Review

‘The Glass Factory’ by Ken Wishnia on Promoting Crime Fiction

by Marsali Taylor
Promoting Crime Fiction
July 31st, 2014

Filomena Buscarella is an ex-cop latina who left Ecuador for the bright lights of the US.  Now she’s a woman on a mission: to get the big boss who’s poisoning all the land in his area…

From the first sentence, this book was a delight.  Filomena is smart and sassy, and totally believable, from her tussles with her three-year-old daughter Antonia (an extra in this book is a fun story told by Antonia aged 12) through sorting out unpleasant thugs and hitting the worst news ever, to the joys of a surprising new romance.  She’s the superwoman we women would all like to be, taking everything in her stride – she’s the fastest improviser around, and there’s no situation she can’t get out of somehow, but in a way that you feel ordinarywoman could too, if she just had Filomena’s pazzazz.  The ‘voice’ was wonderful, the action fast, the ethical dimension of the story satisfying.  This is a re-issue of Wishnia’s third novel (of five Filomena books), first written in the 80s, but there was no outdated feel, and none of those heart-sinking ‘Now this is what you missed in the last three books’ paragraphs.  It read like a stand-alone, and once I’d started I couldn’t put it down.

If you like Santa Teresa’s Kinsey Millhone, or Val McDermid’s Kate Brannigan, you’ll love Filomena.  The first in the series is 23 Shades of Black.

Back to Kenneth Wishnia’s Author Page