The Singer’s Gun is Emily St. John Mandel’s second novel.  Her first, Last Night in Montreal, came out last year just after I first encountered her on Twitter.  Her answers to questions in an online chat piqued my interest, and she was gracious to everyone with whom I watched her interact.  That, plus my long-running infatuation with first novels, led me to seek out a copy at an independent bookstore while vacationing in northern Michigan.  Having given it a good review, I was eager to read her second one, also published by Unbridled Books (which, I have to say, does a lovely job with covers and layout).  Lucky for me, my local library had a brand new copy (have I mentioned what smart buyers our librarians are?) and once I got started, I knew I would not be needing the three weeks of checkout time.

Anton Waker, around whom the action in The Singer’s Gun revolves, is a young reformed crook whose dream it is to marry a nice girl and become a successful middle manager in a quiet New York office tower.  But everyone he has ever known has a secret (or two or three) and their conflicting “truths” begin to undo one another, from Anton’s hard-working and shady parents and his commitophobic bride back in New York, to his former secretary Elena and last-minute business partner David in self-imposed exile on the Italian isle of Ischia.  I can say no more about the plot without spoiling it.

But the delightful thing about both of Mandel’s novels is not the plots—though they are psychologically complex and multiculturally gritty and walk the tightrope between the familiarity you relate to and the fantastical that beckons you into the glittering unknown—but the pacing.  She teases out simultaneous trails of present and past that reveal in small gasps, and without timeline confusion, the major and minor twists of the story (and there are many).  These forays into past and present are lengthier at the beginning, giving the reader time to test theories about the characters, but begin to alternate with more speed until near the end they are rapid-fire, prescient glimpses of the final page.  This attention to structure now has me studying it for the benefit of my own writing.

Characters come and go in these books, and I found I identified with the players of The Singer’s Gun more so than I did with those of Last Night in Montreal.  But all of them have stayed with me, despite the other novels and stories I have read since.  Memorable characters are perhaps harder to write than likable characters, and Mandel reminds us that they are not always the same.

Another point in her favor: beautiful passages appear without warning.  The writing is emotional without sentimentality and evocative without excess.

This is a smart novel, better than her first (which, as I said, I enjoyed), and getting some well-deserved critical acclaim, such as this recent review by The Washington Post.   Recommended for mystery and crime lovers, fans of indie publishing, those who enjoy a good character study, or anyone seeking smarter-than-usual summer reading.

Small Crimes in an Age of Abundance is a true story collection: each story is unique, standing alone, and yet all are connected by a common thread, in this case, the oddities of contemporary human experience that drive moments of life-altering choice.

In twelve stories, we glimpse these moments of choice flaring across the globe.   In “Stone” (particularly reminiscent of Guy de Maupassant’s astonishing stories), a family of tourists in China and their slim case of jewels unwittingly seal a local’s fate.  In “Powder,” a discontent London lawyer not-quite-accidentally becomes a famous drug dealer.  In “Sunlight,” a blocked writer, in a flash of Italian inspiration, trades the true story and the long-term relationship for the best-selling book deal.  In “White,” a Palestinian suicide bomber with second thoughts weighs the cost of his power and accepts his final punishment.

Matthew Kneale, author of the novels English Passengers and When We Were Romans (my review here), is also a master of the short form.  There are no false cadences or improbable characters here.  Each story is just long enough, precise without feeling clipped, evocative without excess detail.  Together, they map the uncomfortable difficulties of being honest in a world where survival is its own reward.

I suspect at least some of these stories — “Stone” and “Powder” especially — might appeal to readers who aren’t big fans of the form.  For the rest of us who love short stories, these are easy to read alongside other longer works or during spare minutes, but also offer a deeper appreciation if read as a collection.  And for anyone learning to write stories, these would make good models to study.

Edward’s friend is dead, and it’s Edward’s fault, and he’s nearly killed himself with grief and guilt, longing only for a forgiveness that will never be granted.  Stuart is not a religious man, doesn’t believe in God, but has decided suddenly to dedicate his life to celibacy and helping people, though he has no particular clarity about what form that might take.  Midge is having an affair and is tortured by her indecision about which man is truly good for her, which man defines her, which man would release her to true happiness.  Thomas believes himself a good psychiatrist, but lies to himself about retiring, is obsessed with his patients, and is completely unaware that his wife has taken a lover.  The Seegard women are mystically devoted to a simple lifestyle in deference to the ill man who has either imprisoned them or been imprisoned by them…

Yes, this is an Iris Murdoch novel, with the deeply philosophical and psychological hallmarks of all her works.  People striving and failing to apprehend goodness is the center of the story, for which an accurate capsule might be Edward’s despairing cry, somewhere around the middle, “He’s religious, you’re scientific, neither’s any good when one’s in hell.”  Like the novelist I recently quoted here, I read Murdoch because “I like her characters’ preoccupation with the state of their souls and the nature of goodness—their own, other people’s, the world’s…. I’m interested in how shockingly difficult it is to be good.”  In The Good Apprentice, the question of who is doing good or learning where to find/achieve goodness is so central to the plot that which character is, in fact, the “good apprentice” would be difficult to argue definitively.

Stream of consciousness is not for everyone, but Murdoch presents her characters so thoroughly and authentically that I lose my sense of self while reading, buffeted and tortured and relieved with them as I encounter their reality.  At times it is exhausting, but this serves to render the encounter more authentic, rather than tedious.  And their thoughts live on in my mind long after I put away the book.  Hers are profound exemplars of character-driven novels, and worth every effort the reading requires.

I previously reviewed Murdoch’s The Bell here.  She is currently one of three writers I am “deep reading” (i.e., reading through their entire lists), the other two being Shirley Hazzard and Kazuo Ishiguro.  Nuns and Soldiers and The Sacred and Profane Love Machine are already in my stack.

Have you read Murdoch?  Are you a fan?  She seems to be one of those writers whom readers either love or hate, with no middle ground.  The Good Apprentice confirms my impression that I will continue to resonate with her work.  I’d love to read reviews others have written, so please include any links with your comments.

Last Night in Montreal is the debut novel of Emily St. John Mandel, one of several great novelists I’ve met so far on Twitter (and if that isn’t a good enough reason to “tweet,” I don’t know what is!).  Mandel’s cast of tragic characters are so unusual, they must be real: Lilia, who’s been disappearing her whole life and doesn’t know the truth about why she wishes to “remain vanishing”; Eli, who’s been working on his thesis on dying languages for so long he’s lost all passion; and Michaela, who long ago gave up on her father, the detective obsessed with solving Lilia’s disappearance case.  The thematic image of Icarus flying too near the sun is carried through with originality and thoughtfulness, hinting at both big dreams and the fleeting moments that may turn out to define our lives.  Each character in this story is flying solo, and in the end will either soar to a new vista or plunge into the depths.  Excellent pacing keeps the reader turning “just one more page,” shifting primarily between Eli’s present and Lilia’s past.  The conclusion is unpredictable and messy, but not altogether unhappy.  A great pick for thoughtful book clubs.

In 2059, Father Emilio Sandoz returns to earth physically and emotionally disfigured, the apparent only survivor of a Jesuit mission to the planet Rakhat in Alpha Centauri.  What happened?  The people of earth demand to know, as does the Father General of the Society of Jesus, who bears the potentially-polar burdens of ministering to a shattered man responsible for the Society’s shattered reputation.

Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow is stunning:  delicate and brutal, heartwarming and chilling.  I credit this mostly to her deeply rich characterization.  Their fears, desires, and humor make every one of the characters (including the non-humans) as believable as your next-door neighbor.  She has created an entire planet in full—ecosystems, sentient creatures of varying races, languages, social structures, architecture—as authentically as she anticipates the technology and sociology of earth five decades future.  (For more about her creation of Rakhat, I highly recommend an excellent interview with Russell by Speaking of Faith’s Krista Tippett on “The Novelist as God.”)  The narrative revolves smoothly between the literary present (2059) and the  years leading up to and during the disastrous mission, revealing just enough to maintain a perfect suspense.  The ending is utterly devastating, but with a barely-there sliver of hope that provides for the sequel, The Children of God.

 Most captivating of all is the way Russell handles her theme: theodicy, or the problem of evil.  The mission crew is prepared for the worst-case scenario, but what they discover to their horror is a reality far worse than they imagined:

Not madness but the mathematics of eternity drove them.  To save souls…no burdens was too heavy, no price too steep.…  Yes, he thought, Jesuits are well prepared for martyrdom.  Survival, on the other hand, could be an intractable problem.

 Russell’s agnostic scientists and Rabbi-quoting Jesuit priests are united in mission but struggle with the individuality of each other’s perspectives.  When you can’t see the end of a journey, how can you evaluate a particular step as being either in the “right” or “wrong” direction?  Is a project coming together evidence that it is “meant to be,” or is it just the result of pattern-seeking people wishing it so?  When all hell breaks loose, is it God’s fault for sending them there, or their fault for seeing God in it at all? 

‘There’s an old Jewish story that says in the beginning God was everywhere and everything, a totality.  But to make creation, God had to remove Himself from some part of the universe, so something besides Himself could exist.  So he breathed in, and in the places where God withdrew, there creation exists’

‘So God just leaves?’ John asked, angry where Emilio had been desolate.  ‘Abandons creation?  You’re on your own, apes.  Good luck!”

‘No. He watches.  He rejoices.  He weeps.  He observes the moral drama of human life and gives meaning to it by caring passionately about us and remembering.’

‘Matthew ten, verse twenty-nine,’ Vincenzo Giuliani said quietly.  ‘”Not one sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it.”’

‘But the sparrow still falls,’ Felipe said.

 Russell ultimately refuses a tidy solution, forcing the reader to consider each character’s point of view—not because everyone is “equally right” but in acknowledgement that there can be no simple resolution to the deepest question humanity has ever pondered. 

If you often consider this question, you’ll be moved by the author’s humanity and authenticity.  And if you don’t often consider this question, this book will force you to.  I dare you to read the one-page prologue and then put down this novel!

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Mary Doria Russell has a PhD in Biological Anthropology and is retired from the faculty of Case Western Reserve University.  She is known is the scientific community for her research challenging claims of Neanderthal cannibalism and arguing instead that the evidence supports “secondary burial.”  The Sparrow, published in 1996, was her first novel; the sequel, Children of God, followed two years later.  She has since published two historical novels, A Thread of Grace and Dreamers of the Day, and is working on a third.  Most importantly for the purposes of my epilogue, she lives in Cleveland, in my home state of Ohio—which makes this review an Ohio stop on the Literary Road Trip sponsored by Michelle at Galleysmith!