Customer Reviews

Janeology

5 star:		(32)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

First time novelist Karen Harrington's JANEOLOGY is a reading experience so thoughtfully conceived and written that accepting the fact that this is a first novel flirts with disbelief. Not only is Harrington a masterful conjurer of a suspenseful thriller, but she is also a wordsmith able to maintain the reader's attention and involvement in her masterful exploration of the science of psychology, genetics, and the fascination with the concept of retrocognition, all the while unraveling a mystery not unlike decoding a strand of DNA. If, indeed, this is a first novel, then we are in the presence of a gifted artist with a bright and solid future.

In a Prologue, Harrington sets the stage for the drama that will unfold in the course of her novel, just as in the Epilogue she manages to tie her tale together in as surprising a fashion as the method in which she relates her story. Jane Nelson is jailed for the drowning murder of her young son Simon and the attempted drowning of Simon's twin sister Sarah. What lead to this horrid act is the theme of the story. That, and the fact that Jane's husband Tom is implicated for not recognizing the mental deterioration and signs of behavior alteration that, had he been more mentally and physically present in the family, could have prevented the tragedy. Tom is supported by his friend and lawyer Dave who is hired to defend Tom in the charges of child endangerment and neglect. Dave, Tom, and 'spiritualist/agent of retrocognition skills' Mariah slowly unravel the events that served as signals to Jane's ability to murder her children. This investigation is done through visits to Jane's past - startling discoveries of familial traits of mental instability as well as repeated incidents of abuse and desertion and brutally faulty mothering and interfamily secrets - that give rise to the question of whether Jane's illness is genetically determined or the product of cruel, inappropriate nurturing.

Throughout these sessions before Tom's trial as a 'co-conspirator' we find Tom's initial love for Jane, his life with her and his twins, and the history of episodes involving Tom and Jane that could have prompted Tom to see Jane for the complete person she is rather than the perception of a wife as he elected to see her with blinders in place. 'The mask of self-control is a powerful antidote to the chaos that rages within us all.' In reflecting on Jane's torrid familial history Mariah states 'Children aren't born practical...Life makes them that way when they are forced to constantly make the best of every situation.' But Harrington's revisiting Jane's genealogy is peppered with many keenly observed ideas: '...time plus tragedy always equal comedy.' and '...pre-death purgatory may look like for the modern man, a place where you are forced to shore up the rationales for your behavior, a waiting room where you must sort out the misdeeds of your mother.' and 'Drugs are often the substitute for multiple generations of parenting support.' and 'I've heard that your mind runs its own tapes, tapes you play over and over again until you banish them through therapy, drugs or religion, or all of those things at once, until you replace them with new thoughts you can live with.'

Tom, in preparing for his trial while Jane is held in custody in jail, absorbs all of the 'ancestral time travel' consequences he has witnessed with Dave and Mariah. '...we three had begun this odyssey looking for traits foretelling danger and we had found them. We found evidence that supported how Jane could have been the inheritor of characteristics that perhaps predisposed her to a personality ill-suited for parenting, its mounting pressures and the daily treadmill of maternal monotony.' And the trial for Tom Nelson pulls all these threads together in a manner that leaves much of the verdict to the reader.

Karen Harrington is such an accomplished writer that it seemed to this reader more important to offer a few pearls of her gift with words and ideas than with a direct recounting of the story within the covers of this strange puzzle of a tale. And that is not to say the story is not revealed with expertise and brilliance: few new writers have the kind of skill Harrington owns in creating a wholly satisfying reading experience. This is a fine book, a unique book, and a book that makes us plead for another by Karen Harrington. Grady Harp, May 08

In Texas Jane Nelson was a loving wife and mother when she suddenly drowned her two and a half years old son Simon and almost killed the lad's twin sister Sarah. She is charged with the homicide, but found not guilty by reason of insanity. The prosecutor goes after Jane's husband devastated Tom saying that he should have known what his wife was capable of doing and thereby failed to protect his children. He was not just an accessory; he by inactivity abetted the murder.

The media hangs Tom; his academic peers blame Tom, the public malign Tom. All need a scapegoat and the lunatic mom is considered too deranged whereas Tom is terific for the role. However, his lawyer Dave plans to make a reasonable doubt defense based on JANEOLOGY that insists her DNA has violence imprinted on it. Jane's psychic relative, Mariah Hernandez assists the defense by looking into Jane's past and that of her antecedents.

This is a fascinating legal thriller with some paranormal elements that is at its best when the focus is on an anguished Tom outside the courtroom. The story line is fast-paced and gripping as readers will want to know what caused Jane to kill her son and attempt to kill her daughter; Mariah's visions provide insight into the motives though admittedly some readers will find that gimmicky. However, the big issue is having the DA force Tom to testify seems inappropriate as he has Fifth Amendment rights that allow his side to determine whether they want him on the stand or not. Still this is an interesting look at the causes and effect of a horrific act.

Harriet Klausner

I went into this book thinking that I had a straightforward mystery in my hands. By the time I was done, I found that "Janeology" is so much more. This book is a surprise, and a very welcome one.

Harrington takes a story that is all too familiar to us -- the murder of a child by a seemingly ordinary young mother who simply can't do it anymore -- and examines deeper issues of responsibility, the power of regret, and the ongoing deliberation concerning nature versus nurture. What begins as a courtroom drama evolves into a sometimes heartbreaking exploration of one family's past and the threads, both genetic and environmental, that connect us all to the unseen generations before us.

As a storyteller, Karen Harrington creates believable characters: flawed, fragile, belligerent, and yet ultimately hopeful. Her dialogue, both contemporary and period, rings true. Most refreshingly, Harrington allows her story to avoid obvious paths and easy, instant gratification. When you reach the last pages, you will find yourself in a very different place than you might have anticipated. Different, and deeply satisfying.

This novel is more than the story of a father and his lawyer struggling to defend an unfair indictment for reckless endangerment arising from the drowning of a child by her mother, Jane. It is a finely-crafted tapestry of family history - of ingeniously plotted stories within the main story - which skillfully illumines a universal truth: the evil that men (and women) do lives after them. It reminds us that each of us is affected by our ancestry in subtle ways of which we may not be fully aware. The choices made and fortune experienced by our parents and grandparents, and those even farther up the family tree, affect our lives in profound and unpredictable ways. Ms. Harrington shows a remarkable ability to create authentic historical subplots and weave the whole into a complex and suspenseful tale.

Janeology is an outstanding achievement, and I look forward to many more fine novels from this resourceful author.

Why do parents kill their children? Mental causes? Physical reasons? What about family history - genealogy? This book presents a compelling story to make you think. The author takes you back in time to explore the nature of Jane's family history. The chapters flow from one family member into the next leaving you curious for more and with a few surprises along the way. Fascinating. Powerful. Thought provoking.

While I've rated Janeology lower than the other reviewers, I consider it a good novel worth reading. Can't help but wonder if all those people giving 5 stars have ever read Faulkner, or Fitzgerald, or even Russell Banks for crying out loud.
Anyway, the other reviews cover the plot. I'll just say that while I believe Janeology contains flaws, at its best it is very good writing that raises important questions.
The flashbacks are generally well done. The first one in particular, which covers a key event in the murdering mother's childhood, is first-rate writing and story telling.
Further, Harington is certainly unafraid to dive into the Big Questions. The big question for this novel is where one person's responsibility ends and another's begins. To what extent is Jane responsible for killing her children, and to what extent is her family history responsible? To what extent is Tom responsible for his wife's actions?
One flaw is that Janeology focuses mostly on the first question to answer the second; but Tom's innocence or guilt is a separate matter. That issue remains largely unexamined.
This is no fatal error though - Harington has raised important questions, and that is enough.
Finally, as a couple reviewers have pointed out, you may or may not accept the Mariah character. She struck me as a gimmick inserted for the purposes of plot resolution - your classic deus ex machina - rather than a developed character.
But again, these are not fatal flaws in a bad novel, but imperfections in a good one.

I finished Janeology in two nights, and I'm sorry that I read it so quickly. I wanted more stories about the interesting, multi-dimensional characters brought to life in the novel. Since finishing the book, the characters have stayed with me, and I've wondered how their lives played out. For me, this is the highest compliment that a book can have. Reading an interesting story with fascinating characters is one of life's great pleasures. After reading Janeology, I can't wait for Ms. Harrington's next book.

The most hurtful thing about losing your child has to be re-living the experience over and over again. Tom Nelson, the protagonist of Janeology, is forced to do just that in this haunting debut novel about a woman who kills her own son and her husband, Tom, who battles both the legal system and numerous inner demons to understand how it happened.

Under the spell of depression that knows no bottom, Tom's wife Jane commits one of the most horrid acts imaginable--she drowns their son Simon. Soon after she is sent to a mental hospital and away from the vindictive reach of the authorities, Tom is charged with failure to protect by a legal system bent on punishing someone--anyone--for the crime. The charge not only puts Tom on public display as a monster in his own right, it magnifies his own doubts about his role in the killing. Could he have prevented it? It's a question that he will ask himself the rest of his life regardless of the legal resolution.

The novel takes an interesting twist when Tom's attorney mounts a radical defense in which they cite ways Jane's genetic makeup made Jane's breakdown inevitable, thus absolving him of any culpability for preventing it. The exploration of her ancestry with the assistance of a woman who possesses the ability to see past events through objects owned by the deceased provides great depth to the narrative.

Janeology is a legal thriller about love and loss, but at its core it is a study of how we may all be haunted by our families.

Karen Harrington, the author of Janeology, must have based her new novel on the horrific murders most of us read about several tyears agoin which a mother killed, not one, but three or four of her children. One at a time. As horrifying as the act was, I can still remember thinking how calm and dispassionate the husband was, the father of the three children. He displayed no anger, no sorrow, nothing. And I couldn't help but wonder if somehow his emotional distance had been on display during their marriage, as well, and if that had something to do with the murders. Ms. Harrington explores in depth the horror of such a crime, something the media never undertook to do. And she does it with masterful insight, trying to understand how such crimes can be committed. Beyond an instant of madness, what else deeper inside the people invlovled led to such murder? Janeology penetrates the darkness with characters you care about in a tale that compels you to read from page one to the very end. I highly recommend this book. The question is, can we learn from what we read to stop such crimes from happening again?

An unthinkable crime, and perpetrated by the most shocking culprit. This is just the start, the premise for JANEOLOGY, Karen Harrington's debut novel that breaks boundaries in every direction.

Most books use "how?" or "who?" as the foundation to build tension. Harrington courageously chose "why?"--the hardest question of all to follow to its source. The book leads us through an actual trial within the story, but more importantly, a trial of our own values and judgments.

Even after the last page, after all the loose ends had been cleverly and seamlessly woven together, I found myself haunted and moved. JANEOLOGY had nudged me to think more deeply about those dark areas that we all tend to whistle past.

JANEOLOGY gives you more than you bargained for in a book; the hours spent enlarge you.