of crime fiction whose work is currently giving the greatest enjoyment to library users".

When the Lao books gained in popularity, Cotterill set up a project to send books to Lao children and sponsor trainee teachers. The Books for Laos programme elicits support from fans of the books and is administered purely on a voluntary basis.

Since 1990, Colin has been a regular cartoonist for national publications. A Thai language translation of his cartoon scrapbook, Ethel and Joan Go to Phuket (Matichon May 04) and weekly social cartoons in the Nation newspaper, set him back onto the cartoon trail in 2004. On 4 April 2004, an illustrated bilingual column ‘cycle logical’ was launched in Matichon’s popular weekly news magazine. These have been published in book form.

Colin is married and lives in a fishing community on the Gulf of Siam with his wife, Kyoko, and ever-expanding pack of very annoying dogs.

Reviews

[Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exciting Asian drama through an Englishman's eyes.

Travel from England to Africa then on to Asia. In Burma we learn of the deadly struggles that split rival groups.

John Jessel is an English Child Protection Unit detective working on pedophile cases in Surrey. Postcards signed 'The Paw' have taken credit for the murders of several children. But The Paw also seems to know too much about John and his family. The Paw was based in Burma where John's father died many years ago.

This is not a story for the faint-hearted. (Colin Cotterill's Dr. Siri series are much more family friendly.) There are many gruesome deaths of young children by monsters who look almost human.

I found this story to literally be a page-turner. I settled down to read it at lunch time and finished it just after dinner.

Enjoy!

[Glen · Rating 2 out of 5]

A policeman who busts pedophiles gets on the trail of a killer who brands his victims. This takes him to Thailand. Meanwhile, A doctor doing work at the Burmese border is also in pursuit of the mysterious villain. Of course, it's a trap.

It's potboiler that never quite reaches 212 degrees.

[Gary E · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is about a very disturbing subject; but it is so well written that I got over it enough to enjoy the story. I really enjoy this authors work and this book lived up to his usually standards. It is essentially a detective story about a detective on the pedophile squad who ends up traveling from the UK to Africa back to the UK then to Southeast Asia and back again to solve a case. It is disturbing but very intriguing that keeps you turning the pages to see what happens next. If you like modern detective stories and or stories about Southeast Asia I suspect you will thoroughly enjoy this book!

[Jackie · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first foray into the darker land of the thriller from the author of the more lighthearted Dr Siri series. Partly set in London and part set in the Far East, our detective finds himself and his family a target of violent retribution during an investigation into child abuse. A good read.

[Mackay · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I adore Cotterill's Dr. Siri books, and look forward to his Jimm Juree books, this one left me a bit cold. It felt like earlier writing, before he'd hit his stride. It had an all-seeing, all-knowing villain. Its plot seemed thick with coincidence and not particularly credible happenstances. I didn't care for many of the characters, and then - o! happy ending.

Dr. Siri is a lot more fun, better written, and interesting.

[Karl Kraus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a "whodunit" -- we find out who rather early on -- but more a "why is he doing it, and how much will he get away with" kind of detective novel. Vividly portrayed characters and highly entertaining, just as one would expect from Cotterill. Not quite perfect, but then, show me a novel in this genre that doesn't have the odd coincidence or race-against-time-to-happy-ending. My one nitpick of consequence is that the villain doesn't quite ring true. The sadism and sadism-as-love, okay, Lord knows those aren't unheard of. But the way he crumples into putty at the end and is judged insane in the sense of avoiding legal punishment? Come on. (I guess that counts as a spoiler.)

Anyway, it's kind of a mystery to me why Soho and Minotaur didn't pick this one up, or for that matter Cotterill's other non-series novels. Or maybe that's exactly why? But they didn't pick up the Jimm Juree prequel either, or the Jimm Juree "case files" collection originally published for Kindles. Oh well.

3 1/2 stars, curved upward on account of addictive readability.

[Dick Harding · Rating 5 out of 5]

I find child abuse a difficult subject. In spite of this anxiety I plowed forward and in the end was rewarded with a remarkable story of international scope and a redoubtable hero. A very good book.

[Theresa Lange · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was kinda hard to read especially at the beginning. Very intense. Turns out I liked it okay 👍

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a fan of Colin Cotterill's Dr. Siri Paiboun series and Jimm Juree series, but I was not crazy about this stand alone novel. The premise was interesting, but the narrative and dialogue were too naive for my taste.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit more saccharine than the Dr. Siri Paiboun series, but still, I'd pay to read Colin Cotterill's shopping list.