Book Review: The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djèlí Clark

• Title: The Haunting of Tram Car 015
• Author: P. Djèlí Clark
• ISBN: 9781250294807

Dang, I’ve posted a lot of book reviews lately. While I have started reading more in the past month, I don’t usually finish this many books so rapidly. It’s just worked out that way.

What if djinn returned to the world in the late 19th Century, settled down, and transformed Cairo into the most modern and innovative city in the world?

Tram Car 015 is a novella, which contributed to my getting through it so quickly. I’d previously read A Dead Djinn in Cairo by the same author. Both of the books follow human field agents of the ministry tasked with keeping supernatural order in the city.

The world Clark’s given us is intoxicating and utterly apologetic in its setting. He uses Arabic, Egyptian, and other cultural and lingual elements without explaining them for the reader. He simply moves on and takes the reader with him, so they understand what these otherwise unfamiliar things mean. It’s just life as usual for the characters and, like a joke, would lose a lot in the explanation.

I’ve really enjoyed both of the things by him that I’ve read so far and am happy that he has so many other works that I can add to my library, including a novel released last year.