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Not my cup of tea, but I know one or two Janeheads (or is that Austenites?)
https://www.facebook.com/janeaustengame
https://www.facebook.com/janeaustengame
Jul. 13th, 2012
I've read many many books this year (110 so far), and most of them have been mysteries or crime fiction, and this title possesses a number of the cliches which have consistently cropped up, and which I find increasingly disturbing.
1. All the black people die. Okay, actually, one black person survives but, as this is the drug-dealing voodoo priestess who skins a live cat with her teeth, I'm not giving the author any credit for it.
2. Except for a gay guy (who is also black), all the victims are female.
This cliche is something which I find particularly disturbing, as it occurs in almost all of the contemporary crime novels I have read lately: women and children are far and away the preferred victims, typically with some additional sexual abuse or dismemberment thrown in. The powerlessness and suffering of the victims--and these victims are always portrayed as powerless--is what provides the motivation for the male investigator's involvement, and also the justification for what often turns out to be the male investigator's own violence and insistence on working outside of the law. And why is it that inevitably female characters, even the voodoo priestess, *must* be saved by the white male?
3. The other person that the male protagonist is working with on the investigation is a black female police officer and, while I spent the first two-thirds of the novel uncertain as to whether she would die or not, this question was resolved for me as soon as she and the male protagonist had sex, because black + female + police partner + sex = like you even have to ask? Out of the other victims, one was described as a "party girl," one was a prostitute, and one was a gay male, so all of them were sexualized in one way or another.
I'm beginning to see the appeal of the "cozy mystery," because at least the reader can be reliably certain that there won't be extreme violence and sexual abuse toward women and children, and one can also be reliably certain that the female investigator will be doing the rescuing.
1. All the black people die. Okay, actually, one black person survives but, as this is the drug-dealing voodoo priestess who skins a live cat with her teeth, I'm not giving the author any credit for it.
2. Except for a gay guy (who is also black), all the victims are female.
This cliche is something which I find particularly disturbing, as it occurs in almost all of the contemporary crime novels I have read lately: women and children are far and away the preferred victims, typically with some additional sexual abuse or dismemberment thrown in. The powerlessness and suffering of the victims--and these victims are always portrayed as powerless--is what provides the motivation for the male investigator's involvement, and also the justification for what often turns out to be the male investigator's own violence and insistence on working outside of the law. And why is it that inevitably female characters, even the voodoo priestess, *must* be saved by the white male?
3. The other person that the male protagonist is working with on the investigation is a black female police officer and, while I spent the first two-thirds of the novel uncertain as to whether she would die or not, this question was resolved for me as soon as she and the male protagonist had sex, because black + female + police partner + sex = like you even have to ask? Out of the other victims, one was described as a "party girl," one was a prostitute, and one was a gay male, so all of them were sexualized in one way or another.
I'm beginning to see the appeal of the "cozy mystery," because at least the reader can be reliably certain that there won't be extreme violence and sexual abuse toward women and children, and one can also be reliably certain that the female investigator will be doing the rescuing.
As an antidote for my extreme dissatisfaction with my most recent novelistic experience, I have decided to reread one of my favorite books: _The Name of the Rose_ by Umberto Eco. Not only does it suit my year of living mysteriously theme, but I've been wanting to reread it since I acquired another book about it, _Postscript to The Name of the Rose: Teaching Medieval Studies through The Name of the Rose_, edited by Alison Ganze.
I feel much better now, especially after reading the final lines of the "Naturally, A Manuscript" introduction:
For it is a tale of books, not of everyday worries, and reading it can lead us to recite, with Kempis, the great imitator: "In omnibus requiem quaesivi, et nusquam inveni nisi in angulo cum libro."
[Everywhere I have searched for peace and nowhere found it, except in a corner with a book.]
I feel much better now, especially after reading the final lines of the "Naturally, A Manuscript" introduction:
For it is a tale of books, not of everyday worries, and reading it can lead us to recite, with Kempis, the great imitator: "In omnibus requiem quaesivi, et nusquam inveni nisi in angulo cum libro."
[Everywhere I have searched for peace and nowhere found it, except in a corner with a book.]