Category Archives: Mystery

April 17, 2020 · 5:53 pm

Long Bright River: Remember when Opioids were a public health crisis?

There’s something so strange about reading a book about a public health crisis that is not a book about Covid19 (oh man! when do you think the first Covid19 novel will come out? And better question, the first good Covid19 novel?), but that’s what I just finished. Liz Moore’s Long Bright River explores the opioid epidemic through the lens of a police officer, Mickey, and her addicted sister, Kasey.

I picked the book because all the reviews I read were like ‘thriller!’, ‘page turner!’, ‘Can’t put down!’ and given my ability to focus right now (limited) and to read (limited), I figured these qualities would keep me engaged long enough to actually read something. And it worked! The book is all of those things, if not very good.

Mostly not good because the characters lack depth and the plot twists are very obvious and very Plot Twisty and it’s written as though it anticipates its adaptation (which spoiler, it has already been picked up for TV adaptation). But! If you are worried you will never be able to focus and read again, you could do much worse. The book is so earnestly trying (and sure, failing) to be a critique of the monolithic portrait of ‘junkies’ and addicts. And there’s something in there about gender and policing that isn’t totally ridiculous. So while it misses the mark on almost every front, it might get points for trying. And for somehow still managing to make you want to keep reading.

If you’re in the greater Guelph area and want to pick it up, I’m happy to leave it on my porch for someone – just send me a note: literaryvice@gmail.com

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December 3, 2019 · 3:25 pm

The Haunting of Hill House: Spooky

Shirley Jackson writes good creepy. We read The Haunting of Hill House for book club and all (who read it, at least) agreed that it was unsettling in the most delightful ways.

We follow a group of four as they plan to spend the summer at a haunted house observing the phenomenon and the effects on the group. Quickly things take a turn, as Eleanor, our mostly protagonist gets weirder and stranger. By the end of the book its an open question about whether she is a ghost herself, where the entire book has been a haunting vision for her, whether the people around her are real or imagined, or a combination of the above. The freedom to interpret and re-interpret makes the book a delight, and the unsettling moments (never truly ‘scary,’ don’t worry) wriggle away in the imagination for days after.

Save it for next October, maybe, or enjoy now, but worth reading if you missed it in…. 1959.

Oh and apparently there are few great adaptations for TV. Not that you watch TV, but just in case.

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September 9, 2019 · 3:42 pm

The Witch Elm: So. Slow.

Folks. Do not read The Witch Elm. Tana French is great and writes wonderful mystery novels that are giant and delightful, but this is not one of them. Though most review sites disagree with me, so I’m probably wrong or just irritable.

Toby, our protagonist, is super obnoxious. He’s entirely self-absorbed, petulant and unaware of how spoiled his is by everyone around him. He uses his girlfriend, Melissa, in ways that the novel doesn’t seem to be aware of, making her self-sacrifice some kind of example of how women are meant to be when their partners are down trodden. Melissa is cast against Toby’s cousin, Susanna, who is some Gorgon-like revenge-monster, making the alternative vision of femininity one of calculated destruction. Even while Susanna is a maternal figure, ending up with her husband because she couldn’t figure out another option, and mostly seeming bored by her children (a common trope when trying to be edgy and counter the helicopter parent).

I suppose the book is supposed to be about understanding who we are and what we are capable of when pressed by circumstance or when the culture around us doesn’t take our concerns and experiences seriously. There’s probably something meritorious in the exploration of that theme, but honest to god, the book PLODS through these questions, ever so slowly reeling out the circumstances of the murder, the connections among characters and their pasts, supposedly building suspense and adding character complexity, but really just irritating me as I didn’t see the point to long digressions about how much wine there was to be had. Which isn’t to say I want all books to be pot boilers. Honestly, I appreciated that Toby’s uncle was a genealogist, a cute way of getting the reader to think about how our inheritance, too, shapes who we think we are and what we think we should be like as people. There were other clever approaches to the thematic question, but they all kept getting blocked for me by how utterly boring the whole thing was. This question of are we born lucky. Do we control our fate. How are we constrained by gender and sexuality. What do we owe friendship and experience. How does memory contribute to our sense of self and identity. Such great questions. Just so… dull in execution.

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September 5, 2019 · 3:23 pm

Louise Penny: Masculinity FTW

I did a lot of reading this summer. The bulk of that reading was Louise Penny novels, and so rather than write one post after the other about Inspector Gamache and descriptions of Quebecois cheese, I’m writing this one post, and it’s fine, because the novels are all the same: a pleasant romp through a picturesque Quebec countryside with characters that make you hope for a better world, even while murder abounds and threats of Darkness loom. I also read a lot of recipe books – many featuring the Instant Pot – of which I will not bore you.

I read The Murder Stone, A Great Reckoning and Glass Houses. My mum rightly pointed out that I’ve done myself a disservice in reading out of order, but let’s be clear that I’m not likely to ever go back and read the others, so finding out that one of the detectives has a drug problem after he’s been to NA and gotten married to Gamache’s daughter hardly ruins the thread for future reading.

So right. If you’ve not encountered Louise Penny here’s the thrust: her novels win heaps of awards. People love them. There are organized bus tours to the town where Penny lives so that people can visit the cafe featured in the novel. They’re incredibly enjoyable while you’re reading them, something entirely comforting like so many wool sweaters and mugs of tea. Inspector Gamache has cult followings who want to know where he ‘actually’ lives (my beliefs about Gilbert Blythe notwithstanding, fictional characters only live in the mind).

So what’s the deal? My guess is that people (and me while I’m reading them) like the security of a man who is kind and who exemplifies the tropes of a gentlemen-masculinity that are all laughable in reality. We want to believe that men can be kind, brave and stand up for principles and values amid a world of corruption, greed, lust and those other sins. Despite All the Evidence to the contrary, and more importantly, despite the reality that no one ever needed men to be the bastions of honour in the first place, Gamache is an irresistible character because of these qualities. We swoon at the idea of a kind and noble man who occupies a place of power because there are so few examples in reality.

I’m not advancing a novel argument here. I’m sure anyone reading the books would come to the same conclusion. That it’s as much the attraction to Gamache and his pastoral perfect life as it is the mystery around the murder that keeps us reading. We want to be close to a life of comfortable chairs, exquisite food (though the descriptions of food are something distracting – like I have to get up and make bread and cheese before I can keep reading) and totalizing romance because such a place and such people are all but impossible to find in the world we occupy. Utter wish fulfillment.

So it’s something of a rude awakening to come back to 2019 and recall the moment we are in. The responsibilities of being flawed after spending so many hours with the flawless is taxing. It almost makes me want to read non-fiction. Almost.

 

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