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Van der Valk #8
Tsing Boum
When Esther Marx is found savagely murdered, mown down by machine-gun fire in her lacklustre apartment, the trail leads to the wide, shallow valley of Dien Bien Phu in Vietnam, 1954. In this remarkable tale entwined with past and present, Freeling brings to life a classic story of murder and intrigue.
217 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1969
8 people are currently reading
85 people want to read
About the author
Nicolas Freeling
87 books59 followersNicolas Freeling born Nicolas Davidson, (March 3, 1927 - July 20, 2003) was a British crime novelist, best known as the author of the Van der Valk series of detective novels which were adapted for transmission on the British ITV network by Thames Television during the 1970s.
Freeling was born in London, but travelled widely, and ended his life at his long-standing home at Grandfontaine to the west of Strasbourg. He had followed a variety of occupations, including the armed services and the catering profession. He began writing during a three-week prison sentence, after being convicted of stealing some food.[citation needed]
Freeling's The King of the Rainy Country received a 1967 Edgar Award, from the Mystery Writers of America, for Best Novel. He also won the Gold Dagger of the Crime Writers' Association, and France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière.
From Wikipedia
Series:
* Van Der Valk
* Henri Castang
Freeling was born in London, but travelled widely, and ended his life at his long-standing home at Grandfontaine to the west of Strasbourg. He had followed a variety of occupations, including the armed services and the catering profession. He began writing during a three-week prison sentence, after being convicted of stealing some food.[citation needed]
Freeling's The King of the Rainy Country received a 1967 Edgar Award, from the Mystery Writers of America, for Best Novel. He also won the Gold Dagger of the Crime Writers' Association, and France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière.
From Wikipedia
Series:
* Van Der Valk
* Henri Castang
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
September 12, 2015
"Tschin, Bum, Tschin, Bum, Bum, Bum, Bum!
Can you hear, boy? They're coming! [...]
Our soldiers, our soldiers, what handsome creatures!"
(Wozzeck, libretto by Alban Berg)
The title of "Tsing-Boum" (1969), the eighth novel in Nicolas Freeling's Van der Valk series, is the French spelling of words from Alban Berg's opera Wozzeck. As usual with Freeling's novels, the title is meaningful. Not only does the onomatopoeic title suggest the 'brothers in arms' thread in the novel, but the explosive words also play an important role in establishing the means of the crime and thus they may be essential in identifying the guilty party.
In the Foreword the author recounts the 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu, where the French forces suffered a comprehensive and bloody defeat in their war against Viet Minh. The bitterness of this defeat cast a long shadow over the French national psyche for many years to come. The novel begins with Commissaire Van der Valk, who is in charge of the criminal brigade in a provincial Dutch town, investigating the murder of a Frenchwoman, whose husband is a sergeant in the Dutch army. The woman has been killed with a military-type weapon, and her connections with the Dien Bien Phu battle soon come to light. Van der Valk travels to France to uncover the past events that were at the root of the murder.
The novel has three distinct parts: a captivating procedural (one of the best written procedurals I have read), followed by equally interesting sequence of conversations with several high-level military and intelligence types, where Mr. Freeling's virtuosity in portraying complex motives of human behavior shines brightly. Alas, then comes the ending with its gun action, quite silly and incompatible with the deep and reflective tone of the entire book. The ending spoils a potentially great novel.
On the positive side, Mr. Freeling's portrayal of Ruth, the ten-year old daughter of the victim, is masterful - one of the best literary depictions of a child. Ruth comes through as a real person, and I am happy that the plot has her become more than just an incidental character. This and the profound study of the world of ex-professional soldiers make "Tsing-Boum" a worthwhile read.
Three and three quarter stars.
Can you hear, boy? They're coming! [...]
Our soldiers, our soldiers, what handsome creatures!"
(Wozzeck, libretto by Alban Berg)
The title of "Tsing-Boum" (1969), the eighth novel in Nicolas Freeling's Van der Valk series, is the French spelling of words from Alban Berg's opera Wozzeck. As usual with Freeling's novels, the title is meaningful. Not only does the onomatopoeic title suggest the 'brothers in arms' thread in the novel, but the explosive words also play an important role in establishing the means of the crime and thus they may be essential in identifying the guilty party.
In the Foreword the author recounts the 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu, where the French forces suffered a comprehensive and bloody defeat in their war against Viet Minh. The bitterness of this defeat cast a long shadow over the French national psyche for many years to come. The novel begins with Commissaire Van der Valk, who is in charge of the criminal brigade in a provincial Dutch town, investigating the murder of a Frenchwoman, whose husband is a sergeant in the Dutch army. The woman has been killed with a military-type weapon, and her connections with the Dien Bien Phu battle soon come to light. Van der Valk travels to France to uncover the past events that were at the root of the murder.
The novel has three distinct parts: a captivating procedural (one of the best written procedurals I have read), followed by equally interesting sequence of conversations with several high-level military and intelligence types, where Mr. Freeling's virtuosity in portraying complex motives of human behavior shines brightly. Alas, then comes the ending with its gun action, quite silly and incompatible with the deep and reflective tone of the entire book. The ending spoils a potentially great novel.
On the positive side, Mr. Freeling's portrayal of Ruth, the ten-year old daughter of the victim, is masterful - one of the best literary depictions of a child. Ruth comes through as a real person, and I am happy that the plot has her become more than just an incidental character. This and the profound study of the world of ex-professional soldiers make "Tsing-Boum" a worthwhile read.
Three and three quarter stars.
January 3, 2022
I am a big fan of Nicholas Freeling. I love the way he writes about real feelings and complex relationships. As an Australian I found this story with reference to the Vietnam War from the French perspective really interesting.
March 16, 2023
I got on to this author from watching the European productions of the Dutch criminal Inspector Van der Valk. I found this obscure volume through another member of the Paperback Book swap club. It was a tough read as some of the sentence structures were intertwinned in an unfamiliar manner. Once I got a hang of his style I found the book engrossing and suspenseful. The Inspector travels to South France to meet with past personalities that he thinks the dead woman would have had interactions with. I learned a bit about the French fight in 1954 at Dien Bien Phu, Vietnam which culminated in a major defeat for elite French forces in IndoChina. These events played heavy in this story and really traumatized the French people (and military) serving as an entre to the later major loss of Algeria and the military revolt that roiled the French government. All this is at play in this volume. The author does a good job in setting scenes of mystery with a nice dose of action amid psychological tension of the characters. I enjoyed the story though I read it slowly over two months. This story differs from the cable character who mainly plys his trade in his home country of Holland while here Van der Valk is on the European continent. The story and the author is highly recommended. I hope to find more of his stories translated into English.
February 4, 2020
Thanks to an excellent Goodreads review by Lukasz Pruski for information on the origin of the title – Alban Berg’s revolutionary opera Wozzeck. It makes perfect sense somehow.
This book was written in 1969 when the US war in Vietnam was ramping up, but the origin of the 1969 murder case goes back to the French war in Vietnam in 1954, and the catastrophic French miscalculation at Dien Bien Phu.
A French woman married to a Dutch soldier is shot to death, multiple times, by a machine gun, when she opens her door to a visitor. She was a quiet woman, mostly unknown to neighbors, tending to her young daughter and her husband. He is a decent fellow, definitely not the killer, loyal to his wife, keeping her secrets, protective of her child. It turns out she was a military nurse in Vietnam, time in Hanoi, contacts with many soldiers and paratroopers, one of whom fathered her child.
The investigation takes Van der Valk to France and into the morass of French colonial misadventures and their lethal consequences.
It is a complex tale full of well-developed characters, ambiguous motives and a look at history that is now mostly forgotten.
This book was written in 1969 when the US war in Vietnam was ramping up, but the origin of the 1969 murder case goes back to the French war in Vietnam in 1954, and the catastrophic French miscalculation at Dien Bien Phu.
A French woman married to a Dutch soldier is shot to death, multiple times, by a machine gun, when she opens her door to a visitor. She was a quiet woman, mostly unknown to neighbors, tending to her young daughter and her husband. He is a decent fellow, definitely not the killer, loyal to his wife, keeping her secrets, protective of her child. It turns out she was a military nurse in Vietnam, time in Hanoi, contacts with many soldiers and paratroopers, one of whom fathered her child.
The investigation takes Van der Valk to France and into the morass of French colonial misadventures and their lethal consequences.
It is a complex tale full of well-developed characters, ambiguous motives and a look at history that is now mostly forgotten.
June 1, 2020
Written in 1968 for a Dutch audience, this novel is a hard one to rate in 2020. I had a 1987 American edition of a 1971 British translation, so the times, references, and jargon were occasionally over my head. I also think the translation was not that good and it suffered from numerous typos. I don’t know if the Dutch frequently write in sentence fragments or if it’s the author’s style, but they are everywhere and it gets annoying. It can also be difficult to follow who is speaking in the dialog, requiring the reader to backtrack more than a few times. The mystery is fairly straight forward and the two final suspects only appear in the final 50 or so pages. There’s no great twist or reveal in the end. Learning more about the battle of Dien Bien Phu was perhaps the most redeeming part of the tale. Perhaps if I was “of the Continent” this might have struck home, but overall, it was an okay read that passed some time. I won’t tell you to avoid it, but neither would I say make this your next read.
January 12, 2024
2 1/2 stars. This was a bit of a struggle - the turn of phrase, the style of writing - and at times I had no clue what was going on. I've watched both the original series and the remake, but never found any of the books to read until now. I did learn a few things though, and I would try reading another title in the series if I can find one
July 11, 2020
Excellent - I ended up doing some research to find out more about the French in Indochina and the lessons we should have learned before we got mired in Vietnam. Great mystery that got me learning more!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 27, 2023
Good but the inciting incident remains damnably opaque.
July 22, 2024
totally confused
October 23, 2016
It is enjoyable to break out from my usual US UK dominated norm of fiction. Although this is not far off. This is more of a routine crime novel than anything sufficiently out of the ordinary to rate a fourth star.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews