Murat Somers' writing is fresh, funny and also politically right-on and his books will have you gagging for more. We caught up with the author to find out more about his sublime book.

Tell us about the Hop-Çiki-Yaya series
Hop-Çiki-Yaya (pronounced Hope Cheeky Ya Ya) is a kind of nonsensical chant which has its origins in 50s and 60s slang. In the 1960s, long before the English term ‘gay’ was imported into Turkish, hop-çiki-yaya was a wink-wink, non-obscene way to refer to over-the-top, screaming queens. Also in the 1950s and 1960s, middle class girls studying at foreign schools in Istanbul would chant "hop-çiki-yaya" as part of cheers to support their school teams.

The series is full of joy, fun and wit! The heroine is a computer whiz corporate consultant and skilful hacker by day and handsome man, club owner, glamorous transvestite and amateur sleuth by night. She runs into different murder cases in modern Istanbul.

How many books are there in the series?
It’s reached its sixth book in Turkish. They are also published in France, Spain and now the UK. Rights have also been sold in the USA, Italy, Germany, Hungary, Greece, Brazil and others. The brilliant Turkish author Perihan Two Girls Magden described the books "as refreshing as cookies and cold lemonade on a summer day. I wish there was a Turkish Almodovar to film all these novels one day”.

The Prophet Murders' intrepid heroine is a transvestite nightclub owner, she's not the kind of detective we usually find in fiction. How did this character come about?
Well, first of all, I humbly consider myself a good crime reader. And as everybody knows, there are many straight male and female detectives in the crime literary genre but only a few gays, with a splash of bisexuals. So, I started to think, why not a transgender one? And as far as I know, my hero is the first and only one, so far.

What were you aims for the character?
I had two aims. The first was to try to alter the perception of transgender people who are not very welcome in most societies. Especially transvestites. They are presented as either slapstick fun material or potential criminals by the media, in bad films and books. For example see the freak transvestite character in The Silence of the Lambs.

As a result transvestites are perceived by many as potential criminals, doomed to be street hookers but nothing else, with almost no moral values. I don’t agree with this attitude at all so I wanted to create a likeable, intelligent, witty, refined, well-educated hero/heroine with positive skills. Not the typical, stereotypical drag-queen. Therefore I furnished him/her with contrasting and considerable talents, plus lots of knowledge and warm wit.

I am trying to show transvestites from a different angle, so having a transgender protagonist helped me a lot. Whenever I want I can cast him as a seductress with an Audrey Hepburn alter-ego, or alternatively as an handsome gentlemen.

My second objective was to write a witty, effervescent crime novel. I personally get bored with dark, dark, dark crime novels. Does that sound like I'm having a middle age crisis? Not yet I hope! Life is still joyful for me.

"The heroine is a computer whiz, corporate consultant and skilful hacker by day and handsome man, club owner, glamorous transvestite and amateur sleuth by night."

Your books are being translated into English, but is there anything about your storytelling and writing that you'd consider typically Turkish?
Istanbul permeates all the books - songs Turkish people listen to, shops they visit, areas they like to hang out; all are real and still exist! I think my dear translator Kenneth Dakan got all of the Turkish references into the English books. I don’t consider my writing and storytelling typically Turkish, but I am sure there must be a splash of something her and there in the series.

English readers might be a bit surprised to hear that there's a transgender scene in Turkey. Could you say a little bit about that please?
Well these are novels, not social studies, so the club mentioned in my books doesn’t exist, and neither does the hero/heroine walk the streets of Istanbul. But for sure there’s a transgender scene and with quite a history.

The Ottoman Empire Divan poetry is a whole genre in praise of the liqueur serving beautiful boys called Saki and there’s the tradition of men dressed as women, called Zenne, dancing and singing, entertaining other men. These historical roots are not completely buried. The most famous Turkish star, a singer, called the Sun of Art was flamboyant and his successor is a transsexual who is still on TV everyday! And nowadays transgender sub-life does exist fully, but unfortunately mostly through underground clubs and street hookers.

Would you describe your books as political?
Definitely! That was one of my purposes. I just reversed the traditional negatives and positives. The criminals are mainly from the polite, white establishment and the generally marginal transgenders are positive characters. Also, with every book in the series, I’ve put a different segment of modern day Istanbul under the microscope. In The Prophet Murders it is the radical Islamic people. With The Kiss Murder, it is the nationalists.

“Transvestites are perceived by many as potential criminals, doomed to be street hookers…with almost no moral values. I don’t agree with this attitude at all so I wanted to create a likeable, intelligent…hero/heroine with positive skills.”

How do you feel about the comparisons made between your writing and Pedro Almodovar's films?
Oh! I love that. I adore his films. Preferably his early films - The Law of Desire is one of my all-time-favourites.

What's next for you?
An Almodovar film project? I wish! I originally wrote The Prophet Murders in 2002. Since then the Hop-Çiki-Yaya has reached its 6th book. There are also two novels in my Champagne Trilogy that have been published, the third one is coming out this year. These are not crime novels but more mainstream books, my Istanbul odes to Harold Robbins and Jacqueline Susann.

What else would you like to say?
Life is a blast! Try to get the most out of it. Read my books!

Look out for our review of The Prophet Murders next week.

The Prophet Murders, by Mehmet Murat Somer
Published by: Serpent's Tail
Released: 8 May 2008
ISBN: 1846686334

Get The Prophet Murders by Mehmet Murat Somer. Buy online and save!