Total Recall

V.I. Warshawski #10

by Sara Paretsky

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A spectacular mystery—complex, fast-paced yet ruminative, and imbued with the grim awareness, shared by all intelligent hard-boiled novels, that the past always catches up with us . . . a thrilling and even moving mystery.”— The Washington Post Book World

V.I.’s journey begins with a national conference in downtown Chicago, where angry protesters are calling for the recovery of Holocaust assets. Replayed on the evening news is the scene of a slight man who has stood up at the conference to tell an astonishing story of a childhood shattered by the Holocaust — a story that has devastating consequences for V.I.’s cherished friend and mentor, Lotty Herschel.

Lotty was a girl of nine when she emigrated from Austria to England, one of a group of children wrenched from their parents and saved from the Nazi terror just before the war broke out. Now stunningly—impossibly—it appears that someone from that long-lost past may have returned.

With the help of a recovered-memory therapist, Paul Radbuka has recently learned his true identity. But is he who he claims to be? Or is he a cunning impostor who has usurped someone else’s history . . . a history Lotty has tried to forget for over fifty years?

As a frightened V.I. watches her friend unravel, she sets out to help in the only way she by investigating Radbuka’s past. Already working on a difficult case for a poor family cheated of their life insurance, she tries to balance Lotty’s needs with her client’s, only to find that both are spiraling into a whirlpool of international crime that stretches from Switzerland and Germany to Chicago’s South Side.

As the atrocities of the past reach out to engulf the living, V.I. struggles to decide whose memories of a terrible war she can trust, and moves closer to a chilling realization of the truth—a truth that almost destroys her oldest friend.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Mystery Thriller, Detective, Thriller, Audiobook

544 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published September 4, 2001

About the author

Sara Paretsky is a modern American author of detective fiction. Paretsky was raised in Kansas, and graduated from the state university with a degree in political science. She did community service work on the south side of Chicago in 1966 and returned in 1968 to work there. She ultimately completed a Ph.D. in history at the University of Chicago, entitled The Breakdown of Moral Philosophy in New England Before the Civil War, and finally earned an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. Married to a professor of physics at the University of Chicago, she has lived in Chicago since 1968.

The protagonist of all but two of Paretsky's novels is V.I. Warshawski, a female private investigator. Warshawski's eclectic personality defies easy categorization. She drinks Johnnie Walker Black Label, breaks into houses looking for clues, and can hold her own in a street fight, but also she pays attention to her clothes, sings opera along with the radio, and enjoys her sex life.

Paretsky is credited with transforming the role and image of women in the crime novel. The Winter 2007 issue of Clues: A Journal of Detection is devoted to her work.

Her two books that are non-Warshawski novels are : Ghost Country (1998) and Bleeding Kansas (2008).

Reviews

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book Review
3 out of 5 stars to Total Recall, the 10th book in the "VI Warshawski" mystery series, written in 2001 by Sara Paretsky. In this book, Paretsky tackles a prominent social issue surrounding the impact of the Nazis and the Holocaust, the war in Afghanistan and the best way to help a friend through what may seem to be a simple problem (but never is!). I always enjoy her books as it's not just a mystery about made-up characters whom you really enjoy; it's also a commentary on what's wrong and right in the world and in history. And for that reason alone, this is a great book; however, I'm a little squeamish about the topic, as it is painful to read about. One of the better parts of this book is the exploration of Lotty's and VI's friendship. We've seen it thru 9 books at this point, but in this one, Paretsky breathes life into their past, and in particular, where Lotty comes form. And VI is determined to protect her friend and mentor. If I based my review alone on that component, it'd be a solid 4, but the plot unravels too much towards the end and I didn't feel satisfied with the outcome and the connections VI shares with everyone involved. Especially given it's the first time we really see / hear about her dating life. As a result, I knocked it down to a 3, but I'll still keep reading this series. There's no one like VI!

About Me
For those new to me or my reviews... here's the scoop: I read A LOT. I write A LOT. And now I blog A LOT. First the book review goes on Goodreads, and then I send it on over to my WordPress blog at https://thisismytruthnow.com, where you'll also find TV & Film reviews, the revealing and introspective 365 Daily Challenge and lots of blogging about places I've visited all over the world. And you can find all my social media profiles to get the details on the who/what/when/where and my pictures. Leave a comment and let me know what you think. Vote in the poll and ratings. Thanks for stopping by.

[Phrynne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always enjoy this series but this particular book was even better than usual. The author does have a formula for her stories which I am quite okay with, but in this one she breaks away from it and writes some of her chapters from a different POV, that of Vic's long term friend Lotty Herschel. Lotty has a very interesting back story as a Jewish child who was evacuated to England during the Holocaust and we learn lots about her and world events at that time.
The rest of the book ran true to form with murders aplenty and Vic dashing around everywhere trying to solve everyone's problems. I did like that she seemed in a better place in this book, a bit calmer and more in control. Some of the time anyway.
Definitely a very good book which kept me up way past my bed time.

[Larry Bassett · Rating 5 out of 5]

I I find myself in 2025 having determined to listen to the entire VI series in the audible format in the order in which they were published. This book is really the complete backstory of Lotty, the Doctor Who is one of the major characters in the book. It is, of course, a complicated story. And several murders are wound into the current day events that have a somewhat contrived connection to the backstory.
________________________
I find myself rereading some of the Paretsky series about VI Warshawski 10 years later. This time I am using the Audible version with the support of the e-book. As I read my previous review, I have some of the same thoughts and experiences from the second time around. My recollection of my previous reading is close to zilch. It is I guess, one of the benefits of age and the passage of years. At this moment, I think that I may have enjoyed the books, more on the first time around. But my recollection of enjoying the series in the past, in spite of my lack of recollection of any of the details of the novels was enough to cause me to line up a good number of the books in the audible format for my listening again. My recollection of the characters that are repeated in the series is a positive part of my reading and recollection.
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Sara Paretsky’s writing comes into the twenty-first century with Total Recall published in 2001. Her protagonist, V.I. Warshawski, is now forty years old. Is she getting too old for her usual rough and tumble existence as a private investigator? Murray, a regular character in the series, says, “You’re getting too old for these tall buildings, Warshawski.” At theend of the book it is Murray who leaves you wondering, Where is this going? Will she survive her usual one or two calamities per book to carry on without missing a beat? You will find out. I am pleased to be getting far enough along in the series to be moving into the current period of time.

One of the things I like about Paretsky is her inclusion of social issues that she weaves into her stories. The issue in Total Recall is the Holocaust Asset Recovery movement, an effort to obtain the financial assets of Jews who died in the Holocaust that have been withheld by financial institutions for many years. Basically, banks and insurance companies have been slow or unwilling to identify and release substantial monetary assets and pay claims to relatives of Jewish Holocaust victims. This was an issue in the news at the time this book was being written. We learn about the issue while it plays a major role in the development of the story.

This book also takes you into the controversy about recovered memories where people, often with help, recall events in their past that they have blocked out of their consciousness. People who doubt this science call them “created” memories and say that sometimes people remember things that never happened. In this book the debate comes up in the context of Holocaust survivors and those who may have suffered abuse when they were young at the hands of a caretaker.

And finally in the social issues parade, one of the characters is a writer who travels to Afghanistan to do research on the Taliban, another hot topic of that era.

In a preface to the book author Paretsky talks about her time as a Visiting Scholar in Oxford, England in 1997. She researched the events related to the Kindertransport in which young Jewish children were taken away from the threat of the Holocaust and raised in England, often never reunited with their parents who were killed in the war. Some of what appears in the book is based on what she learned in this research.

V.I. has come a long way since the days ten years ago when her office was in a decrepit building with a questionable elevator and problematic utilities. She shares an office with a woman architect in a neighborhood that is becoming (she fears) gentrified. She still lives at the same co-op building with her elderly downstairs neighbor with whom she shares two dogs. She may have a boyfriend who lasts more than a single book. Her usual detective work that pays her rent is insurance fraud. This would not make a very exciting P.I. series so these other cases come up in some ingenious ways often through friends who want a favor of some detective work.

V.I.’s politics continue left of center so she is almost always on the correct side of the social issues in my opinion. In my eyes she retains her status as a feminist, the main thing that attracted me to her in the first place. As always, the setting is Chicago and the Chicago Cubs play a regular small role as the representative of the down and outs. Warshawski doesn’t laugh much or have much of what I would call fun. She jogs and probably could leap a small building in a single bound if necessary. Mostly she just breaks into buildings looking for evidence about bad guys with her ever present picklocks.

I thought I was in a second rate mystery as I read chapter twenty. A couple of sad similes:

Next to me, Morrell slept, his breathe coming out in soft little snorts, like a horse clearing its nose.
…
All of last night’s tormented confessions churned in my head like clothes pounding in a washing machine.

These are not examples that show admirable writing or editing skills to be sure. Ms. Paretsky will have to do better if she wants to avoid being labeled a second rate writer. Maybe they were just examples of comic relief?

Warshawski climbs out of the washing machine and heads out with her picklocks and latex gloves to break into an office looking for incriminating documents. And then, guess what? We have our first dead body on page 155 when I was thinking that we would be limited to investigating “financial shenanigans” for the entire book. Maybe Total Recall will get better, like a salmon swimming upstream. (You may use that simile freely, Ms. P.)

V.I. operates with both guts and guile. The combination makes for some tense, exciting and interesting situations and interactions. She regularly gains entrance to secure locations with physical prowess and mental agility and her picklocks. Show V.I. a room full of dusty records and she will amazingly track down the information she is seeking. She also has her share of good luck! There is always the hall closet to duck into and the guard to buffalo. But now that she is over forty won’t she find it necessary more frequently to use cleverness rather than strength? Halfway through Total Recall and she hasn’t been beaten up, knocked unconscious or run fast to escape. She does, however, acknowledge that she does occasionally use “unorthodox methods.”

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. That is what I think about this book. You have to step back if you want to enjoy it to the max. Otherwise it is just another one of the V.I. Warshawski tales with a couple of B&Es committed by our hero who, as usual, also spends some time smoozing with the rich capitalists. She does have the mandatory near-death experience that slows her down for a few hours. Who’s forty? And each book she has to get her Smith & Wesson out of the safe in her house, just in case, and she generally has to use it at some point.

Things heat up near the end with fights and bodies aplenty. The book also has seriousness aplenty with a review of the life of Lottie, an overworked but big hearted doctor who is her best friend. Lottie’s story is a moving account that shows Paretsky can write serious and with some tender emotions, something I do not remember from past books.

This is another one of those half star books: better than a three but not quite a four. It took me a while to begin to really enjoy this book but I am glad that I didn’t stop reading. It left me looking forward to reading the next book in the series by not wrapping everything up nicely at the end. I’ll settle on four stars because I do like the incomplete present and uncertain future. When I was a kid, it got me to come back to the movie theater the next Saturday to see “the next thrilling episode.”

[Johnny · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love Chicago. I particularly love novels and movies set in Chicago (even when they are supposed to be Gotham City as opposed to Chicago—grin). If the novel happens to be a reasonably solid mystery or thriller set in Chicago and using real locations, I like it even more. So, don’t expect me to be objective about those mysteries which involve Victoria Iphigenia Warshawski. She lives near Lakeshore Drive and has a significant other in Evanston. Sometimes, she rides the same purple line express to the Belmont stop that I take into the Loop. She laments the dismal prospects for the Cubs as much as I do (“The Cubs had gone so far into free fall that they’d have to send the space shuttle to haul them back to the National League.” – pp. 120-121). I even learned something about recent Chicagoland history. At one point in the story, someone visits the “Children’s Museum in Wilmette.” (p. 264) I actually live in Wilmette and thought, “Hey! The Children’s Museum is in Glenview.” Then, I discovered that the museum actually began in Wilmette and recently relocated to its present location.

Total Recall, my latest experience in vicariously investigating Chicago-based mysteries with Warshawski, is not the novel upon which the successful science-fiction movie was based. It does, of course, have to do with memories. It has to do with the continuing debate over recovered memories versus planted memories. In Total Recall, part of the challenge is dealing with the idea of a person who discovers a Nazi (literally or figuratively, depending upon whether his memory has been recovered or planted) in his father’s closet. In a masterful way, Total Recall masterfully weaves together the story of those who experienced the Kindertransport and were spirited away from Germany before they could be sent to concentration/death camps, the concerns of defrauded African-Americans, the concerns of defrauded survivors of Holocaust victims, corporate greed, political aggrandizement, and a series of murders.

Of course, it helped my enjoyment that I found myself ahead of the very tired investigator from very early on in the novel. I suspect Sara Paretsky, the author of the series, intended this because the foreshadowing was subtle, but carefully strung together like a fine string of pearls. It also helped that there were multiple, but converging mysteries. For some, the solution would probably be considered a little too convenient, but I can see where the initial catalyst could have occurred. Naturally, I would have some skepticism to the full “avalanche” effect of that catalyst, but the interesting event would still have some repercussions and that enabled me to suspend my disbelief enough to become totally involved in the story and figure it out earlier than usual. There is also a lot of humor in this story, probably to offset some of the horrors cited in the Holocaust memories. Fortunately, neither the horror nor humor was overdone. The balance was delightful.

[Obsidian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was not able to get book #9 (still on hold) but snatched up book #10 when I saw it was available via Overdrive. So I am missing one whole book and some things are mentioned here and there that of course I assume get brought up in the last book.

"Total Recall" was interesting. We get two POVs in this one. VI and her friend and mother figure Lotty. I wish that we had gotten more of Lotty's POV in this one. It seems to come in random places here and there. And I have to say that I honestly wish that VI had knocked some sense into a few people.

VI now has an assistant in this one and is charging more money upfront in order to make ends meet. She's happily involved with a war correspondent who is getting ready to head to Afghanistan. She seems more settled in this one. And doesn't seem reluctant to share his living space like she did with past lovers.

When VI is asked to look into a case where an African American family (close to her old lover Conrad) claims that the insurance company is incorrect about them cashing a deceased's life insurance policy. This case doesn't seem that important, until it gets tied up into protesters demanding slave reparations by insurance companies that operated before and during the Civil War. To make matters more complicated, there are protesters demanding recovery of Holocaust assets from insurance companies too.

Paretsky someone does a good job juggling these two cases. You wonder how everything is tied together, and it takes til almost the very for all to be revealed.

At this point I can't tell how many times that VI has been knocked out. She has to have permanent brain damage though. Also I don't see how she is up fresh as a daisy everytime she gets into a brawl. I have bruises from hiking and could barely walk for a day afterwards and I am not 40 like she is at this point. That's another thing, VI's age changes in this one. In book #8 she turned 40. In this 10th book it's said she will be turning 40. I was a bit confused by that.

I do like how Paretsky gets into recovered memories though. It becomes really apparent that a man claiming to be a Holocaust survivor is unhinged. His therapist was a hot mess and I wanted her to get into trouble for revealing information about Lotty's longtime companion Max. It seemed very odd to me that no one was concerned that this guy changed his story every five minutes and was stalking Max and his family. We do get the Streeters in this one who take over bodyguard duties for Max and his family.

I have to say though I did enjoy Lott's POV, her behavior during VI's POV was out of hand. I called BS on her whole story and when we get to the end to figure out why Lotty has been acting the way she has I was kind of appalled. I wonder what this is going to do to her relationship with Max and her former lover that is part of their group now?

[Jenny Hilborne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Total Recall is set in Chicago and is quite a complex read. The story covers three separate plots that may or may not be connected. The main mystery is centered around an insurance scam, with protestors demanding the recovery of Holocaust assets. PI Warshawski soon finds herself in the middle of another issue concerning the identity of troubled holocaust victim looking for his family. For some unknown reason, this has a devastating affect on Warshawski's friend, Lotty Herschel. As Warshawski bounces between these two themes like a pinball (authors own term), it is difficult at times to remain focused on either plot.

The chapters with Lotty's personal interjections are a little jarring at first, although her story is one of the mystery threads the reader is following, so it is helpful to see things from her perspective. Lotty's chapters are also quite moving.

Not all the characters in this book are likable: Paul Radbuka's behavior is irrational and a little hard to stomach, and Lotty's treatment of her friends is questionable. The ending is also a little flat with unresolved issues for some of the characters. Totall Recall is a long book, with a lot of information for the reader to digest, however, the story is engrossing. The suspense starts with the discovery of the first murder and continues to build. Paretsky creates good tension between her characters, all of whom are flawed, and the secrets between them keep the reader turning the pages. Total Recall is a decent read.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

If Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum novels are the half hour prime-time comedies of women private investigators, then Paretsky's V.I. Warshawski novels are the 10:00pm slot hour-long dramas. These books aren't light, but wow are they mysteries worth sinking your teeth into.

The context of this mystery is a man with supposedly-recovered memories of surviving the Holocaust, his life at the hands of his abusive father, and a group of V.I.'s friends who are Jewish survivors of pre-war Eastern Europe as well. It's heavy at times, and V.I.'s world is often gritty and full of dark reality. But the mysteries are complex and well developed, as are the players in the story. The novel occasionally breaks off into details that don't seem particularly relevant to this novel, but are (I think) part of the ongoing development and storyline of the main character.

I'll be off to the library to catch up on the books I've missed later this week.

[aPriL does feral sometimes · Rating 3 out of 5]

The tenth V.I. Warshawski novel suffers from being a proto-literary/mystery, in my opinion. Some chapters struck me as very worthy of the designation 'literary', while others were solidly in Warshawski's typical voice and Chicago blue-collar world. Fortunately, it escapes the 'teaching moment' trap many long time writers fall into as they mature as people (some of James Michener's later novels, for instance), but just barely. The subject of damaged people still suffering from the psychic horrors caused by surviving the Holocaust is a worthy subject, but I think Parestsky cared so much about the history that she slipped too far outside of the mystery genre in crucial spots in her manuscript, and the not-quite-literary slips hurt the book. I think she also threw in so many elements to mystify readers that the story lost forward momentum, the story meandering in energy. I thought the end result was a a book missing the usual tension inherit in a Sara Paretsky product.

There is the double issue of insurance companies failing to pay WWII policy holders, primarily Jews, and the demand for compensatory payments to descendants of American slaves by insurance companies which benefited tremendously by slavery before the Civil War. This would not be a Warshawski novel without the usual self-serving politicians throwing gasoline on the issues, as well as the multiplying dead bodies and the doubting Thomases throwing scorn at V.I.'s investigation, but there is also a holocaust survivor, a stalker, who is a recovering memory psychiatric patient under treatment by hypnosis, who believes V.I.'s friends are related to him, a progressive meltdown by Lottie Herschel, a couple of insurance frauds depriving a family of burial benefits, and V.I.'s journalist boyfriend departing for Afghanistan.

Too much going on here.....

It is still good, but I think it could be skipped for those who read V.I. adventures primarily for a fun, yet interesting beach read. On the other hand, it does reveal Lottie Herschel's back story, so for those into series trivia, it's not to be missed.

[Jan C · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think I wanted to know more about the Lottie story than the insurance scam.

And Durham lives up to the image of a Chicago politician but not what is frequently the reality.

And Max lives in Evanston (my town).

Paretsky always gets Chicago right. She's been here long enough to do that.

It was good. I finished it after midnight.

Multiple plot lines.

An insurance company selling burial plots to poor Jews in Vienna in the '20s and '30s. And all those years later doing the same thing only to poor African-Americans on the south side of Chicago. And planning not to pay off either time. And the bodies start mounting. Throw in a Chicago politician - of course he wants his handout. Don't they always?

Then there is some guy whose name is (or he thinks it is) Paul Radbuka and Lottie goes into a hissie fit.

And, somehow, Paretsky makes the whole story come together. Doesn't she always?

[Anastasia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Total Recall by Sara Paretsky is the 10th book in the V.I. Warshawski Mystery series. Private Investigator V.I. Warshawski is hired to investigate a funeral insurance fraud as well as to look into a man claiming to be a Holocausr survivor. An interesting mystery where we learn about Lotty's past and explore the controversies regarding Holocaust Asset recovery and also with recovered memories. A few unanswered questions remaining in the end but otherwise V.I. is amazing as ever as she investigates the various mysteries.

[Kelly Hager · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this series to a ridiculous degree and the books that center around Lotty are probably among my most favorites.

[JBradford · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been a fan of the V.I. Warshawski series for a long time, and this may well be the best one yet, pitting Vic in an extraordinarily complicated plot involving two completely different subplots that turn out in the end to be not at all separated. I started off years ago not at all liking first-person narratives, but I have come to appreciate them more during the course of my life, and I think Paretsky does a great job of it. I am intrigued by the sparseness of the dialog; Paretsky can go for pages with no dialog at all, which seems remarkable.

I do not remember if Lotty Herschel was a character in any of the earlier Warshawski novels I have read (and I rather doubt that I have read them all), but she features prominently in this one-so prominently, in fact, that the action is periodically halted by a chapter (including the first chapter in the book, as well as the last) exposing us to Lotty's steam-of consciousness thinking, which is giving us more of the background history, telling us what really happened 50 years ago … which, of course, has direct bearing on what is happening today. The story begins when Vic Warshawski, now a middling-aged Chicago private detective, gets talked into a stint of babysitting, taking care of a precocious monster of a little 5-year-old girl, Calia, who is the granddaughter of a friend, who happens to be Lotty's current lover, while that friend is involved in a panel discussion about the issue of whether or not insurance companies should be paying off holocaust victims, of which the friend is one, and Lotty is another. Vic is supposed to drop Calia off at the end of that panel discussion, is delayed because two separate groups are picketing the building at which it is being held, with one of these groups being led by a Jewish leader insisting on reparation and the other group being led by a black city alderman who contends that this would be unfair to blacks who want reparation for slavery issues. The news item of the day, however, is the appearance at the panel discussion of a member of the audience who reports that he has only just recently discovered that he is Jewish and a holocaust victim, with his memory having been restored by a well-known therapist, and Vic's lover's editor decides that writing a book about this will bring him fame and fortune. Confused? Paretsky has more than two dozen characters in this novel, along with several other minor characters, and she introduces them about as fast as I have here.

Finished with that chore, Vic goes to meet a new client, a black blue-collar worker, who wants to hire her to look into a denial of insurance claim on his uncle, because the insurance company contends that they had already paid out the insurance claim ten years before the insuree died. This client is not able to pay much, and his disagreeable wife is vehemently opposed to the whole idea, in no uncertain terms, but Vic says she will see what she can do within her 5-hour minimum. She expects that to be a fairly easy task, since the director of claims at that insurance company happens to be an old lover of hers. The ex-lover, Ralph Devereux, has his own problems, however, as his company has just been bought out by a Swiss insurance company, and a home-company representative is hovering at his side, and the latter takes an extreme interest in the case, declining to let Vic look at the files. Vic then goes to visit the insurance agency which originally wrote the policy, finding the original salesman has been dead for many years and the firm is now being run by the son of the original owner, who also gets close-mouthed after looking at the file.

That's when things start happening. Before things get sorted out, a few people wind up dead, with Vic's client being blamed for at least one of those deaths, and the intricacy of the constantly turning plot gets more and more involved. I love a complicated plot, but this one actually had my head spinning, so that one point I had to stop reading and go do a sudoku puzzle just to clear my mind before going to bed!

******************************

08/01/2012 -- And here's proof that my youngest daughter was very wrong in telling me that Goodreads would be the answer to the problem of rereading books I had forgotten having read. That only works if one looks them up! I've just read the novel again, three years and a week later, and I had the feeling all the way through that I had read it before, but right up to the last page I did not know what was going to happen or who the bad guy was. In fact, I came here to post a new review and found this one sitting here from the past. If it's any consolation, I gave it four stars the second time, too!

The fourth star is just for extra appreciation, I guess--I’ve just come off from reading two novels (one a 757-page monster that should have been finished within 600 pages), both of which were excellent in their own right, but both of which had a meandering style with a lot of repetition, as well as the inclusion of blind-end trails that did not go anywhere, and Paretsky’s book is so professional that it cuts like a knife. I really like Paretsky’s style. There are a lot of lines of action in this novel, all winding around each other as one thing leads to another. There are several interesting peripheral characters, all drawn rather nicely, but the real prize is Victoria, herself, who is drawn so empathetically that I feel I am looking out of her eyes as I read the book.

[Judith Shadford · Rating 3 out of 5]

I might have read at least a short story of Paretsky's, but this is the first novel. She's really a big deal in the mystery writers community, so it's high time that I pay my dues. A. She's a good writer. There are a couple descriptive lines that are terrific, lovely, even. 2. The plot is a braiding (well, two strands) of one client--African American--who's been cheated out of paid funeral expenses by the insurer. She has to find out how and why. 2B, her friends in this case are Jewish--a female surgeon, ex-lover, current wish-he-was and grandfather, well, it's complicated. Lotty Herschel was part of the Kindertransport, getting many Jewish children out of Germany on the eve of the war. Her history is told through flashbacks. So binding the combined political forces who want reparations for slavery and reparations for Jewish savings accounts never paid to the remaining families is a guy who has maybe recovered his memories of abuse by a stepfather and is looking for his real family...it's complicated. But Paretsky does manage it. The tipping into cliche is VI Warshawski (Victoria Iphegenia), private detective, who drives around Chicago insanely, talking on her cell, not eating, trying to catch up on her work while running with her dogs. You get the idea--lots of racing around. Some violence involving Vic. Boyfriend who goes to Afghanistan on assignment. She misses him. He misses her.

But the Jewish story is compelling, more so than the African-American story, which is a shame, but there's only so much weight you can give a detective story.

[Mary JL · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the tenth in Paretsky's V. I. Warshawski series. As the review above note, it involves the Holocuast--and involves V. I.'s close freind and mentor, Dr. Lottie Herschel.

The story is up to Paretsky's usual high standards, as V. I. tries to discover the truth, based on memories of so long ago. But an extra addition to this novel, is that six chapters are told from Lottie Herschel's point of view. Normally, V. I. is always the narrator; the switch in point of view is unusal and well done. Lotties story begins after WWII, when she is a young woman studying in England).



At age 9, Lottie is being sent to England for safety. ...."my (Grandmother Radbuka) stretching her arms out to me,her beloved Martin's daughter, andI with my (Grandmother Herschel's) jealous eyes on me, giving her only a formal curtsey in farewell. I lay bed weeping, begging my granny to forgive me." (Both grandmothers were dead already in the Holocaust).


Since LOttie Herschel is usually a crisp, no nonsense character, this peek into her memories of the past is fascinating. I would recommend, however, that if you have never read the series, read one or two other books first. Knowing how Lottie is usally portrayed makes thes flashbacks even more powerful. Very higly recommended.

[Bob · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this to be a good one, V.I. Warshawski is asked to look into the case of missing insurance payout that interrupts the burial of her clients husband. It seems that the Ins. Co. claims that the payout occurred some years ago and refuses to investigate. Along with this is the memories of V.I.'s friend Lotty of her early days being shipped to England as a 9yr old to escape the Nazi's. When a young man appears to believe that people in Lotty's group of Jewish friends are his relatives after having been regressed hypnotically by a recoverd memory therapist and makes a pest of himself, V.I. gets involved as well. The two threads eventually mesh, but not before several murders have occurred.

[Cheryl (Collier) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never read a book by Sara Paretsky that I didn’t like. Of course some are liked more than others but this book which intertwines the present and the past around WW2 heldmy interest from page one. The twists and turns will keep people who have not read her other V.I.Warshaski books spinning. For V.I.’s followers we may be a bit more able to solve of the mysteries but the others are quirky enough to keep us guessing, too, and we learn more about the beloved friends who comprise V.I.’s family. Pack this one for that summer vacation.

[Art Marroquin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Slow going. Maybe my problem is that I know up front that the recovered memory movement is a fraud. I like how VI now has a cell phone and uses her computer to gather info; she used to have to get off the freeway when she was driving and find a working pay phone.

...I give up on this book, you lost me, SP.

[John Yelverton · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is a decent story as far as storytelling goes with a central theme about implanted and repressed memories. That being said, it utterly fails as a mystery with the solution being blatantly evident in the first few chapters.

[Deb Aronson · Rating 4 out of 5]

When you are in a certain mood VI Warshawski is the perfect escape!! I only wish I had a few more with me right now. Total Recall is unusually intense, digging back into Lotty and Max's past as Jewish chidren during WWII....

[Nick Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another of Sara Paretsky’s V.I. Warshawski books…but it lasts over 500 pages, which I think should be an illegal length for a crime novel. (But I read it in 30 minutes sections as a peddled on my exercise bike, which made me a captive audience.) It begins the way a Warshawski adventure begins: there are a series of occurrences and we expect them to be pulled together to form a single narrative…or we are introduced to a series of conspiracies and we expect then to come together to form a grand conspiracy. Warshawski is hired to investigate an insurance scam – someone has tried to claim the life insurance after her husband’s death, but has found it has already been cashed; the insurance company is Ajax, who made an appearance in the first book of the series, and they have been taken over by a Swiss company, but there are protests about possible money that was gained in the 1940s by the Swiss company from Jews murdered in the Holocaust…and there are black protesters wanting reparations because of Ajax’s past links to slavery; Warshawski’s two old friends, Lotty Herschel and Max Loewenthal, both refugees from Austria when they were children, are in argument, Max part of a movement to investigate the past, Lotty thinking the past should be left in the past; and then on TV they see Paul Radbuka being interviewed, who claims to have memories recovered from his childhood that show he was a survivor of a Nazi death camp…and Lotty has a physical reaction to the name “Radbuka”, but doesn’t share the meaning it holds for her. As we expect, these strands come together, beginning with Warshawki’s investigation of the insurance scam. But, as always, before the motor of the mystery narrative kicks in, I found it a little flat – Paretsky’s genius is in propelling a story forward, setting up the scenes can be a bit of a slog. And Total Recall begins with Lotty’s voice and we return to her several times in the book, recalling her time in London as a child and young adult – I found these passages held up the central narrative and were a little flat. The characters in a Paretsky novel live in the movement of narrative, when things hold still they hardly exist. As always, I wonder if the book only works if you enjoy Warshawski’s personality and enjoy the rush of her adventures. As always politicians are a dubious bunch, but collective political activism is also shown as suspect, the realm of fanatics – justice is achieved through the actions of the good individual. A theme in past Warshawski books has been the sense of age, that the physical demands of investigation become more difficult with age, but that is largely dropped in Total Recall – I wonder if this was when Paretsky decided the series would continue, that Warshawski could no longer afford to age andf would join Poirot and Maigret as never ageing detectives. And I kept being distracted by the age of Lottie and Max, a doctor and hospital administrator: surely by 2000, they must have been at least in their late 60s, maybe early 70s…shouldn’t they have retired by then? Although I don’t generally try to figure out mystery plots before they unfold, about 100 pages from the end of the book I thought it was obvious who was behind the conspiracies – I waited for the twists and further revelations, but they didn’t really come. Generally, in a Paretsky novel bad things finally occur because of the actions of bad people, but in this one I found the actions of the bad people to be a little over the top – they were more psychopaths than powerful people protecting their power. But, although it was the tenth in the series and my doubts about the series grow, I still enjoy the Warshawski novels, maybe for no other reason than they successfully distract me from my exertions on my exercise bike. (And at some point I imagined Paul Radbuka looked and sounded like Peter Lorre and although this didn’t make any sense he thereafter went through the novel with a middle European accent.)

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

My first book by this author. I enjoyed it, but thought the plot was so complicated it was hard to follow at times. Unusual for a detective book, no one was murdered until 37% into the book. Also unusual in that there were two separate story lines, which didn’t seem to be related, but which then converged at the end of the book. I was a little disappointed with the apprehension scene…not very realistic in that two people with guns were somehow overcome by two people and an old woman who were tied up…really? Finally, having been to Chicago many times, I know the traffic is bad..this book did nothing to dissuade me. Also, that screaming spoiled little kid , Calia…ugh!

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such a well-written book, that I enjoyed it even though I couldn't understand a lot of the book. I could follow the part about the emotionally-disturbed Jewish man, but not the Chicago politics! It gets into issues like urban political corruption and Holocaust survivor/slavery survivor reparations.

[Chris · Rating 2 out of 5]

Another long and meandering plot that goes into the weeds. I read these for the characters; not the plots. Insurance fraud, Nazis, reparations for Holocaust families.

[Ruth Chatlien · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one moved me deeply.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Have been reading Paretsky and really enjoying her series. I stopped reading them for quite a while because I felt her main character, VI, was always angry, always cynical and bitter. Someone also complained about her clear attitude about people who are plump or obese, because she always mentions it, and it is clear that VI is slim, fit, and keeps herself that way, which ergo, leads to contempt for the rest of us.

And yes, that attitude is still present and clear, and I felt like writing a review dinging the books because of that. That I thought about PC and I thought about how main characters, if you want them to be interesting and "relatable" you really need to let them have a few flaws, not make them perfect characters.

So surprise, VI Warshawsky is flawed, despite her need to prove that she's always right. The best aspects of the books are plot (intense, driven, interesting), the fact that you always learn something, and the fact that, let's face it, many of us mystery writers love seeing things set aright. What makes Paretsky's writing so real is that you do see VI pay a price for her behavior and her causes, and you do see her starting to deal with getting older. I think VI would be hard to be good friends with, but if you manage to be a friend to her, she would be absolutely there for you no matter what. Pretty amazing series, written by a pretty amazing writer.

[Vicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the 10th in the V. I. Warshawski series, and my favorite so far. This one involves insurance fraud, and lends a sympathetic voice to the issues of requiring reparations by insurance companies that profited from victims of the Holocaust as well as reparations to African Americans for our shameful history of slavery. V. I. gets mired in the case of a black family that has been denied payment of a burial policy because someone had already cashed in the policy a decade before. In the mean time she becomes embroiled in the turmoil that ensues when a disturbed man is lead to believe (possibly because of false memories) that he is a long lost cousin of either V. I.'s friend Max or mentor Lotty. People are being murdered and V. I. is pinging back and forth trying to get her client's insurance claim paid, solving the murders all while trying to keep Max and Lotty safe.

There are a few too many coincidences tying the resolution together for me to give 5 stars. On the other hand, the chapters interspersed through the book written in the first person view of V. I.'s mentor Lotty Herschel are quite compelling. These chapters give a moving narration of Lotty being forced to flee to England from Austria as a young child during WW II.

[Marsha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had actually read the first nine VI Warshawsky books as they were written, but I stopped reading as my vision got worse. This was the first that I had not read. I still love Sara Paretsky and her writing. The fact that I went to University of Chicago and lived in Hyde Park for several years and have been almost consistently in the Chicago area most of my life may well have something to do with this. Whenever she mentions locations in Hyde Park or the Chicago area it invokes memories and recognition. She has a solid way with personal relationships presented that makes you want to know all of the characters and makes them all your friends.
Many of her characters have a mixed or sordid past, and trust is something earned and not expected. And although the reader feels bad people and situations, pity is not invoked or even allowed! And the lack of gore and violence is well appreciated!

[Amy Savvides · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had read this book a long time ago but I just couldn’t remember the ending. I raced through it eager to find the truth…and I’m afraid I was disappointed.

The parts with Lotty and Paul Radbuka, and the frustrations of the clearly false memories were great. I wanted to know more about that. But that wasn’t enough - which I get, as a PI that was never going to be a bill payer was it?! But the insurance parts were just dull, and to be quite honest, stretched my suspension of disbelief to the very brink in a way that the previous books haven’t.

So, a 4 for the more personal parts and the rare insight we get into Lotty’s life and the others in her circle - a 2 for the corporate fraud for a total of three stars.

[Luanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read one of the more recent books in this series first and loved the characters and the author's style. This book left me thinking I was reading a different author. Part of the problem was the subject matter: Holocaust and African-American families protesting for reparations, with a focus on insurance. The book was filled with tragic memories and a character that was so pathetic, I cringed while reading parts of his story. Not much room for humor here.

My other reason for giving it a 3 rating was that I was able to figure out 90% of the mystery about halfway through the book. I think Ms. Paretsky has improved greatly as an author, and I will stick to her more recent books.

[Sheryl Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not your average V I Warshaski mystery. It is one part modern day mystery and one part historical mystery. It is really very interesting, going into some Jewish history of WWII. At first, it seems to be all about the Jewish aspect, but as the two mysteries progress, the current day mystery becomes apparent. The two stories very much intertwine and are interrelated in a masterful way. Even though there was less of V I showing off her talents, I really enjoyed the book. The peek into the world of the Jewish children sent to England and the loss they endured was heartbreaking, and enlightening.