King

Author: Martin Schüller

Publisher: Emons Verlag Köln (Germany)

ISBN: 3-89705-254-7 (paperback)

The English-speaking Elvis world has had a number of Elvis fiction titles over the years and Daniel Klein's recent excursion into Elvis crime seems to be very successful. Other languages are less well catered for as far as Elvis fiction is concerned, however (indeed, most non-fiction books are translations, rather than original-language titles), so it's good to see an original German publication in this particular genre.

Martin Schüller's "King" is situated in and around Bad Nauheim at Eastertime, 1959, during Elvis's time there as part of his military service. The novel takes us into the Presley household in the Goethestrasse, where we get to know Elvis himself, his father and grandmother, Red West, Lamar Fike, Elisabeth Stefaniak and Frau Pieper, the lady who rented the house to Elvis, but also kept on living there. The fans are outside, too, of course, but there is also a group whose presence is unknown to any of these -- the CIA!

A CIA team is secretly watching out for any trouble to do with Elvis, though none of its members seem to take this too seriously. Things change, however, when an attack is made on Elvis's BMW one night. Could it be an attempt by the Communists to remove this terrible influence on young people? Some think so, but others in the CIA do not share their opinion and look in other directions. The discovery of the body of a young woman brings the German police onto the scene and into Elvis's house and a further apparent assassination attempt gets everyone involved together, though not always seeing eye to eye!

Schüller does a great job at pinpointing the characters of the major players, right down to Frau Pieper's unfriendly nature and the interplay between the German police and CIA agents is often quite comical. He also develops the fans' attitudes, interactions and feelings well, and manages to control the development of a story, which could so easily have become utterly confusing. The beginning is a tad slow and plodding, but once underway, the story develops nicely and Schüller manages to weave fact and fiction into a believable whole. When the story seems to have reached its end, Schüller adds a little extra, which is too good to give away in a review, but might well have some readers pondering on what actually happened...

Schüller is surprisingly not a child of the times, having been born in 1960. He did, however, take advice from people who were in Bad Nauheim at the time and even from fans who waited outside Elvis's house there. Two prior crime novels, "Jazz" and "Killer" (the first of which also had a musical theme), provide a good pedigree for this German writer.

The book has a great cover, too, so if you understand German, this is a steal at just 11 euro.

David Neale
copyright August 2002