Big Crimes

Big Sky, Kate Atkinson

While we're probably overdue a standalone Atkinson novel that's not from one of her two ongoing series, it's always pleasing to crack open one of her Jackson Brody books. And Big Sky doesn't disappoint.

Though set largely around Scarborough and Whitby, and their fading seaside glories of tourist traps and out-of-time variety shows, Big Sky doesn't move very far from its familiar territory of connected crimes and Brody's quiet heroism. But it expertly blends in 2010s-relevant themes of people-trafficking, celebrity sex offenders, child-abuse and even, though subtly, Brexit. And does all these justice, and with a seeming effortlessness from Atkinson, that makes for a comfortable sort of challenging. She doesn't dwell on any salacious details of the crimes - as other, more questionable realms of the genre might - but equally doesn't leave the reader in any doubt about the depravity behind them. With Brody, Atkinson has a foil with which she can go dark while retaining a clear, positive morality, and with a degree of lightness, as her detective quips glass-half-empty asides on life and the damaged lives he sees around him.

It's very interesting to read this immediately after Belinda Bauer's Rubbernecker. There's a lot of superficial overlap (multiple viewpoints, connected crimes, grimly humourous), but both writers manage to retain their own distinct voices. Possibly Atkinson differs because, for all her weariness of human frailties, she remains more empathetic to her characters and their often circumscribed lives. In any case, for a reader, it's fantastic to have two such talents going at the same time. Roll on their next forays.

Loss of loss

As was implied by yesterday's rather short review, and doubtless confirmed by this similarly short one, my pile of books that have been read but not cogitated has grown again. Olympics, holidays, but mostly laziness can be drafted in to serve as excuses, but the bedside table needs to have space for my glasses, so here I am again. Today's hasty summary is for Kate Atkinson's 2006 crime novel One Good Turn, a sequel to her earlier career-direction-change novel, Case Histories (which I was a big fan of).

As with its predecessor, this novel is centred around the character of ex-army sergeant, ex-police officer Jackson Brodie, now also adding ex-private detective to his growing c.v. Finding himself in Edinburgh during the Fringe on account of his girlfriend's sporadic acting career, it isn't long before trouble - of the criminal variety - finds Jackson. When he intervenes in a seeming road rage incident (one good turn ...), it's not long before he's drawn into a chain reaction of murkily-connected events. His fellow passengers include Martin Canning, a successful but troubled crime writer; Gloria Hatter, the millionaire wife of a crooked property developer; and Louise Monroe, a local detective sergeant who finds herself bumping into Brodie suspiciously frequently. Plus an entourage that includes a violent fixer, a pair of seeming Russian twins, and a mild-mannered man who has a military-issue gun for some reason.

The funny thing about this novel is that is has almost everything that made its precursor such a memorable book. Funnier (not "ha ha") is that though it's missing what I think elevated Case Histories above its genre trappings, namely its deep consideration of the human cost of loss, it still works perfectly well, and is still a very enjoyable and satisfying read. This omission certainly makes it a far less complete novel, indeed it makes it difficult to separate this novel from the crowded background of other crime tomes, but I was still almost wholly pleased with my time spent with the wry Mr. Brodie. Atkinson has made one thematic addition that somewhat raises One Good Turn from much of the genre, namely some very clever self-awareness about the crime genre, worked in via the successful but hollow writer, Martin. However, I'd still rather have had deeper themes to ponder (though I am a sucker for such post-modernism).

Still, notwithstanding the foregoing, I will definitely be returning to Ms. Atkinson in the near future. Even shorn of her literary sensibilities, she's still eminently worth reading.

Case Histories

Following on from yet another enjoyable jaunt with Inspector Rebus, I thought I'd dip into crime fiction again, but with a bit of a difference this time. Kate Atkinson was (is?) a writer of literary fiction with a couple of well-received novels under her belt when she appeared to take something of a sharp turn down the dark(-ish) alley leading to crime fiction. Four novels later, she hasn't reversed course just yet, and the private detective she invented, Jackson Brodie, has now washed up in a successful (as far as I can tell) TV series. Anyway, what's her first novel, Case Histories, like then?

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Ex-army and ex-police, Jackson Brodie now resides in the low-rent end of Cambridge, plying a living as a private detective investigating - mostly - missing cats and potentially misbehaving wives at the high-rent end. On the subject of which, he also has an ex-wife who's now shacked up with an academic and is threatening to take their daughter on an extended trip to New Zealand. Into this professional ennui and personal strife, Jackson lands three new cases: a sister missing for 30 years; the unsolved murder of a daughter; and a misplaced niece, the daughter of a murderess. While Jackson gradually collates what little new information he can on these old, cold cases, his meetings with their clients proves at least as eventful. And the ante gets upped further when, for some unknown reason, it appears that someone wants to kill Jackson.

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What a brilliant read. The first thing about it that struck me, and which surprised me, is that it's frequently a seriously funny book. While it does contain a handful of comedy set-pieces (Jackon's first encounter with his nemesis and an old tom cat being one of them), the humour largely stems from Atkinson's characters, particularly Jackson, who she has made endless sources of wry observations on life. Though life has treated him harshly - a fact that the reader is slowly and skilfully edged towards - Jackson is very amusingly insightful of both his own life and that of the others his line of work bumps him into.

[Julia] had one of those husky voices that sounded as if she was permanently coming down with a cold. Men seemed to find that sexy in a woman, which Jackson thought was odd because it made women sound less like women and more like men. Maybe it was a gay thing.

What I found more impressive was that Atkinson pulls this off in a book built on the rock solid foundation of loss. After a (brilliant) introduction to the three case histories that teeters towards loss, the text hovers above this for most of the time, but every so often dips down to remind the reader (if I can get all florid about it) of the yawning chasms in peoples' hearts when loved ones either die or disappear. Atkinson's creation of Theo Wyre, and his murdered daughter, Laura, is, in particular, unbearably sad. But this underlying loss gives the book a balanced texture and an unexpected (to me) veracity.

I was a little less convinced by the structuring of the book. Atkinson jumps around in time a lot, using this as a means to bump the reader's journey onwards. That seemed a little lazy to me, and rather confusing at times, as when significant between-chapters events that are obscured by small jumps forward in time are only gradually revealed to the reader. At one point I actually began to wonder if the copy I was reading had lost a few pages. And the end of the novel seemed a little like a rush to (opaquely, at times) tie up all of the loose ends. The deus ex machina of an unexpected inheritance doesn't help with this misgiving.

It's churlish to complain, what with the novel offering far (far) more than conventional crime fiction (yes, I'm looking at you Rebus), but the "detective" part of the tale is also a little bit unsatisfying. Jackson solves two of the three crimes relatively straightforwardly, basically by chasing up leads that were missed - only partially understandably - during the original investigations. I can't now remember if he actually solves the third case, but the reader gets to do this themselves via a seemingly completely decoupled plot strand and the book's occasional, and telling, mentioning of dates and ages.

These niggles aside, I really enjoyed this book. It made me both laugh out loud and deeply sad, but in the good way. I'll without doubt be getting to Atkinson's sequel novels in the near-future - not least to partake of Jackson's eminently agreeable company. Finally, much as shown when literary fiction writers "invade" science fiction (Atwood, McCarthy), it's yet another sign that the genres are ripe territory for writers who dare.