Crimetime

Preface

PREFACEGeorges Simenon and Agatha Christie—move over a bit. An enterprising clutch of young Filipino writers are encroaching on your turf. They are attempting to write crime fiction in the hope that they are venturing into terra incognita and hopefully make a pile as well the way you masters of who dun it have done it. Now comes Maria L. M. Fres-Felix with her Crimetime story collection, actually linked short stories. The chase starts with a murder at the Quezon Memorial Circle. The prose of Ms. Felix is tight, her plotting linear--a search for the criminal that is at the same time a commentary on our convoluted justice system. Her eye for detail is keen and exacting and her terse dialogue also portrays character and pushes the plot to its conclusion. Crime fiction is a genre that has a wide following in the West but a small audience in this country for most Filipinos still want more of the short romantic fictions that lift them from dreary ordinary living. If Filipinos start reading Ms. Felix’s crime story and those other efforts in this genre, then our literature will acquire wider breadth and hopefully more readers as well.

F. Sionil Jose

National Artist