The ambiguous moral hemisphere Sonchai inhabits can be downright dizzying, but since he observes the rites and rituals of his native culture as conscientiously as he consults a professional colleague from the F.B.I., this self-described half-caste is well positioned to negotiate all paths to enlightenment. Girding himself to outwit a vengeful ghost or a hired killer comes as naturally as offering good-luck lotus blossoms to the Buddha above the cash register at the family brothel.

“You live in a magic-ravaged land,” Sonchai’s F.B.I. contact tells him. But the wonder of Burdett’s hallucinatory brand of Southeast Asian magic — which puts his novels in range of the fabulous Yellowthread Street procedurals William Marshall set in Hong Kong and of Colin Cotterill’s fanciful mysteries featuring the Laotian coroner-sleuth Dr. Siri Paiboun — is that this spooky stuff is manifested in a real world governed by what Sonchai calls “functional barbarism.” The author, who practiced criminal law in Asia and clearly knows his territory, has a fine skill for distilling the morbid beauty (not to mention the grotesque humor) in scenes of everyday misery. But in the end, death-by-ghost still seems a step up from a real-life peasant existence in which children eat dirt and are occasionally stomped to death by elephants.

Pages: 1 2