Ellery Lloyd’s The Club is equal parts forgettable murder mystery and entirely engrossing distraction. Very fancy private club for the richest celebrities – there’s blackmail, murder attempts, hidden identities, adoptions gone wrong. All the best things you might hope from a soap opera among the rich and famous. I can’t say the book does much to explore deep themes (maybe you could stretch at something about women’s autonomy or objectification or power), and probably that is fine for what it is. A glossy magazine turned novel. A novel destined to be adapted for HBO. So enjoy it as an audiobook, or on a beach, or on a rainy Saturday morning (while your kids tear your house apart and the book lets you absolutely ignore the chaos: a true gift).
Tag Archives: Murder mystery
I Have Some Questions for You: So great.
In 2019 I told you that Rebecca Makkai’s The Great Believers was the one book you should read that year (still true), and while I’m not yet prepared to say I Have Some Questions for You is the best thing you’ll read this year, it’s certainly in the running.
Following Brodie Kane, a podcast producer, as she returns to her high school boarding school to both teach a class and investigate the murder of her former school roommate, the book has the distinct feel of a true crime podcast (I’m sure someone has done a comparison to Serial. And… they have), but one that artfully and consciously plays with the ‘just asking questions’ element of exploring a closed murder case, the retrieval of lost memories, the unearthing of new evidence, the exploration of how changes mores of sex and race influence how crimes are investigated and prosecuted, the risks to the families of victims, the exploitation of trauma, and on.
And while all of that makes for great reading – and the murder mystery element itself is captivating – it’s the sections peppered throughout about the all too frequent ways violence against women is normalized, make routine, made mundane and forgettable that utterly gut punches.
The careful way Makkai has Brodie explore the pendulum of #metoo stories through an accusation made against Brodie’s ex-husband is nuanced and challenging not simply in how Brodie reacts, but in how Brodie reacts to the reactions, how so much of what gets told – and believed – is in the interpretation.
And that, I guess, is the heart of the book. How an innocent person can spend years in prison for a crime they obviously didn’t commit because of a story that gets told and believed. How narratives we tell ourselves about our teenage lives get made real and real and real, until we meet that story retold through another perspective as an adult and are forced to consider whether we might have believed a fiction. How everyone we know and everything with think is necessarily a story and that the real failure – of individuals and institutions – is in not recognizing the way this story is made, made up, and reified.
It’s really good.
Filed under American literature, Fiction, New York Times Notable, Prize Winner
Bath Haus: Maybe-Murder, Definitely Mystery, but Easy to Solve, so Maybe-Mystery
I was recently getting my haircut and reading P.J. Vernon’s Bath Haus (I’m terrible at chatting with hair stylists and so I read a book). I’m not usually concerned about being seen reading whatever I’m reading, but in this self-described ‘thriller’ (I should amend my title) there are many, many scenes describing sexy things and murderous things and I kept imagining the stylist reading over my shoulder and judging me OR being so engaged that she’d cut off my ear, which is to say, the book had me on edge.
By the mid point of the book it’s not particularly challenging to sort out the whodunit behind the thriller bits, but there is sufficient tension and slow drip of information to make you want to keep reading. Plus it was – for me at least – a novel plot to have a gay couple maybe murdering and being thriller like. Plus a very mean mom character, which, as I understand it, always does turn the children into criminals.
It’s a good book for vacation, and with a few weeks left of summer, you could do worse. But also better. So… maybe? I don’t know. Like if the library has it on the shelf: get it. If you have to put it on hold and wait a week maybe don’t. And so ended the least helpful review of all time. Ever. The end.
Filed under Book I'll Forget I Read, Fiction, Mystery
The Guest List: As Silly As You’d Guess
Today I unintentionally dressed myself and the small human in matching outfits. We’re at that point. Also the point at which I read trashy airport novels unironically and enjoy them enough to finish. Lucy Foley’s The Guest List is extremely silly. Told from the perspectives of the bridal party (and a few guests) at an exclusive wedding held on a remote island, it’s a murder mystery that is as easy to solve as it is hilarious in its dun-dun-dun finish to every. single. chapter. It is not at all good unless your basic criteria is a book that does not require any thought and is magical in its anticipation of its movie adaptation. Which, tbh, is a pretty compelling set of reasons for reading it in These Times. I am likely mere days away from putting flowered bows on the small human’s very bald head. Send help.
Filed under Fiction, Mystery, Worst Books
Literary Vice 