Case Histories: A Novel

Kate Atkinson's novels have always contained layers, filtered information effortlessly and playfully released, secrets unlocked incrementally. She won the Whitbread for her first novel, Behind the Scenes of the Museum, an amazing, supremely beautiful work, then went on to write two more gorgeous novels and a collection of short stories. But with Case Histories she turns her energy toward the mystery genre and does so while maintaining the unique and charming style that has garnered her success.

Frequently enough authors with a "literary" reputation have tackled genre writing with frustrating results -- overly obvious clues or red herrings, obtuse conclusions, etc., all showing a lack of understanding of the genre and its readers, and choosing form vastly over function. However, as far as mystery writing goes Case Histories stands up to the work of some of the best of Britain's crime writers like Minette Walters, Ruth Rendell, and Reginald Hill, without losing any of its sense of art.

The novel opens with three "case histories" -- crimes that occurred up to thirty-four years ago. In 1970 Olivia Land, the much-loved youngest sister of four, goes missing in the middle of the night, never to be seen again. Then there is Theo Wyre, who loves his daughter Laura so frantically that he worries about her night and day; in 1994 she begins working in his office -- supposedly a safe environment -- and is savagely murdered by a stranger. And in 1974 young mother Michelle Fletcher is found with a bloodied axe in her hands and a dead husband on the floor.

The reader gets a bird's eye view of these events through an omniscient narrator whose sharp observations and hilarious asides come together to produce wonderful characterizations. Here's a taste of the young Land sisters under the narrator's microscope:

"Julia could be a very annoying person, Amelia and Sylvia agreed, she had a bewildering mercurial personality -- punching and kicking one minute, a sham of cooing and kissing the next....Amelia felt stranded, vague and insubstantial, between the acutely defined polar opposites of Sylvia and Julia....Amelia was a more thoughtful, bookish girl than Sylvia. Sylvia preferred excitement to order....Sylvia was nuts of course. She'd told Amelia that God (not to mention Joan of Arc) had spoken to her. In the unlikely event of God speaking to anyone, Sylvia did not seem the obvious choice."

After visiting the scenes of the crimes, we are introduced to Jackson Brodie, a private investigator whose ex-wife and eight-year-old daughter still occupy many of his thoughts and who dreams frequently of retirement in a French cottage. He studies his French language guides on stakeouts. While maintaining some of the clichéd P.I. make-up such as a disheveled wardrobe, the occasional black eye, and a world-weary cynicism, he also has a delightful affability and gentleness of manner: "...despite everything he'd seen and done, inside Jackson there remained a belief -- a small, battered and bruised belief -- that his job was to help people be good rather than punishing them for being bad."

What makes Atkinson's award-winning debut and her subsequent writing so beguiling is her ability to delicately measure humor and pathos -- always a tricky balance. Her language is so playful and inventive that when we are suddenly spun around to view a bloody death, or to peek at the despair of loneliness there is a jolt -- a sudden intake of breath. Atkinson does this with such skill that the reader does not feel manipulated. Quite the contrary, the reader is invited to share all of these characters' stories -- not just the sensationalism of bereavement and crime.

Case Histories is such a satisfying novel, one that is admittedly aided by the inherent compelling nature of a good mystery, yet all the while Atkinson's language can't fail to delight, being psychologically keen, whippet quick, and utterly joyful. You will never want this book to end, yet, like the best mystery novel, you'll stay up all night to find out exactly how it does.

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