Muhammad's Robe
Reviewed by Glynn Leyshon
APRIL 26, 2005 archive
This book, labeled an eco-mystery, is set in California at a fictitious college, Pacific Northwest, and, naturally, has as a side benefit the presence of beautiful female students, beautiful female assistants, and beautiful female enemies. The protagonist, one Bill McKay, teaches a type of physics, the physics of human performance no less. There are thefts, unwonted pregnancies, suicides, mysterious strangers from the past, fires, and near-death struggles, in fact, all one could wish for in a mystery.
Dick Stull is an entertainer. He makes his characters bigger than life but believable, too, with great dialogue and subtle descriptions. They come alive through their interactions as professor McKay proceeds to earn his living, aid in a sports memorabilia auction (Muhammad's Robe), handle his grad assistant, solve a mystery, and play father and husband. It displays as a sociogram of one man's life.
Another strength of the book are the subtle "hooks" that keep the reader reading. While it is a cliché to label a book a "page turner," it does apply in this instance. The pace is whirlwind and I found myself intrigued enough to keep reading long after I should have gone to sleep.
To get a flavour of the characters: Trina, his grad assistant, is a thrice-married single Mom who is a former champion body-builder suffering from osteoporosis and, of course, gorgeous. Trina's contribution is both "ear candy" and plot progression. She isn't alone as the book has, if anything, a few too many characters for the reader to follow adequately.
The title of the book is the thread throughout. The robe is part of a sports memorabilia auction run by the athletic department to raise funds for the organization. The mystery, in part, is that the valuable robe, said to have a bid of $350,000 has gone missing from McKay's office, though just why it was in his office and not that of the athletic director is never explained. Not to give anything away but the robe turns up on the last page, its return as mysterious as its departure.
Muhammad's Robe is an eminently readable book. It is part of a trilogy; I await the next two.
Dick Stull. Muhammad's Robe. Eureka: Creyr Publishing, 2004. 204 pp. Paper.
Copyright © 2005 by Glynn Leyshon