Customer Reviews

Christine Falls

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(30)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(19)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

(4.5 stars) With the same care that he devotes to his "serious" fiction, Booker Prize-winning author John Banville, under the pen name of "Benjamin Black," plumbs Dublin's Roman Catholic heritage in a mystery which examines the question of sin. The result is a vibrantly alive, intensely realized story of Dublin life and values in the 1950s--a mystery which makes the reader think at the same time that s/he is being entertained. Unlike most of the characters, Quirke, the main character, holds no awe for the church. In his early forties, "big and heavy and awkward," Quirke is a pathologist/coroner at Holy Family Hospital, a man who "prizes his loneliness as mark of some distinction." A realist, he has seen the dark side of life too often to hold out much hope for the future, his own or anyone else's.

His vision of humanity is not improved when he goes to his office unexpectedly one evening and finds his brother-in-law, famed obstetrician Malachy Griffin, altering documents regarding the death of a young woman, Christine Falls. Quirke's autopsy of Christine shows, not surprisingly, that she has died in childbirth, a "fallen woman" in the eyes of the church. The nature of Christine's sin, however, does not begin to compare to the sins that Quirke uncovers during his investigation of her death and the fate of her child.

John Banville (Black) has always been at least as interested in character as plot, and this novel is no exception. Quirke lived in an orphanage before being unofficially adopted by Judge Garrett Griffin, father of Dr. Malachy Griffin, who is obviously involved in the case. Developing on parallel planes, the novel becomes a study of Quirke and his personal relationships, at the same time that it is a study of Christine Falls and what she represents about Dublin society, the medical profession, the church and its influence, and the nature of power in upper-echelon Dublin.

Murders, torture, beatings, and violence keep the action level high (and a bit melodramatic), in keeping with the great, old-fashioned tradition of 1950s' mystery-writing. A change of location from Dublin to Boston broadens the scope, connecting the Dublin mystery to the history of the Irish and their traditions in Boston. The author's use of parallel scenes emphasizes contrasts and similarities (a Christmas party in Dublin vs. a Christmas party in Boston, for example), and he maintains a conversational voice appropriate for Quirke. After this fine debut mystery, one can easily imagine Banville developing the character of Quirke in future mysteries and becoming, like Graham Greene, a writer of both serious literary fiction and "entertainments." n Mary Whipple

Solid writer of obscure though occasionally prize-winning literary fiction turns his hand to the crime novel. It sounds like a great idea that solves the 'problem' of both styles: such a novel would have the suspenseful, page-turning plot that literary fiction often lacks, and yet it would be handled with the depth of character and richness of language usually absent from genre fiction. Sadly, the result is more like decorating a suburban bungalow in the style of Louis XIV: ill-advised and more than faintly ludicrous, but salvaged by its winking self-awareness as something not to be taken entirely seriously. Banville claims he was inspired by rediscovering the novels of Georges Simenon. There is something of that here, though not quite enough of the existential anxiety (which Martin Amis, in a similar mode, to my mind nailed perfectly, terrifyingly, in the much-maligned "Night Train"). For me, the central problem here is that the moral claustrophobia of Banville's tale - which needs to be about real, credible characters to move us - is consistently undercut by ludicrous melodrama, the sheer silliness of some sequences, and the relentlessly clichéd depiction of characters such as Andy Stafford. None of it felt real to me, so neither did the moral angst around which the plot turns. I understand this began life as a television script, and that's precisely how it feels: worth spending 100 minutes with over a cup of tea, but not worth slogging through 400-odd pages. I like Banville. I like good crime fiction, too. This is neither.

I'm not a mystery/thriller reader (strictly speaking, this book fits neither genre) and so bought this book only because its author is Banville. So to an extreme outsider it seems that Banville has taken almost every pulp cliché and turned it inside out, doubling up at every opportunity (Mal works with the living / Quirk with the dead. They are married to sisters: Mal's wife is alive / Quirk's dead -- thus they are brothers-in-law and because they share a parent, brothers by law. Father to Mal, adoptive father, or better still, Judge to Quirk. Mal orders an omelet, Quirk, the bird, and so on to deliriously detailed levels of interplay...and later still remarkably persisent stretches of alliteration) that make this something of a entertainingly postmodern excursion in Fun with Form wrapped within a dark to darker noir setting. All this is done without ever abandoning the fundamental obligation of delivering a well-told tale. Time, place, character, plot and the hazy details that shape up lives and deaths are all convincing in their familiarity, but the surface texture isn't all that matters here. As is usual for Banville, the language is exceptionally rich and lyrical, with some allusions proving profoundly unnerving, others profoundly amusing and still others so tenuously connected to their subject that you'll stop and think and think again. And importantly -- unlike another work by a "serious" writer pursuing a theoretically less demanding form -- "Christine Falls" never strains under the weight of all this talent in the way that Martin Amis' "Night Train" sadly came to a creaking halt, mid-rail. Bottom line, this one is as engrossing to read as it must have been to write.

As several of the reviewers here have pointed out and at least one on the back cover of Christine Falls, this novel is not so much a murder mystery as a novel about sin. To that most prevalent theme I would add those of selfishness and corruption, of nostalgia that is in no way wistful. I came to this novel as a lover of Banville's other novels, especially The Sea, and the pellucid style (to use one of his favorite words) that distinguishes his writing is still present here, although more subtly. Christine Falls does not have the intensity of The Sea, at least in part because its narrative is spread out across a number of characters rather than one first-person narrator. But each of these characters is nuanced, marked by Banville's unusual perceptiveness of a person's "tender damage" (to quote another of his novels). And his focus on character is not to say this isn't a damn good yarn. Christine Falls moves more slowly than a usual murder mystery, however, with more of a sense of consequence. It is a dark, affecting novel - and if this is how John Banville has fun, then I can't wait to read his next serious effort.

A mysteriously high amount of praise has been afforded to John Banville's CHRISTINE FALLS, his first mystery novel published under the nom de plume Benjamin Black. The protagonist of this novel (and of its follow-up THE SILVER SWAN), a Dublin pathologist in the 1950s, has been given the sole name of Quirke, which Banville seems to have fallen in love with because all the other characters hail him by his name almost constantly and in almost every sentence they address to him ("How are you today, Quirke?", "Well, Quirke, I have something to tell you...", etc.). That's just one of the many highly affected quirks in this disappointing mystery novel which seems mostly to be a kind of re-working (a tribute?) to Raymond Chandler, since it features many of the stock types associated with the Philip Marlowe novels, particularly THE BIG SLEEP: a scheming and corrupt aging millionaire with sinister plans involving his daughters; his beautiful and highly sexed younger wife; a spoiled heiress wanting to marry an ineffectual man; her sleazy and violent chauffeur; a pair of freakish goons who work the hero over; and so forth.

Removed from its Los Angeles context the whole thing seems a bit odd, especially since Banville also retains a sort of Greek tragedy structure for the whole thing. It certainly plugs along, and Banville's flair for the ringing phrase is always evident, but there's not much new or even all that interesting here.

John Banville is a superb author of cold, complex novels, he is not noted for the creation of empathetic characters. In interviews lately he has spoken of the ease with which he has slipped into the Benjamin Black persona, and how much quicker it is for him to write as Black. This is his first novel as Black, in which he introduces a lone, heavy-drinking pathologist named Quirke. Oh dear! A pathologist, a heavy drinker, a loner, an amalgam of best-seller types.
Nonetheless, there is novelty in the fact that the story is set in 1950's Dublin, among the affluent Catholic middle class. Their world is well described, with a keen eye for detail and interaction. One strand of the story unfolds around the illegal transportation of the children of Irish single mothers to the USA to `good' i.e. Catholic homes. The other main strand concerns Quirke's extended family and its interactions and discoveries. Quirke's life seems over complicated - he was adopted by a medical family, became a rival to the son of the house, loved, but lost the woman who became the son's wife, married the sister of the woman he loved, oh dear.... And it gets even more complex. In fact there's a bit about Quirke's daughter, that I found quite frankly unbelievable, as well as unnecessary.
As I read on, I found myself getting more and more irritated by the book - the minor characters - Conor Carrington, Barney Boyle - why not make some effort at inventing non-alliterative names; even the depiction of the weather - " the wettish morning reeked of smoke and fumes", " the sky was heavy with the seamless weight of putty-coloured cloud" - yes, yes, but a bit indulgent perhaps?
So, overall a pity, it seems like an effort to dumb down, and perhaps make some money by writing a series - Quirke becomes another Rebus or Scarpetta. So delighted was Banville with the ease of production, that in an interview with the (London) Sunday Times he said he had dashed off the third Quirke novel in three weeks, whereas, as John Banville, he might spend an afternoon over a sentence.

Not being familiar with Banville, I was drawn to this book by the reviews and my ongoing desire for a good mystery. The novel's premise seemed appealing. A young woman is dead. Pathologist Quirke becomes curious when he finds his obstetrician brother, Mal, going through the file. Quirke's own investigation unleashes violence and ultimately involves his whole adopted family.

Certainly the writing meets the standard of literary fiction. The structural contrast of Quirke and Mal frames the book. Quirke deals in death, Mal in births. One won his love, the other didn't. And so on.

The first 50 pages of the book held my interest, as Quire began snooping around. The viewpoints shifts form one character to the other - very smoothly done. But I began to get a sense of deja vue. The reasons behind the woman's death...we've seen this before.

Ultimately, despite the writing, I think you'll enjoy this book if you like novel about convolutd, politely dysfunctional families. I did't find the character interesting or sympathetic. Lawrence Block's Matt Scudder was a more appealing drunk.

The ending falters. It's like one of those farces where nobody is they seem. I found the rationale for the solution unbelievable, even given the power of the Catholic church. Ultimately the fictional plot pales next to real Irish stories, like the Magdalene sisters.

John Banville should stick with what he does best. His foray into this "entertainment" of a crime novel is clearly not his best genre. Set in 1950's Dublin and Boston, the story is implausible and the "plot twists" are telegraphed as each stereotypic character makes an appearance. Some of the research is sloppy suggesting this is dashed off as a money-making exercise. For example in Ireland, a Pathologist is referred to as Doctor and not Mr. (reserved for surgeons). Even the literary flourishes smack of a a high school summer course in creative writing. Do all lame people drag their legs like unwilling children, and how many times do we need detailed descriptions of hands and plumes of smoke? More disturbing is the prospect of a series of novels and no doubt a film or television series based on the book. I suppose we deserve what we get for not buying his literary novels in sufficient numbers.

The characters and the basic plotline are more than adequately summarized in many of the other reviews. John Banville (Benjamin Black) is an extremely talented writer and is, as reviewers have noted, quite adept at drawing characters and evoking setting. His talent as a writer of prose cannot, I think, be denied and this book is a fine example.

The problem, however, is that the plot is (a) not entirely plausible and (b) becomes obvious way too early to hold any real suspense.

As for the plot, again, there is no real suspense in discovering who is behind the various crimes. The motive is slower to emerge but, as it does, it does not ring true. My own opinion is that Benjamin Black has quite a bit to learn about this new genre. This book lacked any "aha!" moment, as revelations in the murder/mystery plot were never very mysterious. All opportunities for thrill were deflated before any real suspense could build.

On a minor issue and as others have pointed out, Black dispatched bad characters far too neatly to give any satisfaction.

Banville's skills have not yet translated to a satisfying Mystery/Thriller. At least, I was wholly unsatisfied when the book ended. Perhaps, my dissatisfaction was due to too high expectations.

The prose is worth the read, but the story comes up short.

Quirke has made peace with his lot in life. A Dublin pathologist and long-time widower whose wife died in childbirth, Quirke's only solace is found in endless rounds of drinking to oblivion, a familiar state for this stolid Irish orphan. But when he stumbles upon his brother-in-law, Malachy Griffin, one night after an alcohol-fueled going away party at the hospital, Quirke surfaces from the haze long enough to awaken a nascent curiosity about his brother-in-law's interference in Quirke's domain. Mal's specialty is obstetrics, so it is jarring to discover him stealthily filling in the file of a young woman who died in childbirth, Christine Falls. His curiosity piqued, further research leads Quirke to research Christine's death and the secrecy that surrounds it. The meager details he finds only lead him to more questions, Quirke setting out doggedly on a path that will lead him to the terrible truths about dynasty and power.

It is the 1950s and Quirke's relationships with his extended family are tenuous since Delia's death almost twenty years earlier. He remains emotionally committed to Sarah, the sister he should have married, who wed the distant Mal. Brought into a powerful family by marriage, Boston in America and Dublin in Ireland, this rarified society has never been comfortable to such as Quirke, accepted by Mal's father, Judge Garret Griffin, as a second son, an iconoclast who has taken refuge in his work and alcohol. As the judge is about to receive a papal knighthood, Quirke intrudes on the celebration with his unsolicited questions and judgmental recalcitrance. His one genuinely affectionate tie is to his niece, Phoebe, on the cusp of womanhood and rebelling against her family's expectations, Quirke the girl's only refuge from the conventions forced upon her.

Although he is warned to leave the matter of Christine Falls alone, Quirke is constitutionally incapable of doing so, unearthing years of dubious family secrets and an enterprise that endeavors to place the unwanted children of unwed mothers. The two patriarchs, Judge Griffin in Dublin and Sarah's father in Boston, have attained the status of the untouchable, guided by wealth and the Church's imprimatur on their good deeds. It is Quirke who discovers the monstrous truth and the arrogant power at the heart of a society that remains nearly impenetrable in its security and secrecy. A perfectly crafted mechanism, this social structure resists Quirke's penetration as he is threatened and harmed, stubbornly refusing to quit an investigation that tears apart his family ties and leaves him shaking with rage and self-revulsion. Dark and passionate, this protagonist is both tragic and noble. Luan Gaines/ 2008.