Whisper of Protest - A Kate Wagner Mystery

About the Book

Whisper of Protest, the first of a series of Kate Wagner mysteries, is about a young English woman on temporary assignment in Uganda during the first three years of Idi Amin’s presidency in the early 1970’s.  Kate’s unorthodox work methods frequently lead her into conflict with her supervisor, Stuart McBride, who discovers her lesbian relationship with American linguist Liz Bryant.  He writes to London to report her behavior and request her withdrawal.

Realizing that she needs to leave Uganda before a scandal erupts, Kate fakes a robbery in which she is supposedly hurt, hoping that the people responsible for her in London will be so concerned for her safety that they will immediately withdraw her.  She also determines to teach Stuart a lesson, but her plan goes awry.  Stuart is brutally murdered, causing Kate to be caught in the middle of a murder/blackmail investigation.

Forced to flee to England in order to avoid being arrested for Stuart’s murder, she is blackmailed by Sergeant Musuveni, the chief investigating officer in the case, who is eager to make some extra money.  He devises a plan to obtain money from Kate in exchange for an otherwise unobtainable travel permit, making it possible for her to purchase an airline ticket and return to England.

In London she soon obtains a job as a translator for the British Foreign Office, assisting with interviews of non-English-speaking Ugandan political refugees who are seeking asylum in Britain.  During one such interview she is shocked to encounter Yusufu Musuveni, the police officer who had blackmailed her in Uganda, now a refugee himself.  Having attempted to fool the British authorities into believing that he cannot speak or understand English, Musuveni is passed on to Kate for a further interview.  Kate must decide whether or not to expose his deceit and risk Musuveni revealing that she was a suspect in a murder case, or risk losing her job by pretending that she is unaware of his ability to speak English.  Kate’s resourcefulness doe not fail her.

This story challenges the norms of behavior in missionary contexts, examines the cultural issues rampant in post-colonial settings, takes the reader to a country torn apart by violence, and reveals the complicated lives of a few individuals who try to make sense of life in the midst of it all.  Stuart McBride’s murder changes everybody.  Murders always do that.

Idi Amin has been called one of the greatest anti-heroes of the twentieth century.  His rule over Uganda brought a proud nation to its knees, its economy in ruins and its spirit broken.  This novel gives readers a glimpse of a beautiful and exotic land that few fiction writers have chosen to explore.  The speeches of President Amin are quoted as given by him, and Uganda’s political climate in the early 1970’s provides a thrilling backdrop to the story.  However the novel is a work of fiction, and neither the characters nor the situations in which they find themselves are intended to depict real people or real events.

About the Author

Valerie Spencer was raised in England’s Industrial North, and did leadership development work in Uganda before moving to the United States to work for the Episcopal Church for a year. She became so busy that she forgot to return to England, and is now the owner of a writing and editing business in California’s Central Valley. In addition to working with authors, Val teaches writing classes at a local university and writes non-fiction books and training manuals. This is her first novel. Val was in Uganda in the 1970’s, and experienced the nightmare of Idi Amin’s dictatorship, often placing her own life in jeopardy in order to aid Asian refugees in their flight from Amin’s treachery. Now housekeeper to two cats, who provide her with ample non-monetary remuneration, Val spends her time shopping for cat food bargains and daubing red and blue marks all over other people’s manuscripts.