G.I. Confidential (2019) by Martin Limón
GoodReads meta-data is 198 pages, rated 4.04 by 52 litizens.
Genre: krimi.
Verdict: Rings true.
Another neat police procedural set in the jurisdiction of the US Eighth Army, 1970s South Korea. Ironmen George Sueño and Ernie Bascom investigate GI black marketing (selling everything from tax-payer subsidised cigarettes to washing machines bought cheap at the camp PX to Koreans for profit), drug dealing, stolen weapons, bored and dallying army wives, and such like, until one day a splash in a Hong Kong rag sends them North to talk to a frontline commander at the DMZ who keeps ordering combat alerts within sight of NKs. A quiet word off-line is what HQ wants, but where these two go thunder claps follow. ‘Quiet’ is not the word.
This is the 14th instalment in the long running series and par for the course with one addition and two subtractions. The addition is a strong-willed, razor-sharp journalist who stays one step ahead our heroes all the way, and what’s more is a woman. By turns, she bamboozles them, beguiles them, threatens them, outsmarts them, stays two steps ahead of them, manipulates them far more effectively than their superiors and then briskly takes her leave, while our heroes stand around gaping. Atta girl! The subtractions are from the Ironman quotient. In previous titles George and Ernie have enough alcohol and sex to float the U.S. Seventh Fleet on one liquid or the other, but not this time. Both are oddly dry on each front. Ernie’s zipper seems stuck for once, and George must be broke if he cannot drink dry every one of the many bars they enter.
As with every entry in the series, Límon’s knowledge, respect, and affection for Korea’s people, culture, history, and language shines through. He was a GI Lifer and spent half of that time in Korea. It shows and glows. Equally usual is the far-fetched plot, though as strange Sergeant Strange says to George and Ernie at one point, ‘In Korea most things are possible.’