A Long December

Donald Harsted

Fourth Estate, £10.99 Pb

Rel: Dec 2003

Reviewed by Simon Fowler

Donald Harsted is an author new to me. Before turning to crime writing he was a deputy sheriff in Iowa, and it is this experience which makes this book special. It is December 2001 and America is still on alert after the events of ‘9/11’. Deputy Sheriff Carl Houseman is called to investigate a murder on a rural back road. The execution-style killing is linked to a turf war over drugs among immigrant workers at the local meat processing plant, but over the days it becomes clear that in fact that the murder is connected with an attempt by terrorists to poison meat from the plant which is being transported to kosher delis across the States. Interspersed are chapters on a siege at the local farm in which Houseman and three colleagues are pinned downed by the terrorists.

The book has a real ring of authenticity about it, particularly the account of the siege – was Harsted ever involved in one himself? Houseman and his fellow officers in the Nation County Sheriff Department come across as being likeable hardworking men and women under pressure with too few resources to do their work properly. He also describes the bureaucratic tangle of the authorities – county, state and federal – who are gradually drawn into the investigation from the Iowa Department of Agriculture (almost certainly a first for crime fiction) to the FBI. However, Harsted has a tendency to hero-worship the FBI’s Special Agents and as the novel moves from the local to the national (and even international – there’s a walk on part for Scotland Yard) he becomes less sure of himself.

Even so if you want a different view of policing in America – one that is not urban and centred in New York or Los Angeles – then this book is well worth trying.