A new world of noir

Lost World

By Patrícia Melo

A succinct noir thriller from a talented writer, this book. It was not what I would call ‘tight’: the plot occasionally became tangential. Although Melo used these digressions for important character development work, I think that can be achieved at the same time as relentless action. Instead, Melo opted for an almost leisurely pace, a road trip more than a chase. That’s not to say that there is no chase. Her novel contains plenty of action and adrenaline. And she’s brilliant at creating a sense of claustrophobia felt by a fugitive: freedom is his (for now), but there are people after him. The great thrill of this novel is that you hope he gets to achieve his objective before his pursuers catch up with him. Even though he is in many ways the moral baddie, you want the protagonist to succeed. That might be because he’s our narrator, but also because Melo is careful to characterise his opponent (whom the newspapers would describe as the ‘goodie’) as conniving and manipulative and greedy.

Some things I particularly liked include the following. First, the feeling of being on the road – that’s mostly because our man is being chased and is chasing someone else himself. Second, one of the least likely accomplices in noir fiction: a mangy, sick and rather useless dog, who humanises our fugitive and becomes a central character in his own right. Third, the narrator’s voice is clipped and full of character, but does not resort to cliché. As with all good noir, the ending is particularly significant and filled with moral uncertainties. Melo has done a fine job – and what a thrill to read a noir novel set in Brazil and Bolivia, too!

So real you can smell the blood

In Cold Blood
By Truman Capote

In Cold Blood is an extraordinary book. Friends of literature know its claim to fame – journalism with a novelist’s approach – but the experience of reading it is much more profound than a simple tagline. In bringing together the two worlds of reportage and fiction, Capote is clearly a talented interviewer, researcher and writer. Most of us are blessed if we can succeed in just one of those roles.

The book tells the story of how two young men robbed and murdered a family in a small American town in 1959. In my opinion, Capote’s account is so compelling for focusing on two areas: the shockwaves sent through the community by this awful event, and the psychological profiles of the two killers. Let’s take the first focus. The voices of the community are one of the most memorable aspects of this book, whether it’s the hard line taken by the postmistress or the devastation of the victims’ friends. You can hear these characters as real people. Indeed they are so well drawn that you hit a paradox: they are as well characterised as a novel’s protagonists, which the writer has invented and spent time bending to his will – and yet these are flesh-and-blood people who did indeed live through the nightmare that struck this small community. Capote, then, has a talent for conducting a great interview and then capturing it within his text.

Now let’s turn to his portrayal of the killers, Perry Smith and Dick Hickock. Capote’s masterstroke is his decision not to reveal their motive early on. By doing so, he creates tension and chills. The killers are characterised so perfectly that you feel what they feel, even to the extent of being able to understand how they could come to commit such an awful crime. Capote delves into their respective histories and uses them to craft a chilling portrayal of the pair of them. Their statements – reproduced at length towards the end of the book – are compelling. It’s like reading a detective’s files. In fact, it’s better: it’s like interviewing murder suspects yourself and hearing their ghastly admissions.

One criticism of the book is that Capote fails to convey the killers’ long wait to execution. His attempt includes telling the stories of a few other death-row inmates, but this detracts from the tight story he has told until that point. I can understand why he might want to stretch out the close, as it happened in real life, but he doesn’t quite achieve what I suspect he wanted to. But that is a minor blot on an exquisite canvas. I suspect that In Cold Blood will remain an important book for some time.