Far From True: A Promise Falls Novel
by Linwood Barclay
What is in a conclusion? (1/24/2016)
For every admirable aspect of this novel, there is an equally puzzling deficit. Linwood Barclay is a fine writer. By this statement I mean, he avoids clichés, in a genre ("thriller" fiction) given to formulae and banalities. His story line is well-crafted, and despite the fact that keeping track of his characters—for the first hundred pages, or so—requires either a razor-sharp memory or cue cards, his plot twists are memorable. Indeed, I gradually became attached to certain characters and followed their persistent dilemmas with rapt attention. Nonetheless, the overall success of the work is disappointing, mainly because of the way the novel concludes—or doesn't.
It is important not to spoil the story, for it is, in essence, a mystery, but that would be difficult, for after finally putting the book aside, the reader discovers the mystery is not actually solved. Certainly hints are abundant, and one of the several concerns seems to be resolved. But the novel ends with an excerpt of the next volume that begins: "Sixty-Nine"—the next sequential chapter—only to discover there is no chapter sixty-nine. With no previous warning, the reader must wait to discover what actually happened by reading The Twenty-Three, Barclay's next work, which a note informs us will be available in November 2016.
Four hundred and fifty pages should be enough to settle the narrative's central mystery, but they were insufficient for Barclay. I must confess that I will look for the next volume and hope I can remember who the characters are and what the tangled events left unsettled. This conceit, however, is not, I deeply hope, a trend in thriller/mystery literature.
Home by Nightfall: A Charles Lenox Mystery
by Charles Finch
Lennox at his best (10/29/2015)
Charles Finch has done it again. He has written an engaging, multi-faceted mystery for his well-honed detective, Charles Lennox, to resolve. Replete with historical insights and intriguing details about London and country life in the late nineteenth century Victorian England, this reader enjoys his works for these insights alone. The addition of a good parlor mystery only makes Finch’s novels that much more enjoyable. His cast of supporting characters has been carefully and effectively developed over time, without any of the predictability or triteness of some writer’s casts. Flawed yet sympathetic, his now familiar characters return as genuine friends for the reader to greet. Finch’s works have matured over time as he has refined his nuanced characters and creative plots. I look forward to his next work.
Everybody Rise
by Stephanie Clifford
Not Everybody Can Rise (4/18/2015)
Stephanie Clifford's novel, Everybody Rise, resonates with wit and irony as she presents the resilience of "Edith Wharton"s New York" as it clashes with newcomers who arrive in the city without the pedigree of being raised with the New Yorker on their bedside table or a familial place mark in the Blue Book, yet still wish to be important, noticed. Evelyn Beegan, the protagonist's, class besotted friends, who she seeks to cultivate for her new job with People Like Us, remain seemingly immune to their own privileges but enjoy them nonetheless, as they suggest that issues of class distinction are irrelevant, or as they would say: NBD (No Big Deal). Of course, we remain a class driven, elitist society: a truth an upwardly ambitious Evelyn tries to overcome. With her independent school education at an elite boarding school, she has a toe, or perhaps a Michael Kors shoe, in the door. As Evelyn attempts to create a façade of wealth, she quickly learns what is required to survive, much less thrive, in the city's aristocratic, social whirl. The one sane voice is Charlotte's, Evelyn's oldest friend, who represents the successful nouveau riche, residing in Brooklyn—not the Upper East Side.
If you have spent any time in that world, Clifford's book will seem hilariously familiar. Redolent smells and tastes of elegant condos, Long Island estates, and Upstate NY country retreats infuse the novel. Yet, the very title intones Stephen Sondheim's sardonic song from Company, sung by Elaine Stritch: "Here's to the Ladies Who Lunch"…and, indeed, Clifford acknowledges that provenance toward the end of the novel. The final line of the song: "Everybody Rise, Rise, Rise, Rise…Pretty Women Rise," sung as a brassy parody of a materialistic, superficial life, suggests that Evelyn's rise will not be a smooth one. Complicated by family problems, indeed burdened by her mother's ambitions, Clifford also explores the complexity of young adults crafting secure, independent identities in a city that toasts celebrity behind select and guarded gates.
The beginning is a bit slow and the ending…well, you will have to decide. But the novel is totally worth reading.
Whispering Shadows
by Jan-Philipp Sendker
At what cost (1/28/2015)
The unexpected confluence of two events in my own life—the loss of a child and a son's recent wedding in Shenzhen—made my journey through Jan-Phillipp Sendker's novel, Whispering Shadows, startlingly intimate. This coincidence afforded me a clear perspective on the authenticity of the author's sensibilities about the interior struggle of his protagonist, Paul Leibovitz. As well, my academic background is suffused with the study of Chinese history and literature. My apprehensions were dispelled, almost instantly, by Sendker's sensitive Prologue, which set not only the scene but the mood of the narrative.
Haunted by loss and despairing of his future, Paul Leibovitz eschews any personal contacts that might cause him to forget his son or to render him future pain. He has retreated to an isolated island off the coast of Hong Kong, venturing to the main island only when necessary. From this perspective, he seems a reluctant, improbable "detective." Nonetheless, he finds himself drawn back to life, yet the phrase "at what cost…." shadows his every move.
Sendker's understanding of the modern Chinese dilemma—a complex ambivalence about capitalism—is both effective and important, for it haunts the central discourse of the novel. Indeed, it is Sendker's appreciation for his characters' memories of China's Cultural Revolution, in Deng Xiaoping's "enterprise zone" and throughout China, that creates the real tension in the novel. In many ways, the actual "mystery" is secondary; the absorbing questions are more "novelistic" and focus on the emotional development of several key characters.
Thus the novel is really about emerging: the tortuous development of modern China and the equally painful movement away from absorbing loss. Memories whisper throughout: "at what cost…." does life continue.
The Life I Left Behind
by Colette McBeth
A must read (11/11/2014)
The protagonist of Colette McBeth's absorbing novel, The Life I left Behind, Melody characters undoubtedly have last names, but they seem irrelevant, opines that to finish reading the notes Eve left behind is to "lose" her. In every way I too hesitated to finish this novel because I knew I would have to leave the characters behind, a loss I was reluctant to face.
Melody and Eve are each the victims of the same assailant, and while Eve dies from her encounter, Melody survives physically—but not emotionally. The central conceit of the novel is that Eve can observe Melody's struggle, from the perch of an interim place between heaven and hell—although not really a purgatory—and can influence the narrative.
Before reading the novel, I thought the success improbable; after a few pages, however, I was won over. McBeth cleverly plots her story, as her London-based detective struggles to solve the crime, finally persuading the reader that truth is illusive and deceit pervasive. A must read for those who enjoy the mystery genre.
Island of a Thousand Mirrors
by Nayomi Munaweera
The Island of a Thousand Mirrors (9/10/2014)
There is nothing civil about war--perhaps particularly a "civil war." The oxymoron nature of that couplet becomes stunningly poignant in Nayomi Meenaway's compelling novel about Sri Lanka. Two female protagonists provide the first person narratives and persuade the reader to accept--painfully and vividly--Meenaway's conclusion: "It is a war between two equally corrupt forces....outsiders want moral certainty, a thing I cannot give them." Torn by the intimacy and beauty of Meenaway's prose, my instinct to look away, close my eyes, or comfortably ignore the events as mere fiction collapsed under the urgency of her story. In the pantheon of fine literature on civil wars, this novel deserves a place.
In Praise of Hatred
by Khaled Khalifa
In Praise of Hatred (3/27/2014)
If you are willing to suspend clarity of place and time, entering into Khaled Khalifa's dreamscape novel, In Praise of Hatred, immerses the reader in an intimate sense of modern Syria (1980s) through the eyes of a radicalized, young woman. Her home, albeit the home of her relatives, and the city of Aleppo, provide a backdrop for many of the events and characters that inhabit the story.
Vivid, if only occasional, details punctuate Khalifa's metonymous prose and provide the novel's sense of authenticity and place: the barking of wild dogs, the parsley and aubergines needed from a Souk, a charred corpse that suffers an onslaught of unnecessary bullets. Despite the title, the unnamed narrator's hatred emerges as malleable, as she confesses toward the conclusion of the novel, "The hatred which I had defended as the only truth was shattered entirely….My life was a collection of allegories that belonged to other people." Khalifa's prose is poetic; his story is poignant.
Reading this novel against the background of present-day Syria elevated the works importance, even though the author hopes his novel will not be read as a political screed. It is, nonetheless, a painful reminder of the absence of threat with which most of us live.
The Headmaster's Wife
by Thomas Christopher Greene
Worth the read (1/5/2014)
In this novel, Thomas Greene has adroitly captured the pitch-perfect tone of pre-1960's and 1990's boarding school life, as well as a trenchant understanding of adolescent impunity, along with adult longing and despair. Greene quickly establishes his cynical protagonist, the Headmaster, Dick Ives, but not until the second half of the novel does the Headmaster's wife, Elisabeth, fully emerge.
Surprisingly, authentic, emotional turmoil over loss is the true focus of this work, but Greene's literary trompe l'oeil is only apparent halfway through the narrative, which is both the brilliance and the difficulty of the novel. The first half is trite, but when Greene reveals the real purpose of the work, the reader forgives him and becomes engrossed in the narrative. If readers are tenacious, they will reap the rewards of Greene's poignant world.
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