Here’s an unusual book in familiar trappings. A mystery about a young teenager murdered, described from the point of view of an anonymous narrator with access to the thoughts of the characters. The story is told in ninety-nine short chapters of between one and four pages each. It’s like telling a story by showing a series of photographs, snapshots of each scene. This could be turned into an adult graphic novel quite easily.

Fourteen year-old Ivory is a wild teen, sexually active and smoking pot, drinking, and ready to try just about anything, although she is mainly concerned about getting the attention of her boyfriend Blake. The kids in their crowd get into similar activities, and worse. They also hang out with older teens who are involved in crime. It’s small town life in rural New England, and the locals mostly just want to escape from their miserable lives.

Then Ivory disappears. The police start to search for her, but without much effort or enthusiasm. Ivory’s body is discovered after it’s been left outside for days, and it’s been eaten by wild animals. It has decayed so much her head has come off. The police investigation is half-hearted and doesn’t get anywhere. We learn about characters passing through town at the time of the murder, who also become suspects. The main suspect is Blake, her boyfriend, and eventually he is put on trial. But the case against him is weak, it seems.

Here’s the spoiler, and if you don’t like spoilers, you should stop reading this review now. Kennedy leaves the murder unsolved. The book just goes on and on, with one dead end after another. There’s no justice, no resolution, no climax. Instead, people just become more unhappy as the murder infects every moment of their existence. In a sense, it’s a gothic tale. In another sense, it’s a tale of gritty reality, with the theme of murder simply used to bring unity to these disparate characters. Either way, it’s not much fun to read, and it doesn’t provide any profound insight into people’s lives–they are just miserable. Indeed, the lack of solution to the crime is the only really satisfying aspect of the plot, because it shows some courage in defying the expectations of the murder-mystery genre. After plowing through a mess of details for the majority of the book, it would have been entirely out of the character of the book for it to end with clarity and a clear statement of guilt or innocence. It was the end (or lack of it) of this rather earnest novel that made it distinctive and interesting, and made me suspect that Kate Kennedy is capable of writing a story that matches her ambitions.

Categories: Fiction