Policing Gender and Alicia Giménez Bartlett's Crime Fiction by Nina L. Molinaro (review)

Molinaro's study—the first published book by an individual author on Giménez Bartlett's nine crime novels popularly named after its narrator-protagonist as the Petra Delicado series—explores the gendering of crime fiction, in particular the police procedural. The main thesis of Policing Gender and Alicia Giménez Bartlett's Crime Fiction is that Giménez Bartlett's use of formula fiction in novels published between 1996 and 2013 serves to reflect issues related to contemporary Spain such as immigration, homelessness, and most particularly, the often contentious relationship between the sexes. Individual novels treat a variety of topics related to gender, for example, rape in Ritos de muerte, castration anxiety in Mensajeros de la oscuridad, adultery in Serpientes en el paraíso and family planning in Nido vacío, among others. Molinaro demonstrates how Giménez Bartlett expands the standard police procedural format with its tripartite emphasis on detection, correction and punishment, to incorporate gender differences within the formula. At first glance, it appears that Giménez Bartlett employs the rhetoric of gender difference to denounce many of the ways contemporary Spanish society systematically handicaps women and promotes men, especially among the hierarchal police force. Using various theoretical approaches, Molinaro questions this interpretation, and persuasively shows how the author systematically supports men and denigrates women in the name of patriarchal restoration and the maintenance of social order. That is, contrary to critics who generally interpret the Petra Delicado series as an indictment of a world dominated by men, the conformist impetus that characterizes all crime fiction corroborates a conservative social agenda throughout these novels.

Molinaro initiates her study with a helpful introduction to crime fiction with emphasis on its evolution, characteristics and its apparition in Spain during the transition to democracy following Franco's death. The remaining eight chapters—except for the closing one that deals with the antepenultimate and penultimate installments of the series, El silencio de los claustros and Nadie quiere saber, respectively—focus on one novel in order of publication. In this fashion, readers appreciate the evolution of Giménez Bartlett's narrative vision grounded in issues related to gender. Molinaro argues that the Petra Delicado saga polices gender in three ways. Firstly, the paradigms of interpretation are inverted. That is to say, while Petra, unlike other woman in the series, thinks like a man (she is consistently logical and rational), her subinspector, Fermín Garzón, is portrayed as sensitive and sentimental with emphasis on physical stimulae. Secondly, crimes and criminals are polarized along gender lines, and finally, the mechanics of victimization are similarly gendered. That is, women criminals and victims appear as weak and excessively emotional whereas male criminals and victims tend to be portrayed as physically and mentally powerful, calculating and independent. As such, Molinaro concludes that the traditional focus of the crime procedural in literature with its emphasis on restoring patriarchal order serves Giménez Bartlett well in reaffirming traditional gender roles.

Molinaro structures each chapter similarly, using a quote from the novel under analysis as an epigraph that serves to effectively pinpoint the focus of her interpretation. She then presents her theoretical model, which is followed by a helpful review of previous scholarship on the novel. After succinctly summarizing the plot, Molinaro provides a close and fruitful reading of the text. The chapters on Ritos de muerte and Un barco cargado de arroz build on her previous scholarship on the Petra Delicado series but do not simply rehash the same ideas; instead, she offers original readings of these works. Molinaro provides English translations of Spanish quotes in the appropriate register, thus expanding the critical readership to those unfamiliar with Castilian. In short, she adeptly summarizes and evaluates the criticism on each novel while providing innovative readings. Molinaro also demonstrates throughout her manuscript how the Petra Delicado series serves as a barometer of various public issues relevant to national identity in contemporary Spain. These novels reflect on...