It's been some time since I read this, and I don't recall any details. ( )

Delightful. The Lieutenant is a cop in Prague in the 1960s. In a linked series of stories, he solves locked-room mysteries and the like while we gradually grow to understand his character and get to know his family and his police colleagues. Classic mystery lovers will enjoy the references to Edgar Allan Poe, Vidocq, Ellery Queen, and others. ( )

https://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2015/11/14/long-faced-and-lugubrio... ( )

Although the translation was a little bumpy in places I quite enjoyed this book of connected short stories. Lieutenant Boruvka is a hardworking Czechoslovakian homicide detective. In fact it may be because he is hardworking that he has a mournful demeanour. He would like to be more devil-may-care, especially as regards the female officer with the large chignon, but work gets in the way. And then, there is his wife and daughter who require a certain amount of attention. For a man that is not very good looking Lieutenant Boruvka seems to get a lot of female attention. Maybe that's a little of the author's wishful thinking showing through because from pictures I have seen of Josef Skvorecky he is no Greek god.

Since these stories were published in 1966 originally they show a place and time that no longer exists. The difficulties of living under Communist dictates are alluded to in several of the stories. In "The Case of the Horizontal Trajectory" apartment overcrowding is at the core of the mystery. Several of the cases take place while Lieutenant Boruvka takes his daughter on holiday to celebrate her report card. Except the holiday takes place in October because of the difficulty of getting an exit permit.

But beyond all that are some really good whodunits or howdunits and they are the best part of the book. ( )

Although most of the "mysteries" are very trite - more along the lines of the mysteries in the TV show "Murder, She Wrote", LT Joesf Boruvka himself makes one of the best detective characters in fiction. On top of that, the setting in Communist Czechoslovakia makes fascinating reading. ( )