The novels today come from established masters in their respective genres of fiction. Auster has dabbled in screenplays, but it’s his cryptic, metaphorical, existential novels that continue to dazzle. Hilary Mantel turns historical fiction (and personal memoir) on its proverbial head and she’s become one of its leading lights, while James Ellroy has turned crime novels into works of shattered art.
Invisible by Paul Auster (available at National Bookstore): The novel opens in 1967, as fresh grad Adam Walker meets the mysterious, malevolent Rudolf Born and his “girlfriend” Margot. Traveling in time over 40 years, and moving from Manhattan to the Paris Left Bank and an island in the Caribbean, this is your typical Auster landscape — one that he excels in, and continues to astound with. It’s that gray area between Truth and Memory, between Identity and Authorship, and how the mere threat of violence can drive people to actions and motives that would normally be alien to their personas. More than plot and events, this is about revelations, reactions; and via its unique structure (three narrators), about an author in sublime control of his material. It’s a timely welcome back for Auster!
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (available at National Bookstore): Winner of the 2009 Booker, Wolf Hall takes Thomas Cromwell and the role he played in the life of Henry VIII, as he made Henry’s marriage to Katherine of Aragon void so he could marry Anne Boleyn. This is living, breathing, vibrant historical fiction, with an uncanny sense of time and place. What’s obviously painstakingly done is the research and historical data that Mantel weaves into her fiction; while embellishing it with side stories and vignettes that totally humanize Cromwell, and gives us an intimate glimpse into life during these times, the 1530s. The plague, the Tower, the whims of the King, and how living under the shadow of royalty required nimble footwork and dissembling — they’re all here!
Blood’s a Rover by James Ellroy (available at National Bookstore): After such “masterpieces” as LA Confidential and American Tabloid, Ellroy turns to that juncture in American History (1968 to 1972) when it was all about the assassinations of RFK and Martin Luther King, and the ascendancy of Richard Milhous Nixon. This is political noir at its finest, when smoke and mirrors, puppet strings and shifting loyalties, and conspiracy theories ruled the day. A shadowy FBI agent who directly deals with Hoover, a private investigator with deep personal issues, and an ambitious bagman for the Mob and Howard Hughes, these are our main characters, as the action shifts from LA to Las Vegas, with a Haitian side trip! As always, his writing is stacatto-like, machine-gun bursts!