Novels No. 64

 

Liz Moore. The God of the Woods. USA: Riverhead Books/Penguin Random House, 2024.

Summer camp! Words to thrill urban pre-teens. Or not all of them – in this big, long book. Back in 1975, at elite Camp Emerson situated on the large, heavily forested Van Laar Preserve, twelve-year-old Tracy is not quite comfortable until she becomes good friends with Barbara—daughter of Peter and Alice Van Laar whose summer mansion sits nearby. Barbara was "acting out" at home, such that her alcoholic mother can't handle her, plus a father seldom at home; it was unusual for the upper class property owner to request their child join the campers, but camp director, T.J. Hewitt, felt obliged to accept her. Tracy knows that Barbara sneaks out of their cabin every night to meet a boy. One night she doesn't return, thus raising the hue and cry for search parties. Camp counselor Louise, who often meets her own boyfriend John Paul after hours, feels guilty that she had left her trainee Annabel in charge—she learns the girl also had abandoned her overnight post. Tracy thinks she knows where Barbara might have gone and sets off alone to find her. Big mistake: now two lost girls.

Segue to the wealthy Van Laar family, much of it in 1961. Their eight-year-old son "Bear" (Peter Van Laar IV) went missing in the Preserve. On the family's staff then, T.J. Hewitt's father Vic, and gardener Carl, are as stunned as the parents. Everyone loved the boy. And a serial killer—Jacob Sluiter, locally called Slitter—has frequented the area. The boy was never found. Story structure here is tricky, intending to keep us nervy, hopping between two cases happening a decade apart. That includes context of all the supporting characters, some of whom have their own collateral mysteries—Alice's sister, Vic's brother, John Paul's sister, and Van Laar cronies make it even more compelling. Newby State Police detective Luptack proves herself in handling Barbara's case, despite Capt. LaRochelle's deference to the Van Laars.

Authors who love to twine assorted tangents of time into their mysteries need to make the transitions very clear. Moore moves between no less than six time periods, so keep a sharp eye! Layer upon layer of guile and manipulation filters through two-three generations, fascinating as each is revealed. Above all, woodsmanship has a dominant role. Yet the denouement left me ambivalent. With a lot going on among so many people, I pull random quotes rather than attempt to characterize various individuals.

Bits

▪ "Don't say missing," says Louise. "Say she's not in her bunk." (7)

▪ "Panic," said T.J. But no one raised a hand. She explained. It came from the Greek god Pan: the god of the woods. He liked to trick people, to confuse and disorient them until they lost their bearings, and their minds. (40)

▪ For four generations in a row, there had been only one boy. Only one Peter Van Laar. Sometimes Alice had the feeling that her prompt production of a boy—and such a fine one, at that—was the only thing she had ever done that pleased her husband. (91-2)

▪ "The thing is, Alice," he said, "you're boring at parties. A drink or two will help you be more fun." (93)

▪ He had told nobody, yet, what Bear had said about his grandfather. The way Bear's posture had changed upon hearing his name called in that stern voice. (126)

▪ "Maximum sentence for possession of a controlled substance is five years," he says, chewing. (250)

▪ "But what I'll never forgive them for is not clearing my father's name. After he died, they just let it be—presumed that he was the one who killed Bear." (289)

▪ But the quickest way to make an attractive man ugly was to give him too much to drink. (253)

▪ Behind her she hears Sluiter's voice, his tone unreadable, hovering between mocking and earnest. (395)

Karin Fossum. I Can See in the Dark. 2011. UK: Vintage Books/Random House, 2014.

Why am I reading this? Because it was on my random pile (yes, a random pile now) and at 250 pages, it would not take long to finish, should TPL come through with the real waiting list. And Fossum is known as "Norwegian queen of crime." So. We enter the mind of Riktor, a nurse in a small palliative care establishment. Basically, he's a loner. Beautiful Anna is the second nurse and Dr. Fischer manages the place. Since all the patients are dying, most of them unable to speak, Riktor habitually torments them with pinching and scratching. Not only that, he secretly disposes of the medications that Fischer prescribed for them.

Oh, ugh. Am I committed to this? Should I abandon it? Will there be some kind of transformation or redemption? Apply speed reading. The man is self-aware, perfectly at ease with his perversions, then enjoys down time in a pretty park, observing the regulars. But his dark side prevails—Sociopath? Psychopath? In a nutshell, he ends up charged with a crime he did not commit and is imprisoned. At times Fossum twists the perspective into sympathy for Riktor's work in the prison kitchen, and his tender feelings for Margareth the cook. Brilliant as the author may be, the theme requires overlooking the sick actions and analyzing the man's mind. Sorry, not sorry—not recommended whatsoever.

A few bits

▪ I was a nobody. I was totally insignificant, nothing to look at, nothing to the world at large, eminently forgettable, and this knowledge was insufferable. (68)

▪ "People die in our care the whole time, they drop like flies. They're all on the verge of death, don't you realise that?" (127)

▪ Totally and utterly alone. Deserted and misunderstood, my rights trampled on. Subject of a terrible mistake. Victim of a dreadful plot. Exhausted and in despair. (138)

▪ Margareth. Dear Margareth. (190)

▪ "I rarely find myself speechless," the judge announced. "But I am now." (201)

▪ I was exhausted when the interview was over, but I gave him what he wanted, and I scored the maximum possible, feeling a kind of strange contentment as I did so, because now I belonged somewhere, among the disturbed, and my condition had a name. (210)