Thursday, February 20, 2003
Title: Dead Clever
Author: Scarlett Thomas
Publisher: New English Library
I believe at this point in time Scarlett Thomas has written 5 novels, three of those featuring the character Lily Pascalle. Dead Clever was her first work and the introduction to Lily. The debut of Lily Pascalle in some ways mirrors the life of Scarlett herself, both starting this new career with a departure from London and an arrival in Devon.
Lily has been hanging around London for a couple of years, a graduate in English Lit, specialising in crime and horror. Reaching the bottom of the downward spiral her current relationship has been in, Lily seems to have run out of reasons to stay in the city. With this she decides to visit her family in Devon, returning to find that there has been a grisly murder in the usually sedate locale. At a loose end she takes a job at the local university only to find that she is teaching the class the murdered girl was in. With the death of a second student and one of her colleagues gone missing and elevated to prime suspect as result, Lily finds herself drawn into putting her theory into practice to find out what is really going on.
For the most part the narrative is entirely from Lily's perspective, which tends to be the style of this type of fiction. However, perhaps as an experiment, perhaps just as contrast, we also get odd little paragraphs from the point of view of the villain of the piece - abstracted enough so that they don't give the big deal away, but providing the reader clues that Lily doesn't have. In some ways this is an interesting trick, disorientating the reader to some degree, but for me it does not entirely work and is the one thing I felt negative about with this book. In terms of building character Lily is given a past which emerges as the book progresses, linking her to some of the characters she meets and the environment. A balance which has to be carefully done to make the character believable and human. In plot terms clues are given, as well as the requisite cast of people it could be. Of course keeping certain details close to ones chest so that the reader is kept guessing is a good idea, and one that some writers overlook.
Dead Clever is a fun read and one that works well within the genres of crime and contemporary fiction.
RVWR: PTR
Febraury 2003
