Bryony Rheam to talk at the 2022 Agatha Christie Festival

 Reproduced from The Standard (https://thestandard.newsday.co.zw/2022/06/26/rheam-to-take-part-on-agatha-christies-trip/)

AWARD-WINNING Bulawayo author Bryony Rheam (pictured) is preparing to give a speech on Agatha Christie’s 1922 trip to Southern Rhodesia, which is part of the Agatha Christie Festival 2022. Rheam, a winner of the international Write Your Own Christie competition, is an enthusiast for the writing of Agatha Christie.  The event will be held on September 15 at the Spanish Barn, Torquay at 12.30, admission is free.

“In September of this year, I will be giving a talk on Agatha Christie’s 1922 trip to Southern Rhodesia,” Rheam told Standard Style. “Earlier this year, I was contacted by a South African writer, Michael Sears, who, together with his co-author, Stanley Trollip, had been invited to give a talk on Agatha Christie’s trip to South Africa (as part of the same trip).“As he knew, I had written on Agatha Christie’s trip to Rhodesia, Sears asked me if I would like to join them in the talk.”

She said not many people know that Agatha Christie came to Rhodesia and many people just lump Rhodesia/Zimbabwe with South Africa.“I am really excited to be shedding light on this part of her journey and making people aware of the fact that Rhodesia/Zimbabwe and South Africa are two different countries,” Rheam said.

Zimbabwe cover

.

“My interest in Agatha Christie began when I was a child. “My grandmother loved reading her books and I would go to the library for her to change her books so I knew all the covers and the titles. We used to watch all the series and films as a family and so they were very much a part of my life growing up. I was excited to discover that one of her lesser-known books, The Man in the Brown Suit, was partly set in Southern Rhodesia, mostly in Bulawayo and Victoria Falls.”

UK cover

Rheam added: “I then set out to investigate her journey and see if I could find any evidence that she had been here.  I wrote about this in my blog.”

All Come to Dust is Rheam’s second book,  written in the style of a Christie detective storyThe novel is set in modern day Zimbabwe, but it also looks back to the time just before independence.

All Come To Dust by Bryony Rheam — enter the mysterious detective

Review of All Come to Dust, a murder mystery novel set in Zimbabwe by Bryony Rheam

from BookerTalk May 24, 2022  https://bookertalk.com/all-come-to-dust-by-bryony-rheam-enter-the-mysterious-detective/

Bryony Rheam’s Zimbabwean crime fiction novel All Come To Dust offers a detective who is as much a mystery as the murder he is meant to be investigating.  Chief Inspector Edmund Dude models himself on the quick witted, perceptive detectives he’s seen in countless films and TV programmes. He is particularly fond of The Saint. Edmund is itching for a chance to prove he’s their equal and not simply the guy who sits in a back office in a shabby Bulawayo police station organising paper work and files. 

His chance comes with the death of wealthy ex-pat Marcia Pullman, a woman  who nobody likes and everyone seems to have had a reason to want out of the picture. She bullies her staff, lords it over other members of her book club and looks down her nose at other ex-pats who have fallen victim to Zimbabwe’s rampant inflation.

Edmund’s determination to discover the person responsible for Marcia’s death is frustrated at every turn. Her maid servant and people who knew her fail to pass on key pieces of information or deliberately try to mislead Edmund. Given the run around by the pathologist and denied access to the case files, Edmund comes to suspect that the dead woman’s husband is using his connections high up in the police force to get the case closed down as fast as possible.

Despite being told more than once by his senior officer to keep his nose out of the case and go back to sorting out paperwork, Edmund perseveres. He turns out to be an unorthodox detective who bumbles along with the reluctant help of a heavy-drinking odd job man as unofficial “assistant”. Together they mount night time surveillance operations and stage house break-ins to search for documents. 

Edmund is a complex man, a loner and an outsider who looks for order and structure in his life. We learn his backstory through a series of flashbacks to his childhood in 1979. They reveal a mystery in his own life: the fate of the couple who were his mother’s employers. They had taken Edmund under their wing and ensured he got a good education. But one day when he was still a boy, they just disappeared. 

There’s a further mystery about the Chief Inspector and his role in the police force that comes to light very late in the novel. It would spoil the book for other readers so I’ll just say that the mystery within a mystery within a mystery structure adds an interesting dimension to All Come to Dust. It makes it far more than just another police procedural.

It’s a carefully structured novel that touches on issues of class, race and the colonial legacy in modern day Bulawayo. More significantly it highlights the way young and poor black Zimbabwean girls become prey to unscrupulous people with empty promises of a better life in another country.

The plot takes a while to unravel and comes with more than its fair share of red herrings until it ends with an Agatha Christie style denouement. It was a little too long for my tastes but I did enjoy the novel’s insights into life in Zimbabwe.

All Come to Dust will definitely appeal to readers who enjoy character-driven crime fiction with plenty of twists and a memorable and unusual detective figure.

Footnotes

Bryony Rheam was born in Zimbabwe and currently lives with her family in Bulawayo. Her first novel This September Sun was named best first book in the Zimbabwe Book Publishers’ Association Awards in 2010. All Come To Dust, her second novel. was chosen as one of ten top African thrillers in Publishers Weekly, who described it as a “stunning crime debut". It was first published in Zimbabwe in May 2021 and worldwide by the Welsh independent press Parthian Books in March 2022.

All Come to Dust reviewed in Grumpy Old Books

Reproduced from http://grumpyoldbooks.blogspot.com/2022/04/all-come-to-dust-by-bryony-rheam.html

All Come To Dust by Bryony Rheam

 526 pages 

You can buy All Come To Dust...Here 

You can follow Bryony Rheam's blog...Here 

 I have received a free copy of this book from amaBooks and Parthian Books in exchange for an open and honest review. 

The Blurb... 

Marcia Pullman has been found dead at home in the leafy suburbs of Bulawayo. Chief Inspector Edmund Dube is onto the case at once, but it becomes increasingly clear that there are those, including the dead woman’s husband, who do not want him asking questions. 

The case drags Edmund back into his childhood to when his mother’s employers disappeared one day and were never heard from again, an incident that has shadowed his life. As his investigation into the death progresses, Edmund realises the two mysteries are inextricably linked and that unravelling the past is a dangerous undertaking threatening his very sense of self. 

My Review... 

Well, what an unexpected gem. 

All Come To Dust tells the story of black Police Officer Edmund investigating the murder of wealthy ex-pat Marcia Pullman in modern day Zimbabwe. I think the book succeeds because it engages the reader on many levels. 

Firstly there is an excellent, convoluted, multi-layered murder mystery ala Agatha Christie or PD James. Or I should say there are three mysteries at play. Who (if anyone) murdered Marcia Pullman, who defiled her corpse and what happened to the McDougal family. The McDougal family were Edmund's mother's employers who took a special interest in Edmund, ensuring that he got a good education. However, one day during Edmund's childhood they just disappeared. 

 

There is also a slightly comedic/tragic aspect to Edmund. He is a very shy, bookish introvert bumbling along in his investigation. He finds a collaborator in semi-alcoholic, white-trash, handyman Craig. Craig is a cynical and resentful man. Set this against the incompetent and corrupt background of the comically under resourced Zimbabwe Police Force and it can make for a situation ripe for ridicule. 

In addition the author offers some very interesting takes on a culture that is alien to most western readers and one that would also seem to be in a slow decline. She gives a fascinating insight into the once powerful but now diminishing white Zimbabwe/ ex Rhodesian community. 

As well as the regional insights into class, culture and colour of her community, the author also portrays parts of the universal human experience very well. Loneliness, religion, despair and hope are deftly handled. How the past comes back constantly and intertwines with the present is also a thread throughout this intriguing novel. 

The first part of the novel is steadily paced, but ramps towards the end and the denouement, where Edmund gathers the suspects together and goes through their various, nefarious and complicated intrigues one by one. If there was a tweak to be made, I think the complex plot and numerous back stories, while all well done, means the narrative is possibly slightly too long. 

I started this book expecting a bog standard cozy crime caper. I was pleasantly surprised. The balance of cozy to crime was just how I like it. The hinterland of excellent socio-political with a philosophical tinge writing was a huge bonus. 

Selected Quotes... 

"I envy you, Chief Inspector. 

Me? Why? 

Because you're black. You belong to a community, a race. Living here, being white is such a burden. We've been cut adrift from wherever we came from, amputated like a gangrenous leg that no longer works. We have no roots, no base."

"The kind of policeman she was used to was watchful but for other reasons. Their eyes followed you with a watchful greed. How could they get what they wanted be it money or goods - or sex? But the truth, the truth was rarely something a police officer looked for unless it benefited them in some way."

"I went to Sir Herbert Stanley Primary School, he said without really knowing why he said it. In his embarrassment he wanted to find a reason for his intelligence, as though he didn't deserve it. I was very fortunate to have been sent there by my mother's employers. 

Her wry smile broadened. You're very lucky. But intelligence has little to do with education. I know a lot of educated people who aren't very clever at all."

"Always he felt the loss of that faith. It was like the loss of a childhood belief in fairies or Father Christmas. What was the difference in those beliefs - God and Father Christmas - except at a certain age someone told you the truth about the latter and let you get on with the former? What would life be like as an adult if you still believed in a fat bearded man who came down the chimney once a year? You'd be mad. Yet a God who was never seen, never had been seen, lived on and on - and on." 

About the Author... 

Bryony Rheam was born in Kadoma, Zimbabwe. Her debut novel This September Sun won Zimbabwe's Best First Book Award in 2010 and reached Number 1 on Amazon Kindle in the UK. She has also published a range of short stories in anthologies. In 2014, she won an international competition to write a chapter of an Agatha Christie novel. She has attended the Ake Book and Arts festival in Abeokuta, Nigeria and Africa Utopia at the Southbank Centre in London. Rheam is a recipient of the 2018 Miles Morland Writing scholarship. She is an English teacher at Girls’ College and lives in Bulawayo with her partner and their two children.

Agatha and I

 

Agatha and I, by Bryony Rheam, is reproduced from https://murderiseverywhere.blogspot.com/2022/03/agatha-and-i.html

Bryony Rheam

Bryony Rheam is a Zimbabwean author who lives with her family in Bulawayo. Her debut novel This September Sun won Best First Book award in Zimbabwe and went to #1 on Kindle in the UK. Her new book, All Come to Dust, also an award winner, was chosen as one of ten top African thrillers by Publishers’ Weekly who described it as a “stunning crime debut”. I loved the book, and it was my pick of mysteries set in Africa for 2021. Paula Hawkins (author of The Girl on the Train) clearly felt the same way, describing the protagonist, Chief Inspector Edmund Dube, as “a fictional detective as memorable as Hercule Poirot”.

That would have made Bryony’s day because of her long association with Agatha Christie’s books. Here she tells us about that and how it motivated All Come to Dust.

Welcome Bryony to MurderIsEverywhere. Michael Sears

In preparing what to write for this blog, I looked back on some old blogposts of mine where I discussed the importance of Agatha Christie in my life. One of the lines stands out for me and seems to have taken on a deeper meaning than I meant at the time. I had just finished researching Agatha Christie’s trip to Rhodesia in 1924, a trip that resulted in her writing her third novel, The Man in the Brown Suit, and I had delighted in being able to follow her on part of her journey to Bulawayo and Victoria Falls. I wrote: ‘When I began my research, I thought I was following Agatha Christie on part of her journey, but now I wonder if the journey hasn't become my own.’

My journey with Agatha Christie began many years ago with my maternal grandmother. She was a lovely lady: very clever, well-read and funny. Having left school at the age of fourteen, she was largely self-taught. She loved to read, and she read anything and everything, but, in particular, she loved Agatha Christie. On Friday afternoons, I would take her books to the library for her, and I would exchange one lot of Agatha Christies for another.

She must have read them all; she must have read them two or three times, but it did not bother her. As an adult, and as an ardent fan of Christie’s myself, I now understand part of this desire to read and reread her novels. My grandmother was brokenhearted - she had lost her son in a car accident when he was twenty-one. She struggled, but she could not overcome severe depression and grief. All reading provides an escape, but with Christie it was so much more.

Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie is considered the "Queen of Crime". Although not alone in doing so, she is credited with the development of the crime novel into what we know today and its growth in popularity. She is best known for a "closed murder" story in which the crime can only have been committed by a limited number of people, each with their own particular motive for doing so. Everyone is a suspect and usually it is the least obvious person who "dunnit".

The murders are not gory; there are no detailed descriptions of prolonged deaths, the pain and injuries inflicted or the mutilated body. That is not important. What is, is the method and the motivation. The planning behind the murders is always meticulous: the murderer knows who will be where when, how many minutes he or she has to cross the garden and enter the study window, how important it is that the poison is administered with the bedtime cocoa and not the after-dinner coffee, or how the drinks on the tray must be arranged just so in order that the victim chooses the correct one.

Of course, they make other errors which eventually lead to their downfall. Yet it is this absolute attention to detail that I believe makes Christie novels so intriguing. It’s the puzzle that’s important and puzzles can eventually be solved. All the pieces are there; the reader just has to put them together correctly – which of course we rarely, if ever, do – and that’s exactly where Christie’s genius lies.

Despite her upper-middle class background, Agatha Christie always felt like something of an outsider, which likely accounts for two of her most famous detectives, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, being on the margins of society: Poirot is a foreigner and Marple is elderly. As such, they are able to bring attention to both the idiosyncrasies and the shortcomings of English society.

But there is another way in which Christie undermines the very essence of Englishness, and, in doing so, also undercuts the stereotypes associated with it. Her books capture that beautiful feel of an orderly life: the clock ticking in the drawing room, the letters on the breakfast tray, the train arriving at exactly three minutes past four. Her characters who lead such orderly lives are well-spoken, polite and know which spoon is for the soup and which for the dessert. The undermining of all this is what unsettles us so much. How could the vicar’s wife devise a murder so clever and with such calculation that it takes the powers of a super sleuth to detect the flaws? How could the murderer have written such hateful letters in the beautiful library; how could they have thought of putting poison in the tea served so punctually at four o’clock on the terrace?

It unsettles us. Christie takes us into the dark areas of the places we consider safe. More than that, the very things that add to that lovely slow rhythm of conventionally English life - trains that run on time, tea at four o’clock, an efficient postal system - seem to have been used against us. If these things, these people, these places are unsafe, then where is not? We would feel less vulnerable on the streets of New York or in the ganglands of Glasgow. As readers, we feel we have got into the car of the stranger our parents always warned us about. But they were smiling, they were welcoming, they had double-barrelled surnames we say – and so we seal our doom.

The good thing, of course, is that she rescues us. The detective arrives, the plot is worked out and the murderer is caught. Except perhaps for Murder on the Orient Express, everything is sorted out and any loose ends are firmly tied up. The puzzle is solved and the dark places dissolve. Once again, the calm ticking of the clock is restored. That is what I find so satisfying and that is what appealed so much to my grandmother. She had come to fear life. Her experience told her that anything can be taken from you at any time, even people you love with your entire self. Being a good person, living a good life – what did it mean? It was no guarantee that you wouldn’t be dealt a terrible hand. But if the dark places were not made light in her own life, at least they were in fiction.

Bryony with Matthew Pritchard

In 2014, I was a winner of the Write Your Own Christie competition organised by AgathaChristie.com.  The prize was dinner with Agatha Christie’s grandson, Matthew Pritchard, and her publisher at HarperCollins at Greenway, her home in Devon.  It was an emotional moment for me, one that linked the little girl who spent afternoons listening to her grandmother’s stories of life in India and Persia to the adult with a longing to write a crime novel of her own.

Outside Agatha Christie's House in Greenway

Yet it was to be another six years before this became a reality. All Come To Dust was published in Zimbabwe in November 2020, the UK in September 2021, and in the US this month. When I sat down to write it, I wanted to follow the structure of a classic Christie novel. However, there were some very obvious differences that I had to negotiate: present day Bulawayo is very different to the England that Christie wrote of from the 1920s to the 1970s. A closed murder seemed unlikely; in fact, it felt claustrophobic. The more I thought and planned, the more that it became apparent that many of the conventional tropes of the western crime novel would not work.

Zimbabwe’s police force is riddled with corruption.  It is also generally quite inefficient and there would certainly be very little forensic investigation into a death. However, I still decided to use a policeman to investigate the murder. He is also an outsider, a man who wants to do good in a world that seems overwhelmingly corrupt. He spends his time typing up traffic offences, trying to put the world to rights through the meticulous recording of events that will probably be settled by the payment of a bribe to someone on the force.

The lack of forensic investigation was a bonus for me as I, like Agatha Christie, could concentrate on the puzzle and not get weighed down by having to bring in technical detail. Nor did I go into any great description of the murder itself for I do not feel the need to do so. This is probably one of the reasons why reviewers often describe All Come To Dust as ‘an old-fashioned’ murder.

Yet this would suggest a ‘happy ending’ and, while it is true, that the mystery itself is solved, there is also a strong sense that any form of justice in Zimbabwe is not administered in the conventional way.  The sense of restored order evident at the end of an Agatha Christie novel is also not present. The peace is hesitant, wary, aware always that it is under threat.

Modern Day Bulawayo

I might not have set out to undermine the archetypal crime novel, but it became increasingly clear that the structure did not sit well in an African setting. It seemed obvious therefore to try and highlight this disconnect rather than ignore it. In doing so, I was able to explore modern Zimbabwean society through an eclectic range of characters, each bound in some way to the past and fearful of the future.

When I finished writing All Come To Dust, I decided that I would not write another crime novel. I had set myself a challenge and I had completed it. But now I see crime writing offers so many opportunities to explore the inconsistencies evident in Zimbabwean life. And so it is that the quest to follow Agatha Christie’s journey has led me to a journey of my own. I can only be excited of what lies ahead.

Bryony is to participate, with Michael Sears, at this year's International Agatha Christie Festival.

All Come to Dust 'is way above five stars'

To simply describe this beautifully written, densely textured, novel as a murder mystery would be an egregious understatement. To describe it as a police procedural, or a maverick cop, or a psychological thriller – for it is all of these – would similarly undersell it. To set the scene, the story centres around Edmund Dube, a black Zimbabwean, at two specific points in his life. In 1979, aged seven (the Jesuitical age when personality is formed), he is almost the only non-white pupil at a prestigious school in Bulawayo, Rhodesia. His access to the school had been facilitated by Chief Inspector McDougal, for whom Edmund’s mother worked as a maid. Now, in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, he is Detective Chief Inspector Edmund Dube. The cultural shifts evidenced in that name change underpin this book but are subliminal not overt. The reader doesn’t need to know the history because the writing provides the ambience.

When a woman is reported as murdered, Edmund rushes off to investigate and quickly establishes that the paperknife buried in the centre of her chest is not the murder weapon, because she was dead before she was stabbed. The deceased is a white woman, Marcia Pullman, part of the dwindling number of such individuals, rich, influential, a pillar of society and detested by almost everyone. Her husband is a beefy, obnoxious, functioning alcoholic who, on the face of it, runs a safari company. Both of these sound like stereotypes, caricatures, but in this writer’s hands they are neither. Edmund begins an investigation but is swiftly removed from the case (if a natural death embellished with a dagger actually constitutes a case) and side-lined, ridiculed. Clearly the Pullmans have enormous influence within this kleptocracy. Edmund, and an unlikely (indeed random) assistant, must try to resolve if there is a murder; if so who is the murderer; what illegal activities surround the Pullmans' apparent control of the local powers-that-be? And what connection, if any, is there with his childhood?

The quality of the writing, the skilful use of metaphor, the sense of place, the depth of the characterisation, the intricacy of the plot, combine to produce a singular work. This book is way above five stars.

 from Denis Wheller, Goodreads

Bryony Rheam wins the Zimbabwe National Arts Merit Award for Outstanding Fiction

The Zimbabwean writer Bryony Rheam has added to her list of accolades by being awarded the Zimbabwean National Arts Merit Award in the category Outstanding Fiction. The award is for her novel All Come to Dust, which was initially published in Zimbabwe before being co-published by Parthian Books and amaBooks in the UK. The National Arts Merit Awards are the premier award given by the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe in recognition of outstanding achievements in the arts and culture. The inaugural award ceremony was held in February 2002. Since then, the award ceremonies have been held in February each year to recognise artists who had excelled in the previous year. The exception is this year's awards, which, because of Covid 19 restrictions, considered the work of artists from the previous two years.

All Come to Dust  was previously recognised in November 2021 by winning the Bulawayo Arts Award for Outstanding Literary Work (Fiction). 

Her novel, in which Detective Chief Inspector Edmund Dube investigates the suspicious death of socialite Marcia Pullman with the assistance of the ‘mullet hairstyled’ Craig Martin, can be considered a long-simmering, intriguing, twisting murder mystery. But it is also an incisive depiction of life in present-day  Bulawayo and of how the injustice and privilege of the past are still baked into everyday life.

Bryony Rheam commented: 

'I'm delighted that All Come to Dust is doing so well. Winning these two Zimbabwean awards is a reflection of the fact that local readers can identify with the plot and the issues it raises. It is a great honour to be recognised in my own country and this gives me the impetus to carry on. 

However, the book is not confined to Zimbabwean readers. I have been heartened by the number of reviewers and other readers who have said that they learned something about Zimbabwe and its history through reading the book. I believe that place and time affect the feel of a book, but characters are generally universal and they are what interests readers most. I didn't initially intend to write another crime novel, but now I see it as an interesting way to explore society. The African crime novel is different to the Western one for a number of reasons and I think that makes it quite an exciting genre to be exploring right now.'

Goodreads reviews of All Come to Dust

 

Crime fiction with a central detective character is a favourite staple on the bookshelves. All Come To Dust by Bryony Rheam takes the stereotypes, shakes them out of the box and upends expectations. The first few pages take the reader into an “other” place, familiar yet strange. The colours, smells and the noises of suburban Bulawayo are woven throughout this book, creating an atmosphere that leaves a lingering smell of hot concrete, bright bloom bursts and a coating of orange dust on the tongue. A post colonial world that has aged relics from Britain trying to cling on to an outdated way of life while the pulse and chaos of modern Zimbabwe strains to burst through underneath.

Chief Inspector Edmund Dube is a diligent police officer who works methodically with a razor sharp instinct for the truth. Polite, deferential and softly spoken, he’s a man who puts up with the broken typewriters, scuffed shoes and the down at heel environs of his shabby Bulawayo police station. He realises not only is he the wrong person for the job, he is in the wrong place at the wrong time. Forced to ask for a lift from a stranger because the only working police car is being used elsewhere, he is light years away from his cherished schoolboy reading book world of traditional English policing.

At first slightly comical and almost pathetic – we soon come to realise that Edmund Dube is a sharp observant operator.

He is no Adam Dalgleish, Morse or even Poirot but could stand shoulder to shoulder with those literary detective creations as he starts his crime solving. The novel flits between present day and Dube’s 1970s upbringing in a world that has slowly disappeared. A bright African schoolboy, Dube’s childhood memories provide clues to his personality and deliver an intriguing mystery story arc.

Victim Marcia Pullman is the typical suburban social climber, a bully and a snob. Her murder – behind the closed security gates of a house staffed with sullen servants and an obnoxious husband – sparks a classic detective whodunnit. Bryony Rheam deftly draws a colourful cast of believable characters that have flaws, secrets and many human failings.

Chief Inspector Dube has to battle against corruption, ingrained racism and class prejudice as he works his way to the book’s conclusion. Bryony Rheam has created a richly detailed, hugely enjoyable and satisfying crime novel, dense with clues, twists and turns. It’s no surprise that this book has already gained prestigious awards in her native country.

A murder mystery with an African aura that refreshingly skews traditional reference points for English language crime fiction.

Sue Lewis

----------------------------------------

Bryony Rheam's well-crafted murder mystery takes a hard look at life in contemporary Zimbabwe. Much of the story takes place in a historically white suburb of Bulawayo. Several of the inhabitants are hard up after the runaway inflation, but those who have access to hard currency – in one way or another – are doing much better. The latter include Marcia Pullman and her husband who run a tour operation, but they clearly have many lucrative side interests.

Then Marcia is discovered dead in her home with a letter opener sticking out of her chest. Chief Inspector Edmund Dube goes to the scene, having wheedled a lift from a man at the police station who is arguing about a speeding fine. Dube realizes that there’s not enough blood and it’s clear that the victim was dead before she was stabbed. The pathologist, a friend of Marcia’s husband, agrees and says she died of natural causes. Nevertheless, the question of why she was stabbed remains. The crime is laid at the door of the recently dismissed gardener, but Edmund believes there's a lot more to it than that. However, the senior officers at the police station seem intent on thwarting his efforts to get to the bottom of the case.

Edmund identifies a cast of suspects: Marcia’s husband; the Pullmans’ maid and gardener; the peculiar neighbor; Janet Peters who was bullied by her, and has an invalid mother; a mysterious woman interested in Marcia's old records; and Craig Martin, who has publicly threatened her.

Superficially, the novel seems to follow the usual tropes of the detective story genre, but as the author delves into Edmund's past, the book's rich characterizations and subtle surprises remind one more of PD James than Agatha Christie. Nothing is as it seems.

My pick for the best African mystery of 2021.

Michael Stanley

------------------------------------

Marcia Pullman was preparing for her book group when she felt a headache coming on and decided to lie down. When Janet, a member of the group, arrives she finds Marcia in her bed with a letter opener protruding from her chest. The coroner determined that she was dead of natural causes before being stabbed, but why stab a corpse? Chief Inspector Edmund Dube takes the call reporting the death and arrives to investigate. Dube was influenced to become a policeman from the images of investigators in novels and movies, but he is soft spoken and overlooked by everyone at his station. Marcia’s husband has connections with the police and Dube is soon warned off. Determined to find answers, he continues to investigate on his own. The story builds slowly as Dube questions Janet, Marcia’s husband, her maid Dorcas, Craig Martin, a man who recently threatened her, and her neighbor Roland. Each time he reaches out to them he learns more of their connections and history with Marcia and realizes that she had a hold over each of them and they all hated her.

Set in a primarily white suburb in Zimbabwe, this is a contemporary mystery that deals with the faltering economy and racial relations in a post-colonial society. Bryony Rheam builds her story slowly until the final third of the book, which moves rapidly to the conclusion. In a Poirot-like confrontation, Dube gathers his suspects together and reveals their secrets and his conclusions with a truly surprising twist. All Come to Dust is a lengthy mystery that is beautifully written and well worth the time that it takes to follow Chief Inspector Dube’s quest for the truth.

Jean Kolinofsky

---------------------------------------

A fabulous combination of eclectic Bulawayo characters with strong character development, vivid writing, and a great murder mystery to boot. 

Absolutely loved this.

Margie Rees

Michael Sears interviews Bryony Rheam about her new murder mystery

From: https: //www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/books/news/2021-12-06-michael-sears-interviews-bryony-rheam-about-her-new-murder-mystery/

Originally from The Big Thrill (1/12/21) Africa Scene: Bryony Rheam

Bryony Rheam is a Zimbabwean who lives in Bulawayo. Her debut novel This September Sun was named Best First Book in the Zimbabwe Book Publishers Association Awards and went to number 1 on the UK Kindle chart. She was one of the five Africans chosen for a Morland scholarship in 2018.

Rheam’s new book, All Come to Dust, was chosen as one of 10 top African thrillers in Publishers Weekly, who described it as a “stunning crime debut.” Paula Hawkins, author of The Girl on the Train, said it was “an intriguing, twisting murder mystery, a witty combination of old-fashioned detective story and keenly-observed portrait of life in suburban Bulawayo,” and chief inspector Edmund Dube was “a fictional detective as memorable as Hercule Poirot”.

In the story, Marcia Pullman is discovered dead in her Bulawayo home with a letter opener sticking out of her chest, but there’s not enough blood and it’s obvious that she was dead before she was stabbed. Edmund goes to the scene, having to wheedle a lift from Craig Martin, who is at the police station arguing a speeding fine. The pathologist, a friend of Marcia’s husband, says she died of natural causes, and the senior officers at the police station seem intent on thwarting Edmund’s efforts to get to the bottom of the case.

Superficially, the book seems to follow the tropes of the detective story genre, but soon we see it’s nothing like that. The rich characterisations and subtle surprises remind one more of PD James than Agatha Christie.

In this interview with The Big Thrill, Rheam shares further insight into her latest release and teases what she is working on next.

Bryony Rheam

Although your first book, This September Sun, also involves a murder, All Come To Dust is more of a murder mystery. Initially, the story seems to follow the framework of a typical detective story — the smart detective who is committed to the solution of the crime against the odds, the cast of suspects, the unreliable witnesses. It even has the final gathering of the suspects where everything is to be revealed. But you turn everything on its head. Was that always your plan, or did the context drive you in that direction?

I am a great Agatha Christie fan and always wanted to write a crime novel. Like Christie, I am not a great fan of a lot of violence; to me, unravelling the mystery is the most important thing. However, the classic Christie-type plot belongs very much to a time and a place, and it was obvious it would not work in Zimbabwe, despite our little English eccentricities that have survived 40 years after independence.

Many of the characters have some link to a type of crime writer: Craig, for example, reads an author called DP Radley (a fictional author) who chases fast cars and is surrounded by beautiful women; Mrs Whitstable reads Inspector Morse; Edmund reads The Saint. Yet none of these detectives seem to fit the location. They all seem to fall short in some way.

I suppose this is a reflection of the fact that I couldn’t use that same model of the detective story in the context of Bulawayo. The police are very unhelpful in Zimbabwe, and there is little in the way of forensic investigation, so I couldn’t rely on bringing in certain information in the same way. As I was writing, I became increasingly aware that the novel was not going to fit a certain model, and so I decided to undermine it instead.

Chief inspector Dube is an intriguing character. He’s smart and committed to solving the crime, but his back story suggests he has many deep issues of his own. We follow his childhood in Rhodesia as the son of a live-in maid whose apparently kindly white employers help him go to a good school and even with his homework every afternoon. How did you conceive him and his role in the novel?

A flame tree-lined street in Zimbabwe

The Zimbabwean police are not well-known for being either efficient or useful. During the Robert Mugabe days, they were synonymous with corruption. I thought there must be someone in the force who wanted to do a good job, someone who signed up with good intentions. That’s where Edmund came in.

The classic detective novel focuses on the crime at hand: who did it and why. There is not much detail about the investigator’s life. More recent crime novelists often present the investigator/police officer as a lonely person, someone who has given their life to solving crimes as an escape from the chaos of a dysfunctional family life, an unhappy marriage, or an inability to connect to others on a social level. In some ways, Edmund falls into this category as his marriage is not a happy one. However, he is also isolated at work, he is not taken seriously and is constantly put down. This forces him to go off on his own and work independently of the police force.

I am always drawn to the idea of an outsider. Edmund has never fitted in. He was one of a small group of black children who were let in to formerly white-only government schools in 1979. This was a very difficult time in the country’s history as it began to transition to majority rule. Edmund’s mother’s employers believe they are doing the right thing for Edmund by sending him there but are unaware of the challenges he faces. Later on in his life, Edmund again feels he does not belong when he joins the police force and is forced to take part in activities he does not agree with.

Edmund is intelligent and sensitive. He wants to do right in a country where everyone is very obviously doing wrong. He craves order and structure, hoping to put the world right by typing traffic offences and making sure forms are completed properly, yet outside is chaos and corruption. There is no room for people like him. It was very important for me to develop his back story and show how he came to be the sort of person he is. I liked the idea that he was solving a crime, and yet was also part of an unsolved mystery.

A house in Zimbabwe where the Pullmans may have lived

Marcia Pullman is the victim, but she and her husband are most unpleasant characters. Marcia dies in the first chapter, yet much of the book is about her and her impact on the people around her. By the end, we feel we know her well. Was it hard to build her character only through the eyes of the people who knew her?

I suppose in some ways I was unfair with Marcia, as, apart from the very beginning of the book, I don’t show her point of view. Everything the reader learns of her is through other people. However, I feel she is more symbolic than anything else. There is a new type of corruption in Zimbabwe which in some ways is quite difficult to explain. For years, people have pointed at the government as the main source of corruption, the implication being anyone else is not corrupt. I feel many white people in particular are like this. People fail to see how they themselves are drawn into the web of corruption. If they do acknowledge it, it is with the sense of “well, everyone else is doing it” or “how else are we supposed to survive?”

Perhaps ironically, there is no racism in this new type of corruption. Nigel Pullman teams up with the police, Marcia buys valuable antiques off old people (who would be mainly white) and gives them nothing for them.

Another view of the house

I based Marcia on someone I met who did this very thing. Back in 2000, when many people were leaving the country due to the farm invasions, she would buy up lots of valuable antiques and ship them to the UK. Many people had beautiful furniture that had been in their families for generations, but they did not really know what they were worth, tending to view them as old rather than antique. The same thing happened with old cars. You used to see lots of Morris Minors around, for example, typically driven by old ladies who had had them for years and years. Then buyers came from places like SA and bought them for a song. It was criminal.

Edmund identifies a cast of suspects: Marcia’s husband; the Pullmans’ maid and gardener; the peculiar neighbour; Janet Peters, who was bullied by her, and Janet’s invalid mother; a mysterious woman interested in her old records; and Craig Martin, who has threatened her. Each seems, in a way, to illustrate a different aspect of modern life in Bulawayo. Was that part of your plan for the novel?

Yes, it was. As well as writing a crime novel, I also wished to explore modern-day Zimbabwean society. We have all become increasingly isolated and lonely. This is due to politics and also the dire economic situation. There are those, like Marcia Pullman, who look after themselves at the expense of others, and there are those, like Dorcas, the maid, and like Janet Peters, who cannot stand up for themselves.

Craig is a handyman with poor business skills and low self-esteem. Edmund dragoons him to help with the investigation—staking out suspects, driving him around. Despite their wide differences, they seem to have features in common both in their adult lives and in their childhood pasts. Is this a yin and yang situation?

Craig and Edmund have much in common. They both had a traumatic event happen in their childhoods, and they are both essentially quite lonely characters, unable to connect to others.  However, Edmund is definitely much more organized and focused than Craig, who really is very lost. Somewhere along the line, they help each other. When Edmund asks Craig to do some investigating for him, it gives his life a sense of purpose, and he, in turn, can be of more practical help to Edmund.

Much of the story takes place in a historically white suburb near where the Pullmans live. Several of the inhabitants are hard up after the runaway inflation, but those that have access to hard currency—in one way or another—are doing much better. Did you set out to explore the effects of this modern dichotomy in the country?

Yes, definitely. Life in Zimbabwe has been very difficult over the last twenty years. Hyper inflation wiped out life savings and pensions for many people. The transition to the US dollar was very clumsily done as well, and many people lost money that way, too.  Sometimes it feels that almost everyone is doing something dodgy in order to earn US dollars! There is very little appeal in doing a conventional job as the salaries are so low. I think the older generation have been very badly hit. They struggle to survive on ridiculously small pensions, and really battle to understand the value of the currency as there is the official government rate of exchange and then the black market rate, which varies considerably. The divide between the haves and the have nots is widening considerably.

Would you tell us something about what you are working on now?

I have finished my third novel, The Dying of The Light, and it is at the editing stage. It is set in Bulawayo in the late 1930s and is told from the perspective of a house servant who works for a wealthy lawyer and his wife. I have started a book for young adults called Going Up.  It is set in modern-day Bulawayo and concerns a young man who has gotten into drinking and drugs. His wealthy grandfather gives him an ultimatum to get himself sorted out and hands him the responsibility of evicting vendors from an old department store that he owns and wishes to knock down. However, the young man soon begins to develop other plans for the building and sets out to restore it to its former glory.

Just lately, I have been thinking of another crime novel, and may even bring Edmund Dube back, this time as a private investigator. I think the crime genre is a perfect one in which to explore the decay at the heart of Zimbabwean society.

Michael Sears writes with Stanley Trollip under the name Michael Stanley. Their award-winning mystery series with Detective Kubu is set in Botswana, a fascinating country with magnificent conservation areas and varied peoples. The first book in a new series featuring Kubu as a young detective is Facets of Death, set when Kubu first becomes a detective and is faced with solving a diamond heist at the world’s richest diamond mine, Jwaneng. They also have a thriller Shoot the Bastards, which introduces Minnesotan environmental journalist Crystal Nguyen. Set mainly in South Africa, it has as backstory the vicious trade in rhino horn.

Michael has lived in South Africa, Kenya, Australia and the US.He now lives in Knysna on the Cape south coast of South Africa. 

All Come to Dust is published in Zimbabwe by amaBooks, co-published in the UK by amaBooks and Parthian Books and is available elsewhere throough the African Books Collective.

Bryony Rheam wins a 2021 Bulawayo Arts Award for All Come to Dust

All Come to Dust has won the Outstanding Literary Work – Fiction category at the 2021 Bulawayo Arts Awards. 

The Bulawayo Arts Awards are multi-disciplinary arts awards that recognise and honour exceptional individuals and collaborative artistic efforts in the city of Bulawayo, Matabeleland North and South, as well as those from the region who are practicing arts elsewhere in the world.

This year there were over 24,000 submissions across all the categories of the awards, and Bryony is especially delighted to win the outstanding fiction award given the strength of all four of the shortlisted writers in that category.

The novel is published in Zimbabwe by amaBooks and is available in Bulawayo at Inganu Bookshop at the Orange Elephant, 12th Avenue Extension and in Harare at Bindu Books, 37 Victoria Drive, Newlands.

In the United Kingdom, it is co-published by amaBooks and Parthian Books and is available through all good bookshops as well as through www.parthianbooks.com/products/all-come-to-dust and online book outlets.

In North America and Australia/New Zealand it is available through www.africanbookscollective.com or Amazon.

The Full List of Award Winners:

Outstanding Literary Work – Fiction: All Come To Dust by Bryony Rheam

Outstanding Literary Work – Non-Fiction: Our Food, Our Heritage, Our Culture by Makhosi Mahlangu

Outstanding Ndebele Literary Work: Ngubani Owabulalala uDube by Mihla Sitsha

Outstanding Song of the Year: ‘For Me’ – DJ Zandimaz

Newcomer of the Year (All Genres): Sandra Sibanda

Outstanding Male Artist of the Year: Msizkay

Outstanding Female Artist of the Year: Vuyo Brown

Outstanding Hip Hop Artist/Act: Awa

Outstanding Kwaito/House/Gqom Act: Mawiza

Outstanding Alternative Music: Thandy Dlana

Outstanding Gospel Artist/Act: Mai Mwamuka

Outstanding Imbube/Acapella Group/Act: Focus Accapella

Outstanding Tshibilika/Rhumba Act: Insimbi Zezhwane

Outstanding Music Producer: Nashville 

Outstanding Music Video: ‘Induku Enhle’ – X Mile

Outstanding Radio DJ: Nomalanga Nyathi – ZIFM

Outstanding Club DJ: DJ Mzoe

Outstanding Dance Ensemble: Geek Twins

Outstanding Female Dancer: Dorcas Ngwenya

Outstanding Male Dancer: Hebson Ncube

Outstanding Arts Journalist: Mthabisi Tshuma – The Chronicle

Outstanding Arts Photographer: Sadee LensWorks

Outstanding Online Media: Ekasi Magazine

Outstanding Theatre Actress: Musawenkosi Sibanda

Outstanding Theatre Actor: Cadrick Msongelwa

Outstanding Theatre Production: Bhalagwe Is Burning by Victory Siyanqoba

Outstanding Comedian: Zwe Hlabangana

Outstanding Poet: Desire Moyo

Outstanding Fashion Designer/House: A Tribe Called Zimbabwe

Outstanding Model: Ben Chest

Outstanding Ambassador (worldwide): Vusa Mkhaya

Outstanding TV Production/Programme: Mjolo FM – Byo Memes

Outstanding Short Film: Figure It Out – Nkosilesisa Ncube

Outstanding Film/TV Actress: Lee Mchoney – Wadiwa Wepamoyo

Outstanding Film/TV Actor: Leroy Mthulisi Ndlovu – Figure it Out

Life Achievement Award: Ebba Chitambo

People's Choice Award: Mai Mwamuka

Video of the online UK launch of All Come to Dust

For those who weren't able to attend the launch of the novel on 8 September, the video contains the interview of Bryony Rheam by Drew Shaw about her murder mystery novel All Come to Dust. It includes a discussion of the book as 'more than simply a standard murder mystery, but set in Zimbabwe', the process of writing and readings from the novel by Bryony.

All Come to Dust is now available in the UK through https://www.parthianbooks.com/products/all-come-to-dust , as well as through good bookshops and websites; in North America through https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/all-come-to-dust and, as an ebook, Amazon.com; as an ebook in Australia/New Zealand through Amazon.com.au; and in Zimbabwe through Bindu Books in Harare (sales@bindu.co.zw) or the Orange Elephant in Bulawayo.

 

Invitation to the online launch of Bryony Rheam's All Come to Dust

 

This Wednesday at 7pm BST, join Bryony Rheam in conversation with Drew Shaw to celebrate the launch of her fabulous detective novel All Come to Dust.

Parthian Books of Wales and amaBooks of Zimbabwe are proud to present the UK launch of All Come to Dust, by award-winning Zimbabwean author Bryony Rheam.

Join us for the online launch of this fantastic new murder mystery, as Bryony Rheam discusses her writing, characters and practice, and reads extracts from All Come to Dust. This event will premier on the Parthian YouTube channel on Wednesday 8th September at 7pm BST. Reserve your free ticket to receive a link on the day. There will be a live chat for audience interaction during the event screening. 

FREE tickets are available on this link:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/book-launch-all-come-to dust-by-bryony-rheam-tickets-168285669969

 

All Come to Dust is available to order from Parthian Books: https://www.parthianbooks.com/products/all-come-to-dust

Reviews of Bryony Rheam's All Come to Dust

 

Wow!  I haven’t had a book captivate me like this one in a long time.  I intended to just read a chapter to get a feel for it and 100 pages in I was in heaven.

This is a great plot for me personally.  At its most basic, this is a murder mystery set in current day Zimbabwe.  It evolves into something so much more to include issues of repressed memories, trauma, racism, colonialism, family and mental health.  Instead of telling us about these issues, we are shown through narrative, the effects of past decisions and events on current everyday lives of the individuals and their families.  I love books where I’m entertained as I learn that this is very well accomplished here.   There is often a bit of a philosophical tone which I quite enjoyed.  

Our main investigator is not the typical hunky detective type, rather an insecure male who is very aware of his flaws and is consciously working on his self-confidence.  I loved Edmund for the first half of this novel as he proves himself not to be as pathetic as he would have led us to believe.  There are some unexpected twists to his story that I did not anticipate, and I ended the book not quite as enamoured with him.  Human beings are not perfect and none of the characters in this book is without fault.  I love how real and flawed they are.  

 The plight of a poor white man in a newly independent African nation was engrossing.  We get to know Craig pretty well and his back story is most intriguing.   Rheam gradually reveals each player to the reader when his/her that perspective is revisited, and they all grow in complexity and the reader grows in understanding.   Mrs. Whitstable was the biggest surprise for me.  We get to know a few of the “good” characters quite well but none of the bad guys.  I’d have liked to see some of the story from Marcia or Mr Pullman’s perspective.  Many subplots were woven together for a satisfying ending.  I do have a few questions though, especially regarding the plight of the women who were transported over the border.  

There is a wonderful sense of place; smells, sounds, sights transported me to Bulawayo.  The writing is amazingly easy to read, and it moves everything along every quickly.  The use of some local language is perfectly integrated so that I never felt I had to look something up.   

I loved this book and look forward to more from a highly talented author.  I will be checking out her other novel, This September Sun, as soon as I can.  (Mary S. Educator, Netgalley)

All Come to Dust is a novel by a Zimbabwean set in modern Zimbabwe. On the surface it is a classic—and very complex—mystery. But I felt throughout as though there was a literary novel behind the scenes attempting to show itself behind the screen of a conventional mystery. The writing is often quite lovely, and the story is told from various points of view, each one shedding light not only on the diverse characters but also on the details of living in Zimbabwe. Add to this the fact that much of the suspense concerns the characters’ pasts, not the present murders of a disliked middle-class white woman, and you have a book that feels much more like literary fiction than a genre novel.

The mystery suffers somewhat. Its resolution is extremely clever, with one of those endings where you discover that every character’s story is an interlocking piece of the puzzle; but the clues leading up to the resolution are somewhat murky, often requiring cultural knowledge the average reader may not have (I didn’t). It takes a plot strategist and practiced writer like Agatha Christie to pull off the sleight of hand of showing the clues in such a way as to make them ignored but present enough in the subconscious for an “Aha—that was it!” moment at the end. This was not such a mystery, though it has enough of the trappings of a mystery to make the reader wonder exactly what it is trying to be. The reader who wants to be sure of the clues may need to reread the book—and this is a book that would stand up to rereading, primarily because of the vivid picture of Zimbabwe.

I found myself highlighting often, because of the vivid passages about Zimbabwe. Bryony Rheam’s slow, observant, and graceful writing calls to life the dusty roads, the smell of grasses, and the blossoms tossing in the trees, while limning an elderly generation of impoverished British non-leavers, a sleazy group of exploitative whites, and a mixed race underclass attempting only to find a job and make a contented life in a country where not even the electricity and water can be relied on. Bryony Rheam writes of this country with authority and astuteness. In Zimbabwe, she has found her ordained setting. I am not certain that the mystery is her genre. But I am sure she is a writer to watch; and I look forward to her next book with considerable eagerness. (Helen Aristar-dry - Goodreads)

Initially assuming that All Come To Dust was a straightforward murder mystery, I was impressed to find that actually Rheam is doing something much more intricate and important here. Rather than a No 1 Ladies Detective Agency-style southern African comic romp of a mystery novel, All Come To Dust instead grapples with difficult issues of colonialism, racism, mental health, and memory. The insights into the lives of the remaining white population of Zimbabwe were fascinating while clear-eyed: the reader is encouraged to sympathise with certain of them, but also reminded of their privilege. Highly recommended. (Janet B, Netgalley)

All Come to Dust is a long-simmering stew, with the raw-ingredients of an old-fashioned detective mystery and the mélange of spices of post-colonial Zimbabwe breaking down and melding together to offer up something far more than you might have expected when you started. The writing itself is incredibly patient, only revealing itself slowly and at its own measured pace. But within it Rheam is able to slowly develop an assortment of characters. Each time we revisit someone we learn more about them, forcing us to be patient as they reveal themselves. Similarly, the sense of place is intense. I have never visited Zimbabwe, but the writing instantly brought me to Bulawayo, from the scent of the flowers in the trees to the piles of utterly useless bureaucratic paperwork at the police station. Without ever being heavy handed, the occasional use of vernacular language combined with really specific sensory descriptions to really make the setting its own character, and one that affects every other character in their own way.

The characters are well drawn out, if slowly, just playing on enough of tropes or archetypes to let the reader assume they know something prematurely. The story itself is both riveting and small, or enclosed, at the same time. It takes its time unspooling, and offers enough red herrings mixed with its clues along the way that you want to keep reading and don’t feel cheated out of a proper resolution. All the while it is a portrait of how class, race, and gender still function in contemporary Zimbabwe, not as much an indictment as it is just a laying bare of how injustice and privilege are still baked into everyday life, and the efforts different people take to escape such social shackles. 

If you’re interested in a compelling detective story, you can find that here, and although surely this novel wraps itself in that affectation it is more than that. It was a joy to read, even as it slowed me down and insisted I take it at its own pace. Every aspect, from characters, to story, to writing, was deliberate and nothing felt rushed or hackneyed. The latter third of the book did feel a little more rushed than the first parts, though that is part and parcel with whodunits. There were some things that wrapped up a little too neatly, or quickly, again common in the genre but it didn’t feel entirely fitting with the rest of the story. It wasn’t enough to feel unearned, though, and the incredibly memorable primary character, who himself was more than just a copy-and-paste genre detective but actually someone who experienced growth and development throughout the story, was more than enough to give this novel high marks and a hearty recommendation. (Gyalten Lekden, Netgalley and Goodreads)

All Come to Dust is available:

 In the UK for pre-order from www.parthianbooks.com/products/all-come-to-dust  (UK Publication Date is September 2021). 

In Bulawayo  through Inganu Bookshop at the Orange Elephant, River Estate, 12th Avenue Extension, Bulawayo (WhatsApp 0772 851 609 or 0733 781 246).

In Harare through Bindu Books, 37 Victoria Drive, Newlands (0242 782720 or sales(at)bindu.co.zw).

in North America through the African Books Collective: https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/all-come-to-dust

As as an ebook in North America: https://www.amazon.com/All-Come-Dust-Bryony-Rheam-ebook/dp/B094RJHMCJ

and in Australia and New Zealand: https://www.amazon.com.au/All-Come-Dust-Bryony-Rheam-ebook/dp/B094RJHMCJ

NetGalley helps publishers and authors promote digital review copies to book advocates and industry professionals. Publishers make digital review copies and audiobooks available for the NetGalley community to discover, request, read, and review.

Goodreads is the world’s largest site for readers and book recommendations. Their mission is to help people find and share books they love.