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Jungle Beat #1
Pago Pago Tango
Detective Sergeant Apelu Soifua spent seven years in the San Francisco Police Department, where the job was just a job and solving crimes required cool detachment. But back home on American Samoa, life is personal—especially for a cop. Because on a small island where no one is a stranger and secrets are widely known but never discussed, solving crimes requires a certain…finesse.
Here, Apelu must walk the line between two cultures: Samoan versus American, native versus new. And that gulf never yawns wider than when a white family’s home in Pago Pago is burglarized. And what appears to be a simple, open-and-shut case turns out to anything but. As the evidence piles up, Apelu follows a tangled trail between cultures, dead bodies, hidden codes, and a string of lies on his hunt for the ugly truth buried at the heart of paradise.
Set against the steamy backdrop of the Samoan jungle, this thoughtful whodunit introduces a memorable new gumshoe to the ranks of detective fiction.
265 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 1, 2012
49 people are currently reading
337 people want to read
About the author
John Enright
6 books13 followersJohn Enright was born in Buffalo, New York, in 1945. After serving stints in semi-pro baseball and the Lackawanna steel mills, he earned his degree from City College of New York while working full-time at Fortune, Time, and Newsweek magazines. He later completed a master’s degree in folklore at UC-Berkeley, before devoting the 1970s to the publishing industry in New York, San Francisco, and Hong Kong. In 1981, he left the United States to teach at the American Samoa Community College. He spent the next twenty-six years living on the islands of the South Pacific, working for environmental, cultural, and historical resource preservation. Over the past four decades, his essays, articles, short stories, and poems have appeared in more than seventy books, anthologies, journals, periodicals, and online magazines. His collection of poems from Samoa, 14 Degrees South, won the University of the South Pacific Press’s inaugural International Literature Competition. Today, he and his wife, ceramicist Connie Payne, live in Jamestown, Rhode Island.
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June 28, 2025
Noir In American Samoa
I had the rare good fortune to have a job that allowed me to get to know the territory of American Samoa, the only flag-flying part of the United States south of the equator. I visited the territory twice and was impressed by the beauty of the islands and by the strong American patriotism of the people. American Samoa has a unique relationship with the United States which allows its inhabitants to practice the Fa'a Samoa, or the traditional Samoan way of life. Samoa presents a challenging mixture of local and American values.
The fond memories I have of American Samoa led me to this new book, "Pago Pago Tango" by John Enright. [Pago Pago, the capital of American Samoa is pronounced "Pango Pango"]. Enright is a mainland American who lived in Samoa and taught at the American Samoa Community College (which I visited) for many years before returning to the United States.
It was a pleasure to visit American Samoa again in this book with Enright as a guide. I recognized the places he describes --the government buildings, the American Samoa National Park with its rickety cable car which somehow I found the nerve to ride, the hotel, the cannery, the airport, the LBJ Hospital, the local jail and its culture, the small local shops and restaurants, and more. It was recollection for me while it will be a new world for most American readers.
Enright has written a complex involved mystery centering upon a Samoan detective, Apelu Soifua. Pelu, as he is called, spent much of his childhood in San Francisco followed by seven years as a detective on its police force before returning to his native island. Pelu's life and detective work shows the tension between mainland and Samoan culture, a tension mirrored in American Samoa itself. His story develops slowly and involves a complicated series of events and crimes beginning with a small break-in at a home in a compound reserved for mainlanders which gradually escalates and becomes tied in through Pelu's efforts to murders and a large clandestine drug operation.
The crimes, and the manner in which Pelu investigates them, show a great deal about island life even though I found the story itself somewhat tangled and forced. The book is most valuable in describing the clash and accomodation of local and mainland American culture. It discusses the importance of the cannery to Samoa's economy, and the influx of different people on the island, including Koreans, New Zealanders, and residents of other Pacific islands, in addition to Americans. Enright contrasts well the close, communal character of traditional Samoan life and the interaction of the native population with the immigrants,who only rarely become fully integrated long-term residents of Samoa.
The story has a wonderful sense of place and a feel for the people of American Samoa. It is possible of course to learn about American Samoa from the dry pages of a study, but few readers would be inclined to do so. Even fewer people would have the opportunity to work with and visit American Samoa as I have done, and as Enright did to a much greater degree. In "Pago Pago Tango" offers readers an opportunity to get to know American Samoa through a good suspenseful work of noir fiction. The book offers an introduction to most Americans of an aspect of their country that will be new to them. The book made me with I could visit American Samoa again and see it with new eyes.
Robin Friedman
I had the rare good fortune to have a job that allowed me to get to know the territory of American Samoa, the only flag-flying part of the United States south of the equator. I visited the territory twice and was impressed by the beauty of the islands and by the strong American patriotism of the people. American Samoa has a unique relationship with the United States which allows its inhabitants to practice the Fa'a Samoa, or the traditional Samoan way of life. Samoa presents a challenging mixture of local and American values.
The fond memories I have of American Samoa led me to this new book, "Pago Pago Tango" by John Enright. [Pago Pago, the capital of American Samoa is pronounced "Pango Pango"]. Enright is a mainland American who lived in Samoa and taught at the American Samoa Community College (which I visited) for many years before returning to the United States.
It was a pleasure to visit American Samoa again in this book with Enright as a guide. I recognized the places he describes --the government buildings, the American Samoa National Park with its rickety cable car which somehow I found the nerve to ride, the hotel, the cannery, the airport, the LBJ Hospital, the local jail and its culture, the small local shops and restaurants, and more. It was recollection for me while it will be a new world for most American readers.
Enright has written a complex involved mystery centering upon a Samoan detective, Apelu Soifua. Pelu, as he is called, spent much of his childhood in San Francisco followed by seven years as a detective on its police force before returning to his native island. Pelu's life and detective work shows the tension between mainland and Samoan culture, a tension mirrored in American Samoa itself. His story develops slowly and involves a complicated series of events and crimes beginning with a small break-in at a home in a compound reserved for mainlanders which gradually escalates and becomes tied in through Pelu's efforts to murders and a large clandestine drug operation.
The crimes, and the manner in which Pelu investigates them, show a great deal about island life even though I found the story itself somewhat tangled and forced. The book is most valuable in describing the clash and accomodation of local and mainland American culture. It discusses the importance of the cannery to Samoa's economy, and the influx of different people on the island, including Koreans, New Zealanders, and residents of other Pacific islands, in addition to Americans. Enright contrasts well the close, communal character of traditional Samoan life and the interaction of the native population with the immigrants,who only rarely become fully integrated long-term residents of Samoa.
The story has a wonderful sense of place and a feel for the people of American Samoa. It is possible of course to learn about American Samoa from the dry pages of a study, but few readers would be inclined to do so. Even fewer people would have the opportunity to work with and visit American Samoa as I have done, and as Enright did to a much greater degree. In "Pago Pago Tango" offers readers an opportunity to get to know American Samoa through a good suspenseful work of noir fiction. The book offers an introduction to most Americans of an aspect of their country that will be new to them. The book made me with I could visit American Samoa again and see it with new eyes.
Robin Friedman
February 6, 2014
This was a pretty standard mystery set in American Samoa. I've never read anything set in this locale so the descriptions of island life and Samoan culture were really fascinating to me.
Detective Sargent Apelu Soifua has been working the island beat for the last ten years since he and his family returned to Samoa from San Francisco to care for his ailing father. Dear old dad has since passed away and Pelu is now taking care of the family land and working at the local police station. Things begin to go bad when he is asked to look into a burglary at a local "palangi" neighborhood. The wife of corporate boss at the SeaKing tuna processing plant reports that her home has been broken into and some videotapes and a VCR have been stolen. But something about the break-in and the tapes that have gone missing doesn't quite add up. Pelu begins his investigation and other odd incidents start happening around the island. Gang violence, crimes against other palangi, mystery tapes showing up at the local video store all add up to an interconnected crime but Pelu isn't sure who to trust.
A decent mystery, and a very interesting setting. I would like to know more about this area and will definitely be picking up the next in this series.
Detective Sargent Apelu Soifua has been working the island beat for the last ten years since he and his family returned to Samoa from San Francisco to care for his ailing father. Dear old dad has since passed away and Pelu is now taking care of the family land and working at the local police station. Things begin to go bad when he is asked to look into a burglary at a local "palangi" neighborhood. The wife of corporate boss at the SeaKing tuna processing plant reports that her home has been broken into and some videotapes and a VCR have been stolen. But something about the break-in and the tapes that have gone missing doesn't quite add up. Pelu begins his investigation and other odd incidents start happening around the island. Gang violence, crimes against other palangi, mystery tapes showing up at the local video store all add up to an interconnected crime but Pelu isn't sure who to trust.
A decent mystery, and a very interesting setting. I would like to know more about this area and will definitely be picking up the next in this series.
May 5, 2013
Detective Sergeant Apelu Soifua in Tafuna, American Samoa, makes distinctions between crimes involving Samoan natives and those involving palangi (“white people,” pronounced “puh-LANG-ee”). In the former cases, everyone knew what happened and why and usually “the perpetrator would either be waiting for [Apelu], already collared and ready to confess, or easily identified and apprehended” (Chapter 3). But with the palangi, the police rarely knew what had really happened. When someone breaks into the upscale home of SeaKing Tuna executive Gordon Trurich and his vodka-swilling trophy wife Karen, Apelu quickly realizes there are more unknowns than usual.
First of all, the mode of entry differed from that of the recent string of robberies. Secondly, why would burglars take a VCR and 50 videotapes, most just home-made ones, and then dump the VCR on the edge of the property but take the tapes? The same tapes that Mr. Trurich forgot to mention on the police report. (This narrative is set in the early 1990s.) And why did neither Gordon nor Karen Trurich report the .357 that was stolen, as well — a gun later used in a shooting at a nightclub? Later on, even more discrepancies — and some mayhem — emerge. Apelu quickly realizes the case constitutes more than a run-of-the-mill burglary by teenaged gang members.
Himself a palangi who spent 26 years in the South Pacific, John Enright has created a great protagonist in Apelu, an imperfect man at odds with his people’s missionary culture, his religious and strict wife, and his superiors at police headquarters. Pago Pago is pronounced “Pango Pango” so that the title is said “Pango Pango Tango”; that’s perfect because Apelu finds himself dancing a very intricate dance between palangi and native cultures, between traditional views of honor and its modern consumerist bent, between his own sense of justice and his strained relationship with his superiors, between the overwhelming demands of his job and the needs of his family. Enright has a great mystery with a suspenseful ending, of course, but what I really welcome was the chance to learn about American Samoa, about which I knew virtually nothing. Enright has created a valentine to with this debut novel while not shying away from the sordid aspects of life in a supposed paradise: the subverting of native culture, the destructiveness of inter-village rivalries and resentments, the corruption and nepotism involving the traditional chiefs. As with the novels of Robert van Gulik, Pago Pago Tango provided this armchair traveler a chance I’d not otherwise get: to see another faraway culture from the inside.
The next book in the so-called Jungle Beat series, Fire Knife Dancing, appears later this month. I can’t wait for a return visit to Tafuna.
First of all, the mode of entry differed from that of the recent string of robberies. Secondly, why would burglars take a VCR and 50 videotapes, most just home-made ones, and then dump the VCR on the edge of the property but take the tapes? The same tapes that Mr. Trurich forgot to mention on the police report. (This narrative is set in the early 1990s.) And why did neither Gordon nor Karen Trurich report the .357 that was stolen, as well — a gun later used in a shooting at a nightclub? Later on, even more discrepancies — and some mayhem — emerge. Apelu quickly realizes the case constitutes more than a run-of-the-mill burglary by teenaged gang members.
Himself a palangi who spent 26 years in the South Pacific, John Enright has created a great protagonist in Apelu, an imperfect man at odds with his people’s missionary culture, his religious and strict wife, and his superiors at police headquarters. Pago Pago is pronounced “Pango Pango” so that the title is said “Pango Pango Tango”; that’s perfect because Apelu finds himself dancing a very intricate dance between palangi and native cultures, between traditional views of honor and its modern consumerist bent, between his own sense of justice and his strained relationship with his superiors, between the overwhelming demands of his job and the needs of his family. Enright has a great mystery with a suspenseful ending, of course, but what I really welcome was the chance to learn about American Samoa, about which I knew virtually nothing. Enright has created a valentine to with this debut novel while not shying away from the sordid aspects of life in a supposed paradise: the subverting of native culture, the destructiveness of inter-village rivalries and resentments, the corruption and nepotism involving the traditional chiefs. As with the novels of Robert van Gulik, Pago Pago Tango provided this armchair traveler a chance I’d not otherwise get: to see another faraway culture from the inside.
The next book in the so-called Jungle Beat series, Fire Knife Dancing, appears later this month. I can’t wait for a return visit to Tafuna.
October 15, 2012
American Samoa is a place I am highly unlikely to ever get a chance to visit, so I'll probably have to settle for armchair tourism, and this debut mystery is my first visit. The book is the first of what looks to be a projected series featuring Detective Sergeant Apelu, a Samoan who spent his childhood on the island and much of his adulthood in the US. This included seven years with the San Francisco Police Department, which he was able to parlay into a job back in Samoa when he needed to come care for his dying father. The story kicks off with a bit of a bang, in which Apelu is nearly killed while searching for a dead palangi (Caucasian) in a national park. Thanks to that off-the-books investigation, he is reassigned to trivial duties, including a routine burglary call which entangles him in something much more sinister.
What that ends up being is not particularly complicated, as far as mysteries go, nor is it entirely convincing. Or rather, it's just convincing enough not to spoil the book. The real fun of the book is exploring the culture of modern American Samoa as it struggles to reconcile traditional systems and structures with the influences of America, Asia, and most of all, capitalism. Unlike many stories set by outsiders (Enright lived in Samoa, but is not from there), these are woven into the fabric of the story and characters, and there are not passages that feel like info dumps from a guidebook. Apelu is a compelling protagonist, balancing his beliefs with his time in America, family life with work and the desire to have fun. His investigative style might be described as a kind of tropical Columbo, as he tends to just drop in on people for chats and then, just as he's leaving, pull out the old. "Oh, one more thing..." card before delivering his real "gotcha" question. Good fun, and I'll look forward to the next in the series. Definitely recommended for those who read fiction for setting, less recommended for those primarily concerned with plot.
What that ends up being is not particularly complicated, as far as mysteries go, nor is it entirely convincing. Or rather, it's just convincing enough not to spoil the book. The real fun of the book is exploring the culture of modern American Samoa as it struggles to reconcile traditional systems and structures with the influences of America, Asia, and most of all, capitalism. Unlike many stories set by outsiders (Enright lived in Samoa, but is not from there), these are woven into the fabric of the story and characters, and there are not passages that feel like info dumps from a guidebook. Apelu is a compelling protagonist, balancing his beliefs with his time in America, family life with work and the desire to have fun. His investigative style might be described as a kind of tropical Columbo, as he tends to just drop in on people for chats and then, just as he's leaving, pull out the old. "Oh, one more thing..." card before delivering his real "gotcha" question. Good fun, and I'll look forward to the next in the series. Definitely recommended for those who read fiction for setting, less recommended for those primarily concerned with plot.
August 4, 2017
I raised my rating to 4 stars after reading this again. As a crime novel, it's fine, compelling, does the trick. But I love this book & have read it twice & am continuing with the series because I work in American Samoa on the island of Tutuila, where this is based. From that perspective, Enright does a superb job of portraying the culture & history of American Samoa. He should, as he is former Director of the American Samoa Historic Preservation Office. I didn't know that upon my first read & wasn't sure if he was getting all his facts right, since I hadn't heard much of it before. But I've since been back to American Samoa, learned of his past life, & listened again. The more I know about American Samoa, the better this book gets. It reminds me of Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Study in Scarlet," because much of that famous book is less mystery than a primer in the history & sinister nature of early Mormonism in the U.S. Similarly, Enright does a superb job of portraying the current state of American Samoan culture & putting it in historical context. I do love a pulpy detective novel that takes me around the world, but more than that, I love when I can imagine every scene being described because I have been there & know those streets. Very well done. I'm on to the next in the series, &, so far, it's just as historically & culturally exciting.
November 9, 2013
What a find this mystery turned out to be! I found it by accident, as I was searching for books for my Read Around the World challenge. It is set in contemporary American Samoa, and proved to be a welcome lesson in the culture and history of the island, as well as a strongly plotted mystery. I really liked the main character, Det. Sgt. Apelu Soifua, or Pelu, for short. A family man, with a scarred past as a former San Francisco cop and drug user, Pelu has returned to his native island, and reclaimed his life in order to become a dedicated father, husband and police officer. He loves his culture, at least most of it; and worries about the impact of many decades of white culture and inhabitants, on the island. This book is as much about Samoan culture as it is a well constructed mystery. And John Enright knows whereof he speaks! A former journalist for Fortune, Time, and Newsweek, Enright spent twenty-six years living on American Samoa, teaching college courses. He is interested in cultural folklore, having studied it at UC-Berkeley, and weaves Samoan stories and cultural tidbits throughout his book. Pelu believes in many of the old ways, and actively practises them as part of his daily life.
This book saddened me at times, as Enright describes many of the negative effects white culture and economic endeavours have had on the island. The tuna canning industry, represented by the famous Charlie the Tuna, of Starkist fame, does not come off favourably, in Enright's text. The "palangi", or whites have been having considerable impact on American Samoa since it was used by the Navy in 1907 as a base. A huge population of wild dogs, a garbage plagued harbor with badly contaminated fish, severe damage to the island's reefs from cannery waste, declines in native birds and plants replaced by invasive species brought to the islands by white outsiders.....the
list of problems tied to white interference goes on and on.
There are two other books in this series. I will be reading them, to continue to follow Pelu's career, and to learn more about his people's culture, and to see if there are any solutions to be found for American Samoa's problems, perhaps suggested by Enright, based on his observations, having made the island his home for almost three decades.
This book saddened me at times, as Enright describes many of the negative effects white culture and economic endeavours have had on the island. The tuna canning industry, represented by the famous Charlie the Tuna, of Starkist fame, does not come off favourably, in Enright's text. The "palangi", or whites have been having considerable impact on American Samoa since it was used by the Navy in 1907 as a base. A huge population of wild dogs, a garbage plagued harbor with badly contaminated fish, severe damage to the island's reefs from cannery waste, declines in native birds and plants replaced by invasive species brought to the islands by white outsiders.....the
list of problems tied to white interference goes on and on.
There are two other books in this series. I will be reading them, to continue to follow Pelu's career, and to learn more about his people's culture, and to see if there are any solutions to be found for American Samoa's problems, perhaps suggested by Enright, based on his observations, having made the island his home for almost three decades.
July 17, 2016
John Enright's “Pago Pago Tango” introduces readers to Samoan detective Apelu Soifua, returned to the Island after serving on the San Francisco Police Department. Soifua's department has his hands full with a spate of murders – except, Soifua has been assigned dealing with a robbery in a paalangi (outsider, in this and most cases, American) community. Mystery readers will, of course, realize that a detective of Soifua's ability (and the protagonist of the story) won't be kept on the sidelines for long.
Mr. Enright has written 4 tales in this series. I've enjoyed the first two, and hope that other readers discover him and his prized character Detective Soifua. With a few more readers, I'm sure we can be treated to a 5th (and beyond) book in the series.
RATING: 4 1/2 stars., upgraded to 5 stars where 1/2 stars are not acknowledged.
Mr. Enright has written 4 tales in this series. I've enjoyed the first two, and hope that other readers discover him and his prized character Detective Soifua. With a few more readers, I'm sure we can be treated to a 5th (and beyond) book in the series.
RATING: 4 1/2 stars., upgraded to 5 stars where 1/2 stars are not acknowledged.
March 29, 2021
There's an interesting sub-genre of mystery novels which are set in exotic locales or on Indian reservations. This book is set in American Samoa, and it's full of interesting cultural and linguistic tidbits as well as descriptions of the tropical landscapes that go along with it. Lots of local color, including local lingo. Reminds me a bit of Hawaii and, indeed, Hawaii is a big influence on the Territory what with the similar culture and language and the fact that Honolulu is the nearest large city in 2500 miles.
I'm hoping to get to Pago Pago some day but, until I do, I'll have to settle for reading about it.
I'm hoping to get to Pago Pago some day but, until I do, I'll have to settle for reading about it.
November 14, 2016
The crime part was a OK, nothing special. Detective Sergeant Apelu was a good character, eminently likeable and his views of the palangis were quite humorous. Some very interesting insights into the culture of the Samoans and the problems facing them due to their reliance on US funds and the scourge of Ice.
April 13, 2017
Detective Sergeant Apelu Soifua is somthing of a Samoan Columbo, with his deceptive mannerisms disguising his keen mind. I truly enjoyed this crime novel.
September 15, 2017
This book nails the atmosphere of Pago Pago and American Samoa.
Brings back the feel of the place to me, as I lived there for a short time many years ago.
Brings back the feel of the place to me, as I lived there for a short time many years ago.
July 13, 2021
59🎧 🇦🇸AMERICAN SAMOA🇦🇸 I was hesitant about reading this book because I really want to stick to indigenous authors, and Enright isn’t. However, I was hankering for a crime thriller after all the history, biography and inter generational family sagas I have been reading lately. Fo you ever hanker for a crime thriller? And as I have said before, audiobooks from the Pacific are rare (I was so excited to see Thor Hayerdahl’s classic Kon Tiki on @audible that I purchased it before realising it was narrated in German🤦🏻♀️). Well, I think I have struck hold, because not only was this a cracker of a read, but it’s a series (Jungle Beat has four books)! Oh my glory be! I am in audiobook heaven for a few more weeks🤩Detective Sergeant Apelu Soifua is a likeable protagonist and Enright draws on his experience living and teaching in American Samoa to paint a realistic picture of this tiny US territory. 🌏📚#Readingworldtour2021
February 7, 2021
This is essentially a police-procedural set in American Samoa but much more interesting for the culture and geography than the pedestrian mystery. Apelu Soifua is a Samoan cop, initially investigating a break-in at a white manager’s house which eventually connects to violent deaths, corrupt cops and drugs. The plot and denouement are absolutely stock-standard as is Soifua's maverick approach and his non-involvement of his superiors. It all moves at a sedate South Pacific pace with characters blurred at the edges, but it's still a rewarding read for the location.
June 8, 2017
My most favorite genre is a mystery set in another time or place. Pago Pago Tango is set in American Samoa. I give it a five for sense of place, both the warts and the beauty. I give it a three for Detective Sergeant Apelu Soifua, who annoyingly hid evidence that could help his superiors solve the case and apparently has no issues with entrapment. I hope I respect him more in the next installment, because in this one he was just plum lucky.
August 8, 2018
An ok read....
I loved the surrounding storyline of Samoan lifestyle and heritage customs but a couple paragraphs would have been sufficient not so many many pages.....almost forgetting the real plot that was happening before the long overdone descriptions. But I still enjoyed Pelu......interesting place and its people....
I loved the surrounding storyline of Samoan lifestyle and heritage customs but a couple paragraphs would have been sufficient not so many many pages.....almost forgetting the real plot that was happening before the long overdone descriptions. But I still enjoyed Pelu......interesting place and its people....
May 5, 2024
Well written but a bit problematic. Central character is Samoan. Writer is white American who spent over 20 years in American Samoa. He conveys surface impressions well but doesn't write with the authenticity I hear from my Samoan friends. It's still an OK book but I'd have preferred a more own voices approach.
March 21, 2016
Pago Pago Tango, by John Enright
The title of John Enright’s novel is light-hearted, a joke. True, in one place he refers to the “dance” of different cultures in Samoa where the novel takes place. On the cover the book is described as “a Detective Apelu Soifue Jungle Beat Mystery,” but this too is tongue-in-cheek humor. The book is, actually, a parody of the old-fashioned detective novel. A native of Samoa, Apelu is the opposite of the hard-boiled Philip Marlowe-style cop: he has seen much of the world, appreciates humor and jokes, is relaxed, he might be the most attractive “detective” in the entire genre. Surrounded by crime and violence he perceives the human side of the people he encounters. His job as he sees it is only (!) to keep the peace. This is an extremely warm-hearted book.
The novel has a broad cast of characters from all walks of life. It is a sensitive, well-informed cultural study masked as a detective story. In this sense “Pago Pago Tango” is a dance and a study of two very different cultures in concrete detail. The characters range from the plantation boy or “tama” from a bush village-- a serf living in near-slavery conditions-- to the Samoan administrators, and the different kinds of chief. There are the many “palangi,” the Samoan word for whites: the managers of packing and shipping plants, “SeaKing Tuna,” after the local government the largest employer on the island. Most palangi live in gated “State Department Housing.” There are also “half-castes” or afakasi, sometimes with Anglo-Saxon last names, who have inherited wealth from their parents. Into the mix are also American tourists. The author, John Enright, knows the Samoan language, and convincingly shows how Samoans think, act, and react. He has seriously studied folklore, and lived in the Pacific islands for many years.
Apelu, the detective, is surrounded by two cultures in collision, the native Samoan and the white money-dominated “palangi.” He knows the two cultures well from first-hand experience. As a young man he was taken to California and went to Mission High School in San Francisco; later he found a job with the SFPD. His “beat” was the Tenderloin, but after a couple of years it became filled with the victims of methamphetamine. This was one of his personal reasons for accepting the family’s “mandate” to return to Samoa: to escape the world of meth and “get off that ice train headed nowhere.” His wife accepted the move; it worked, and saved their marriage.
Just as the cast of characters is broad, the nature of the crimes committed is also broad. The events Apelu is called on to investigate almost always have an “unknowability factor;” they are rarely about morality. There are different rules in different situations depending on who is involved. “Apelu’s new cases are very Samoan—done deeds, acts of one kind of passion or another, with suspects already confessed and in custody. He had only to take statements and commiserate with the victim’s families.” The number of homicides in Samoa is enormous, given the island’s population. But the use of a firearm in a murder is exceptional; the usual weapons are rocks, bottles, two-by-fours, bush knives, weapons of personal anger. A dead man is much more likely to have his skull caved in than a bullet hole in him.
The “clues” almost always turn out to be cultural clues. Apelu tries to soften the blows if he can. Among Samoan youth, “Ice” or methamphetamine has widely displaced weed, “it was here like a trailing plague.” The problems in the two cultures are ironically similar, but the Samoan drug problems are drowned by palangi money. Apelu arrests at the airport a young fugitive “ice-head” involved in a violent crime; he is hopelessly addicted, about to return to his home on an out-lying island. Apelu always wants to avoid incarceration, it is his own personal rule. He returns the young addict’s passport, gives him a stern warning to stay away from “the Territory” (Samoa) in the future.
Apelu is called on to investigate a petty crime in the pelangi “State Department Housing,” and the plot becomes increasingly more violent. He must interview a high American executive in the packing company. He meets members of the family that turns out to be deeply dysfunctional. The wife drinks, has a vacant stare, loathes Samoa and longs to return to America. At one point she confides to Apelu “I hate to tell you, but your island sucks.” The mother and attractive daughter are unable to speak to one another. The daughter contemplates running away but doesn’t know where. In desperation she has taken up with a local adolescent ice-head who is involved in violent fights. He becomes a fugitive. Apelu has a warrant to arrest him.
The conflicts accelerate and gather the force of inevitability. With executive complicity the palangi packing company and its international trade turns out to be a major supplier of “ice” in volume. Using a very clever code of accounting for the shipping containers, huge sums of money mix with the highly addictive drugs.
Pago Pago Tango is a warm and generous book. It is extremely well-informed, a book of nuances and cultural awareness. It is a great pleasure to read.
The title of John Enright’s novel is light-hearted, a joke. True, in one place he refers to the “dance” of different cultures in Samoa where the novel takes place. On the cover the book is described as “a Detective Apelu Soifue Jungle Beat Mystery,” but this too is tongue-in-cheek humor. The book is, actually, a parody of the old-fashioned detective novel. A native of Samoa, Apelu is the opposite of the hard-boiled Philip Marlowe-style cop: he has seen much of the world, appreciates humor and jokes, is relaxed, he might be the most attractive “detective” in the entire genre. Surrounded by crime and violence he perceives the human side of the people he encounters. His job as he sees it is only (!) to keep the peace. This is an extremely warm-hearted book.
The novel has a broad cast of characters from all walks of life. It is a sensitive, well-informed cultural study masked as a detective story. In this sense “Pago Pago Tango” is a dance and a study of two very different cultures in concrete detail. The characters range from the plantation boy or “tama” from a bush village-- a serf living in near-slavery conditions-- to the Samoan administrators, and the different kinds of chief. There are the many “palangi,” the Samoan word for whites: the managers of packing and shipping plants, “SeaKing Tuna,” after the local government the largest employer on the island. Most palangi live in gated “State Department Housing.” There are also “half-castes” or afakasi, sometimes with Anglo-Saxon last names, who have inherited wealth from their parents. Into the mix are also American tourists. The author, John Enright, knows the Samoan language, and convincingly shows how Samoans think, act, and react. He has seriously studied folklore, and lived in the Pacific islands for many years.
Apelu, the detective, is surrounded by two cultures in collision, the native Samoan and the white money-dominated “palangi.” He knows the two cultures well from first-hand experience. As a young man he was taken to California and went to Mission High School in San Francisco; later he found a job with the SFPD. His “beat” was the Tenderloin, but after a couple of years it became filled with the victims of methamphetamine. This was one of his personal reasons for accepting the family’s “mandate” to return to Samoa: to escape the world of meth and “get off that ice train headed nowhere.” His wife accepted the move; it worked, and saved their marriage.
Just as the cast of characters is broad, the nature of the crimes committed is also broad. The events Apelu is called on to investigate almost always have an “unknowability factor;” they are rarely about morality. There are different rules in different situations depending on who is involved. “Apelu’s new cases are very Samoan—done deeds, acts of one kind of passion or another, with suspects already confessed and in custody. He had only to take statements and commiserate with the victim’s families.” The number of homicides in Samoa is enormous, given the island’s population. But the use of a firearm in a murder is exceptional; the usual weapons are rocks, bottles, two-by-fours, bush knives, weapons of personal anger. A dead man is much more likely to have his skull caved in than a bullet hole in him.
The “clues” almost always turn out to be cultural clues. Apelu tries to soften the blows if he can. Among Samoan youth, “Ice” or methamphetamine has widely displaced weed, “it was here like a trailing plague.” The problems in the two cultures are ironically similar, but the Samoan drug problems are drowned by palangi money. Apelu arrests at the airport a young fugitive “ice-head” involved in a violent crime; he is hopelessly addicted, about to return to his home on an out-lying island. Apelu always wants to avoid incarceration, it is his own personal rule. He returns the young addict’s passport, gives him a stern warning to stay away from “the Territory” (Samoa) in the future.
Apelu is called on to investigate a petty crime in the pelangi “State Department Housing,” and the plot becomes increasingly more violent. He must interview a high American executive in the packing company. He meets members of the family that turns out to be deeply dysfunctional. The wife drinks, has a vacant stare, loathes Samoa and longs to return to America. At one point she confides to Apelu “I hate to tell you, but your island sucks.” The mother and attractive daughter are unable to speak to one another. The daughter contemplates running away but doesn’t know where. In desperation she has taken up with a local adolescent ice-head who is involved in violent fights. He becomes a fugitive. Apelu has a warrant to arrest him.
The conflicts accelerate and gather the force of inevitability. With executive complicity the palangi packing company and its international trade turns out to be a major supplier of “ice” in volume. Using a very clever code of accounting for the shipping containers, huge sums of money mix with the highly addictive drugs.
Pago Pago Tango is a warm and generous book. It is extremely well-informed, a book of nuances and cultural awareness. It is a great pleasure to read.
June 7, 2019
Twists and Circumstance
Great storyline. Filled with many twists. Author showed a real understanding of the bumps, blockades, and backtracks involved in solving a case. A little rough at spots, but basically a good read.
Great storyline. Filled with many twists. Author showed a real understanding of the bumps, blockades, and backtracks involved in solving a case. A little rough at spots, but basically a good read.
August 25, 2019
Great listen, engaged with characters and cared about them. I usually guess the twist within two chapters but this time I didn't guess it till five chapters before the end. Glad I have found this new author (for me )
August 23, 2021
Exciting.
The cultural difference between native Samoans and their white, US neighbors lends itself to the page-turning mystery/thriller. Several plot twists ratchet up the intensity
The cultural difference between native Samoans and their white, US neighbors lends itself to the page-turning mystery/thriller. Several plot twists ratchet up the intensity
February 16, 2023
This is a good mystery set in Samoa, featuring a likeable policeman named Apelu. In addition to the mystery of who is killing people and why, this book is a good look at a culture that many of us know little or nothing about, so I appreciate learning about that as well as experiencing the mystery.
June 5, 2024
I was not thrilled with this mystery. I was able to figure out the criminal easily. There were also parts added that had no impact on the plot, frustrating me. I don't believe I will be reading the other books in this series.
December 4, 2025
I read this book as part of a read around the USA challenge. It did provide a lot of information on the language, culture, landscape and food of the island which made the plot slower. I almost gave up but am glad I kept reading. But the last 1/4 had so much action that I couldn't put it down!
May 21, 2017
I am so glad i didn't pay for this as I had lost interest long before the plot attempted to come together.
December 2, 2017
Samoan detective Apelu unravels a mystery with a tense climax. Promising first in a series.
April 16, 2018
Not what I was expecting. Didn't get to the point where I cared about the characters or the crime. The island setting was a nice change but not enough to salvage my attention.
April 21, 2018
Nice police story
It started a little slow, but the tempo picked up in the end. The ending was left open for some reason, as a second novel.
It started a little slow, but the tempo picked up in the end. The ending was left open for some reason, as a second novel.
June 2, 2018
This book was fine. Decent writing and storyline, interesting setting. Ok summer read.
June 4, 2018
A really enjoyable read. Learning about the culture of the Samoans, was interesting. I will be buying the next book in the series.
August 25, 2019
Well-written, but I'm not the market for this book. Too depressing - drug prevalence, poverty, corruption. The good guy cannot succeed.
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