Kenneth Wishnia - The Glass Factory

Wishnia writes with brio, energy, rage, passion, and humor. Brash, sassy, smart and indomitable, Filomena is purely a force of nature, and The Glass Factory is another winner. Booklist

Riveting circumstances, a strongly focused plot, and ably described settings make this essential reading. Library Journal

Mother and daughter are so appealing, and the case against an unscrupulous businessman is put together so compellingly, the tale keeps one reading to its bittersweet end. Boston Globe

Filomena is one lady clearly worth watching. Houston Chronicle

Surprising, thrilling Wishnias narrative style is nearly perfect. Filomenas voice is tough, edgy and quite female. This is a very good book in a very good series. Davis Enterprise

This sleuth is sharp, witty, indomitable and interesting. Daily Oklahoman

An entertaining environmental mystery. Fans of a strong female lead will gain much pleasure from Wishnias latest novel. Midwest Book Reviews

Action-packed, nerve-wracking and full of sharp wit. This is a must-read book. I Love a Mystery

A hard-hitting tale of one womans fight against the powers that be. Tough and gritty, this is a realistic story with a determined heroine. Romantic Times

Filomena Buscarsela [is] an irreverent, intrepid, Ecuadorian-born, former New York City cop with the savvy of Erin Brockovich and the stamina of Wonder Woman. Newsday

Filomena Buscarsela [is] a Latina heroine with the epic appeal of Everywoman. The worlds a mess, but Filomenas still fighting. Its that perspective that sets Wishnia aparttheres nothing else out there remotely like his books. Rocky Mountain News

The Glass Factory
2013 Kenneth Wishnia
This edition 2013 PM Press
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be transmitted by any means without permission in writing from the publisher.

ISBN: 9781604867626
Library of Congress Control Number: 2012954999

Cover: John Yates / www.stealworks.com
Interior design by briandesign

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

PM Press
PO Box 23912
Oakland, CA 94623
www.pmpress.org

Printed in the USA, by the Employee Owners of Thomson-Shore in Dexter, Michigan.
www.thomsonshore.com

To the real Katherina Minola

Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Dylan Thomas

It is a cruel reality that the hard-boiled world of crime fiction is littered with the ignored corpses of excellent novels written by gifted authors. This, while formulaic, paint-by-the-numbers novels featuring cardboard-cutout, superheroic protagonists and soulless, one-dimensional villains shoot to the top of the bestsellers list. I like meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and gravy as much as the next guy, but not every day of the week and not when I want to lose myself in the experience. In the crime fiction world, it almost seems as if there is a sort of inverse proportion between a novels originality of plot or character and its unfair and unjustified lack of recognition. Such is the case with Ken Wishnias The Glass Factory.

Third in the series after the Edgar Awardnominated 23 Shades of Black and Soft Money, The Glass Factory includes all of the ingredients that separate a unique piece of fiction from the run-of-the-mill variety. But we need look no further than Wishnias protagonist, Filomena Buscarsela, to understand what sets this book apart. Buscarsela, an Ecuadorian transplant and former member of the NYPD, is all the things a reader of the genre expects from a hard-boiled protagonisttough, wisecracking, intelligent, insightful, resourceful, jaundiced, caringand more. So much more. Wishnia smartly plays Fil against type. Buscarsela is an attractive woman, but Wishnia resists the urge to fall prey to using the sex kitten card, a card way too many of us in the genre rely on. In fact, the author lets us know from the first that if youre expecting Fil to be a string-thonged, high-heeled, purring pussycat of an ex-cop, youd better go find another book.

The novel opens with a phone conversation between Fil and one of her former male police colleagues, a Detective you get the idea.

Yo, Filgirl! What you been up to? Puke in anybodys van lately?

Beyond Wishnias refusal to have Fil depend on her anatomy as a first line of offense or defense, he saddles her with problems faced by many single mothers: a low-paying job without benefits, an unreliable ex, unhelpful relatives. So Fil is both uniquea tough ex-cop torn between her home and homelandand an everywoman character. Readers of the genre are used to their protagonists dealing with divorce, alcoholism, etc. But Fils problems, I think, hit a lot closer to home. No one is going to come and make it all better. Fil is left, as we all are, to make the best of what we have even if it aint much. And then Wishnia takes a daring step. He does something to Fil that ramps up the tension in the novel to another level. I wont play spoiler, but let it suffice to say that the author makes Fils choices deadly serious ones, from which there will be no retreat. Isnt that what we want as readers, to be challenged? To have our representative, the protagonist, face hard choices, moral choices, life-and-death choices?

The Glass Factory isnt some mindless thriller full of endless, meaningless movement from world capital to world capital. The body count here isnt vastthough it might be, depending upon Fils choices. The victims arent nameless, faceless henchmen left on the streets of London, Rome, Paris, or Jerusalem. The potential victims here are our neighbors, our neighbors kids. But when it comes to those tough choices, Fil does not make them on the global scale. Its about being a mom. Its about the best gift a parent can give a child. Nearly halfway through the novel, Fil has a very telling conversation with a friend:

I think one of the most important things you can do in life is raise a kid to be a skeptical, independent thinker, whos ready to fight and make the world a better place.
Then do that instead
Dont you see? That is what Im doing. But it has to be by example. Not just words.

As appealing and unique as Filomena Buscarsela is, The Glass Factory is more than Fil. Although the novel is set in the early nineties, it deals with an issue that couldnt be more current. The novel isnt about fracking for natural gas, but it might as well be. Here, I suspect that Ken and I have somewhat differing opinions, but thats what good books do. They engage you whether you came for a challenge or not. And engaging the reader in a meaningful issue is what hard-boiled fiction does perhaps better than even nonfiction. Because while the reader is being entertained by the mystery and the steps taken to solve the case, he or she can also be presented with any number of sides to an issue. Wishnia hits the environmental issues hard here, but not too hard. Some might say not hard enough. Youll decide.

In any case, I cant recommend The Glass Factory enough for the reasons Ive stated and many more. The next time youre five pages into a book and wondering why you picked the thing up in the first place, consider taking a fresh look at Ken Wishnias The Glass Factory. Whether you love Fil or hate her, whether you agree with the political stances taken in the novel or not, you wont regret the decision. The Glass Factory is a novel written with a unique passion that both adheres to and plays with the best traditions of the genre.