Pretty Glass Houses

So, here's a portrait of the week's hostess (aka nominator), slightly toasty with a second glass of nice chardonnay, more than exhausted and ever-tardy. And yet, this post will appear bright and early Monday morning. Ah, the glories of computation.

Today posts will bat back and forth (hopefully, otherwise you're stuck with my mad-batting) about Jeff Ford's wonderful, now-EDGAR AWARD-WINNING The Girl in the Glass. Cheers!

I suppose to start things off, I'd like to come back to how truly satisfying a read this book is. It takes a lot to pull that off. I always think about Sean Stewart's mission statement as a writer (another brilliant novelist, this one stolen away at present by alternate reality games): "I want to write meaning-of-life thrillers -- books that explore the most profound aspects of human existence, but don't skimp on swordfights." (And, actually, if anyone reading this feels a little high and mighty about genre literature of any kind, I'd suggest you go read Sean's site introduction and, well, just that.)

Girl has no swordfights, but it more than makes up for that in butterflies and carnies and ghosts. In fact, one of the things I love most about this book could be seen as a swordfight of sorts -- the beautiful, pitch-perfect period dialogue throughout, always used to question, advance and expose the story and, more importantly, its wonderfully drawn characters. There are so many great conversations in this book. Here's an example, from earlyish in the book (page 77 for those of you with hymnals; it may seem a bit long for excerpting, but indulge me):

"This detail's a snooze and a half," said Antony, blowing smoke.

"Miss Hush's powers seem somewhat less than startling," I said.

"Well, one thing's for sure, not that we should talk, but that name's phony as a three-dollar bill."

"I thought it was poetic," I said.

"Poetic, maybe. Phony, for sure. Besides that, though, Miss Hush is a fine-looking woman, even if she's got the complexion of a snowball."

"She must live under a rock," I said.

"Did you see the boss's face when she coughed up our real names?"

"I doubt she could see his surprise, because he covered it with that smile."

"Yeah, the business smile," said Antony. "Sleight of mouth."

"Maybe his best trick," I said.

"Do you think she pulled that information out of a dream?" he asked.

"I don't know. She seems like she could either be a con or the real thing, if there's any such thing as the real thing. Schell's pretty much convinced me there isn't."

Antony blew a smoke ring, then flicked his cigarette butt out the window. "Once I was with this traveling show in Georgia for a few weeks, wrestling a bear--"

"Here we go," I said.

"No, it's true. The sorriest fucking bear in the world. It was sort of like rolling your grandmother, like moving furniture. Had to quit; I felt sorry for the bear. Anyway, with that show, there was this old hag, and I mean hag. She sat in a tent and you went in and paid your dime and she'd tell you your future. And for an extra nickel she'd tell you the day you were gonna die."

"Sounds like fun," I said.

"We're talking the loneliest of occupations," said Antony. "But in the short time I was with that crap outfit two people actually took her up on the nickel special. One was a local guy in the little town outside of Atlanta. She told him he had two days to live. Two days later, sure as shit, he's walking home from work and gets struck by lightning. Blood boils, head pops like a grape."

"She got lucky," I said.

"That's pretty damn lucky. Well, not for the guy. But there was another guy too. A midget who was with the show. He went to see her after the first guy got hit by lightning. The midget's show name was Major Minor. He dressed in a military outfit; was a real self-important little prick.* The hag gave him a date in six years. So what? Right? Who's gonna remember that? But about maybe eight years later, I ran into Bunny Franchot, the Alligator Girl, one of the most screwed-up-looking broads I ever knew, in a carnival in South Jersey. She'd been with the outfit in Georgia when I was there. We got to talking, and it came out that the Major, who had this Model T rigged so he could drive it standing up, went out one night, got loaded, and ran himself into a tree. He'd forgotten the prediction, but Bunny never did. It was the exact day she predicted."

I shook my head.

"There's more bullshit in heaven and earth, than you can dream up in your scenario," said Antony.

"Well put," I said.

-- And scene --

Well, actually it goes on, setting up a soon-to-come, jaw-droppingly horrific scene that fulfills the sinister promise of the early mystery, the phantom girl in the glass who Schell says appears to him on a con before he sees her again, this time a missing rich girl in a newspaper.

One of the beautiful things about this particular conversation (and there are many, not least of which is Antony, the big lug of the main trio, who always brings more insight than you expect and turns the right phrase, but in the way he would turn it) is how it comments on one of the core mysteries of the book. Did Schell see the girl or didn't he? Was the girl a ghost in the glass, or wasn't she? What is real and what isn't? When does it matter?

I don't know about you, but this is the kind of thematic underpinning, the kind of question, the kind of story that makes me roll over and purr like a cat. (Which Lauren Cerand says is important.)

So yeah, The Girl in the Glass is one of those rare reads that can go into dark, dark places, but remain funny and remain a pleasure to read. That's what made it so satisfying a book for this reader, anyway. More to come.

(*Footnote for writer geeks: "The midget's show name was Major Minor. He dressed in a military outfit; was a real self-important little prick." You don't even see the semi-colon in that sentence, because it's that sentence. Drool.)

Comments

[jeff ford]

Gwenda: Just wanted to say thanks for the starting post. I know my turn comes later in the week, and I'll not return here to write till then, but I did want to say that in your description of the book you do catch what I was trying to effect as my model was The Thin Man by Hammett. My own description of that novel is -- a comic-noir. Will have more to say on Thursday.

[Gwenda]

Hey Jeff -- Thanks for coming by and do feel free to stop in any time you want this week, not just on Thursday.

Comic-noir; exactly. You nail it in this book. I wouldn't have connected it to The Thin Man on my own, but a thousand times yes once you point it out.

[jeff ford]

Gwenda: I'll be lurking on and off and will write if anyone has questions. Another book that I found has pretty solid comic overtones as well is The Last Good Kiss by Crumely (I'm not sure of the spelling of the author's last name). I think a lot of writers think that to be unremittingly dark is to be unremittingly profound, but one of the surest ways to bumble that mission is to forget the integral role of humor in the human drama. Ok,Ok, I'll shut up for now.

[Dan Wickett]

James Crumley - and I agree.

Glad to see you're reading along this week Jeff - this was a great, great read - very hard to put down. I do think every once so often, writers may forget that part of the experience that the reader enjoys is having an actual story to read and you certainly give your audience one with The Girl in the Glass.

[Megan]

Good point Dan. Do you ever get the feeling that having a good story is seen as bad in some circles? To me, one of the most important aspects of the book is it's ability to grab your attention. One of the things I liked best about The Girl in the Glass was that although the plot kept you reading, there was a lot going on underneath it all.

[a nanny mouse]

The odd group detectives reminded me of the early Burke novels by Andrew Vachss and the Mongo series by George C. Chesbro. Wonder if Jeff has read any of these.

[jeff ford]

a nanny mouse: I've read only one Vachss novel. It was very dark, about child abduction, which, from what I hear is the theme of many of them. The writer Patrick O'Leary turned me onto it. Never did any more than that one. Don't know the other guys.

[Inversiones en petroleo]

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