Books
Hotel Brasil: the Mystery of the Severed Heads

by Frei Betto
Bitter Lemon Press, March 2014, $14.95

One of the weirdest (and most wonderful) of the new crop of mysteries is Frei Betto’s extraordinary Hotel Brasil: The Mystery of the Severed Heads, translated from Portuguese by Jethro Soutar. Think you’ve stayed at some pretty rough hotels? Think again. At Hotel Brasil someone is decapitating its long-term residents. The villain could be one of the hotel’s busy prostitutes, a political functionary, a journalist, or maybe even a transgender entertainer. Told intriguingly in short, titled scenes—e.g., The Prices of a Person, Reveries, The Pale Light of the Afternoon, etc.—this beautifully written novel gives us a look at a Rio de Janeiro the Olympic Committee would rather we not know about. We learn about Rio’s horrific crime rate, the starving children scrounging through trash bins for food, and the appalling tactics used by Rio’s thuggish police force (days of torture until a “confession” is finally obtained). Through all this horror wanders Candido, the most respectable of Hotel Brasil’s residents. Candido is a former priest who now works as a freelance editor for a questionable publisher. He spends his life slogging his way through inept prose, ministering to Rio’s slum children, and occasionally saving a life. When Marcal, a down-on-his-luck gemstone dealer, is decapitated in one of the hotel rooms and his eyes torn out, Candido determines to find the killer before the police frame one of the children for the murder. But Candido is no Hercule Poirot. His investigations are as ungainly as is his life, and since everyone he interviews is a liar, he becomes increasingly frustrated. And that’s good, because the parts of the book describing Candido’s frustration are often hilarious. This helps offset the grim pages that describe the plight of Rio’s street children. Author Betto’s writing is always elegant, even when describing empty eye sockets or scars formed by prolonged torture. His characters are unique, in the way that Rio is unique. One of the most strongly drawn (besides the unforgettable Candido) is Madame Larencia, who, after becoming too old to turn tricks anymore, arranges short “romances” for lonely men in search of younger flesh. She’s a pimp. But so are all the other residents of Hotel Brasil. While you may not want to take up permanent residence there, you’ll want to visit Hotel Brasil again and again, because one reading simply isn’t enough. This is a book to be read at least twice, perhaps more.

Betty Webb

One of the weirdest (and most wonderful) of the new crop of mysteries is Frei Betto’s extraordinary Hotel Brasil: The Mystery of the Severed Heads, translated from Portuguese by Jethro Soutar. Think you’ve stayed at some pretty rough hotels? Think again. At Hotel Brasil someone is decapitating its long-term residents. The villain could be one of the hotel’s busy prostitutes, a political functionary, a journalist, or maybe even a transgender entertainer. Told intriguingly in short, titled scenes—e.g., The Prices of a Person, Reveries, The Pale Light of the Afternoon, etc.—this beautifully written novel gives us a look at a Rio de Janeiro the Olympic Committee would rather we not know about. We learn about Rio’s horrific crime rate, the starving children scrounging through trash bins for food, and the appalling tactics used by Rio’s thuggish police force (days of torture until a “confession” is finally obtained). Through all this horror wanders Candido, the most respectable of Hotel Brasil’s residents. Candido is a former priest who now works as a freelance editor for a questionable publisher. He spends his life slogging his way through inept prose, ministering to Rio’s slum children, and occasionally saving a life. When Marcal, a down-on-his-luck gemstone dealer, is decapitated in one of the hotel rooms and his eyes torn out, Candido determines to find the killer before the police frame one of the children for the murder. But Candido is no Hercule Poirot. His investigations are as ungainly as is his life, and since everyone he interviews is a liar, he becomes increasingly frustrated. And that’s good, because the parts of the book describing Candido’s frustration are often hilarious. This helps offset the grim pages that describe the plight of Rio’s street children. Author Betto’s writing is always elegant, even when describing empty eye sockets or scars formed by prolonged torture. His characters are unique, in the way that Rio is unique. One of the most strongly drawn (besides the unforgettable Candido) is Madame Larencia, who, after becoming too old to turn tricks anymore, arranges short “romances” for lonely men in search of younger flesh. She’s a pimp. But so are all the other residents of Hotel Brasil. While you may not want to take up permanent residence there, you’ll want to visit Hotel Brasil again and again, because one reading simply isn’t enough. This is a book to be read at least twice, perhaps more.

Teri Duerr
3605
Betto
March 2014
hotel-brasil-the-mystery-of-the-severed-heads
14.95
Bitter Lemon Press