The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon (2007, Unabridged, Compact Disc)

Nobody can accuse Michael Chabon of self-imitation: the versatile author continues to explore and expand genres and produce original and thoroughly entertaining novels. Imagine what would have resulted if, in 1948, displaced European Jews were granted temporary asylum in Alaska. It’s no challenge for Chabon, who has effortlessly created a police procedural set in a diverse, fictional Jewish community, populated with characters as believable as they are memorable.

Sixty years have passed since creation of the Sitka, Alaska settlement which is only months away from the Reversion, the diaspora that will return the land to the Indians and scatter the Jews throughout the world. In this political climate protagonist/detective Meyer Landsman and his half-Indian half-Jewish partner investigate the murder of the estranged mystical son of an influential rabbi. Various members of the community, to say nothing of his ex-wife/boss and the US Department of Justice, want this investigation stopped. Landsman, who believes the murder is somehow linked to the death of his own sister, plows on anyway.

Chabon is a beautiful stylist, and his ear for the touching self-mockery so characteristic of Jewish humor is superb. Narrator Peter Riegert’s ear is, if anything, even better. His pacing and character differentiation are exceptional.