Hector Belascoarán Shayne

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Created by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
(1949- )

“It was a joke. just one hell of a big joke. Thinking that he could be a detective in Mexico. It was crazy.”
–Hector ponders his chosen profession in An Easy Thing

Mexico City’s one-eyed HECTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE (his mother was an Irish folksinger, and his father was a Basque nationalist) is a rather philosophical gumshoe. He shares his office with an upholsterer, a plumber and a sewage engineer, all of whom seem to have differing political views, and aren’t exactly shy about expressing themselves. Hector fits right in. Moody, cynical, fatalistic, and contrary to a fault, he refuses to be pinned down by anyone else’s terms, be it “leftist,” “believer,” “radical or anything else.

He even rejects being called a private investigator, preferring instead to himself instead as an “independent detective” in The Uncomfortable Dead (2006).

But there’s no doubt that Hector is an interesting addition to the genre, offering a fresh setting and a at-times shape-shifting perspective that’s worlds away from the standard P.I. novel, with some definitely surreal touches, rumbling throughout the series. In one novel, he’s even killed off, only to return in the next one, Return To The Same City, with no apologies from Taibo, although he does offer an explanation of sorts:

“His appearance in these pages is therefore an act of magic. White magic perhaps, but magic that is irrational and disrespectful toward the occupation of writing a mystery series. … As always, it must be said that the story told here belongs to the terrain of absolute fiction, although Mexico is the same and belongs to the terrain of surprising reality.”

Turns out too many readers complained that Hector had been killed off, and the author realized he had a few stories about Hector to tell.

As in “Holy Sherlock, Batman!”

Not that Hector comes back all hale and hearty–in the course of the series he loses an eye, and in an afterword to the English language edition of Frontera Dreams, Taibo provides a sketch of Shayner, detailing all the scars on his bullet-riddled body.

The latest (final?) novel in the series, The Uncomfortable Dead (2006), may be the most surreal and political book yet, with Mexico City fully justifying its rep as “the craziest and most upside-down city on the planet.” Co-written with Subcomandante Marcos (they alternate chapters), a real-life spokesperson for Mexico’s Zapatista movement, it swings between a complex case involving Hector, Elías Contreras, a detective for the Zapatista National Liberation Army, a government-backed murderer and assorted ghosts–one of whom may be leaving arguments for the rights of indigenous peoples and rants against globalization and privatization on Hectoir’s answering machine. Of course, this being typical Taibo, the dead just don’t stay dead, characters occasionally step outside of the book to discuss their progress and co-author Marcos even writes himself into the story. But the strangest thing about this unapologetic, politically charged story was that it was actually nominated for a Shamus in 2007.

Not that it moved the needle any large amount in this country. But back home in Mexico, the books have (so far) inspired at least five film adaptations.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Author, journalist, historian, and political activist Paco Ignacio Taibo, II was born in Spain, but lives in Mexico. He’s had severalbooks published; but may be best known outside of Mexico for his mystery series with Shayne. In fact, he’s one of the most popular Mexican crime writers around these days. He’s also one of the major forces behind the International Crime Writers Association’s “Semana Negra” held every summer in Gijon, Spain, a ten-day festival that brings together writers of the “novela negra” from around the world.

TRUE CONFESSIONS

  • “The novel, like reality, like the histories we all know and those that befall us, is full of parentheses, pitfalls, ellipses that dance and that jump from side to side with no desire to settle down or to explain themselves.”
    — Paco Ignacio Taibo II

UNDER OATH

  • “Hector Belascoaran Shayne [is] the damnedest, most unique private eye you’ll likely encounter in this day and age.”
    — Joseph Wambaugh
  • “Taibo’s best work…weaves politics, crime, socialogy and the marvellous history and mythology of Mexico into a tapestry rich with unforgettable characters and an inventive plot.”
    — Margaret Cannon (The Globe and Mail)
  • “Great writers by definition are outriders, raiders of a sort, sweeping down from wilderness territories to disturb the peace, overrun the status quo and throw into question everything we know to be true. . . . On its face, the novel is a murder mystery, and at the book’s heart, always, is a deep love of Mexico and its people.”
    — Los Angeles Times

NOVELS

  • Días de combate (1976)
  • Cosa fácil (1977; aka “An Easy Thing”) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
  • Algunas nubes (1980; aka “Herencia Maldita,”“Some Clouds”) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
  • No habrá final feliz (1981; aka “No Happy Ending “) | Buy this book  | Kindle it!
  • Regreso a la misma ciudad y bajo la lluvia (1989; aka “Return to the Same City”) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
  • Amorosos fantasmas (1990)
  • Sueños de frontera (1990; aka “Frontera Dreams”) | Buy this book
  • Desvanecidos difuntos (1991)
  • Adiós, Madrid (1993)
  • Muertos Incomodos (2006; aka “The Uncomfortable Dead;”; with Subcomandante Marcos) | Buy this book | Kindle it!

SHORT STORIES

  • “All Kinds of Phantoms” (1991, Vol. 1, No. 2, New Mystery)
  • “Zacatecan Hookers” (1996, Vol. IV, No. 2, New Mystery)

FILMS

  • DÍAS DE COMBATE
    (1982, Conacite Dos)
    89 minutes
    Language: Spanish
    Premiere: September 30, 1982
    Based on the novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Screenplay by Paco Ignacio Taibo II and Jorge Patiño
    Directed by Alfredo Gurrola
    Starring Pedro Armendáriz Jr. as HÉCTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE
    Also starring Julissa, Ernesto Gómez Cruz, Guillermo Murray, Hilda Aguirre, Juan Peláez, Manuel “Flaco” Ibáñez, Susana Kamini
    The first of two adaptations to be released in 1982, with Pedro Armendáriz Jr. as Shayne.
  • COSA FÁCIL
    (1982, Conacite Dos)
    115 minutes
    Language: Spanish
    Premiere: December 9, 1982
    Based on the novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Screenplay by Paco Ignacio Taibo II and Jorge Patiño
    Directed by Alfredo Gurrola
    Starring Pedro Armendáriz Jr. as HÉCTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE
    Also starring Julissa, Ernesto Gómez Cruz, Juan Peláez, Manuel “Flaco” Ibáñez, Humberto Elizondo, Princesa Lea, Arturo Benavides, Martha de Castro, Ricardo Noriega, Gerardo Vigil, José Nájera
    They must have hoped for a series here, and they may have shot both films simultaneously–the cast and crew are almost identical.
  • HERENCIA MALDITA
    (aka “Algunas nubes”)
    (1987)
    93 minutes
    Based on the novel Algunas nubes by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Directed by Carlos García Agraz
    Starring Alejandro Camacho
    Also starring Claudia Ramírez, Héctor Ortega, Julián Pastor, Jorge Fegán, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Ignacio Retes, Pedro Armendáriz Jr.
  • AMOROSOS FANTASMAS
    (1994, Televicine S.A. de C.V.)
    92 minutes
    Language: Spanish
    Premiere: June 11, 1994
    Based on the novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Screenplay by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Directed by Carlos García Agraz
    Starring Sergio Goyri as HÉCTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE
    Also starring Gustavo Angelino, Marta Aura, María Aura, Bruno Bichir, Elizabeth Cris, Alberto Estrella, José Antonio Ferral, Citali Huezo, Rebecca Jones, Elisa Lipkau, Monica María
    Another attempt to establish a series, this time they made it to three.
  • DÍAS DE COMBATE
    (1994, Televicine S.A. de C.V.)
    95 minutes
    Language: Spanish
    Premiere: August 5, 1994
    Based on the novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Screenplay by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Directed by Carlos García Agraz
    Starring Sergio Goyri as HÉCTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE
    Also starring Rebecca Jones, Wolf Ruvinskis, Eduardo López Rojas, Lorenzo de Rodas, Telly Filippini, Lisa Owen, Bruno Bichir, Guillermo Gil, Ramón Abascal, Alicia Laguna, Mercedes Itzaxil Serna, Gabriela Moreno, Alpha Acosta
  • ALGUNAS NUBES
    (1995, Televicine S.A. de C.V.)
    93 minutes
    Language: Spanish
    Premiere: September 15, 1995
    Based on the novel by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Screenplay by Paco Ignacio Taibo II
    Directed by Carlos García Agraz
    Starring Sergio Goyri as HÉCTOR BELASCOARÁN SHAYNE
    Also starring Héctor Ortega, Lorenzo de Rodas, Patricio Castillo, Damián Alcázar, Pedro Altamirano, Rene Pereyra, Lisa Owen, Bruno Bichir, Roberto Soto, Armado Garcio, Óscar Castañeda, Bruno Rey, Miguel Ángel Rangel

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

Report respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith. Thanks to Fr. John Woolley for not so much naming names, as telling me where to put them.

Published

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