Title: twice
Author: Lisa
Unger (Lisa Miscione)
Publisher: Broadway
Publish
date: 2004
ISBN: 978-0-307-95317-9
To describe
a novel jam-packed with brutal death, revenge, maniacs, monsters and more as ‘delightful’
may seems wrong, but really that’s what it is. A fantastic, fresh, young zest
for life bounces innocently through the pages describing (with considerable
skill) horror after horror – and it’s a great combo.
It’s an early Lisa Unger book, and she’s still writing under her maiden name. Having read
some of the later ones I was surprised initially at some of the tell-tale
flourishes and pet-projects of a writer slightly less in control than they
might be. The earlier chapters are peppered with description of what designer
brand of jeans the main characters are wearing, what type of plush covering
they have on their cushions, what upmarket ingredients they have in their
salad, what their ‘taut’ bodies are like. The language oozes the writer’s own
appreciation for these things, and it’s a funny little paradox that while the
main character couple move in together they’ve ‘got rid of most of their own
furniture and belongings’ because ‘new beginnings demand new objects’, one of
them ‘never developed attachments to things anyway.’ A very New-York sort of Designer-Zen
where you change your yoga-mat for the latest model every six months and have
state-of-the-art surround sound system playing you waterfalls and birdsong in a
very expensive, sterile apartment. (My description, not hers.) One laughs a
little at this, but the fact is Unger is a very sensual writer, and everything is described in heightened ‘appreciation’:
the stench of the subterranean network under New York, the way a policeman’s
face is ‘dirty and round as a potato’, a slashed vinyl cover to a discarded
table ‘gaping like a mouth’. They don’t stop coming, and it makes for an
engaging read. There is, it’s true, quite a bit of doubling up, and the whole
book feels as if it’s been written at breakneck speed, never looking back, as
if the monsters in the book are running after the author. ‘Grey’ must be used
at least 50 times throughout the novel (I’m reading on paperback, can’t do a
word count). A lot of things are ‘musty’ and smell of ‘damp earth’. There’s a
wonderful description of a librarian who’s ‘as dusty as an old unabridged
dictionary’, but then half a page later the same librarian is interviewed and
she’s neat and bright as a new penny. A certain house has an ‘evil smell’ –
again a combination of ‘musty’ and ‘earth’ but no mention of the pipe that the
owner subsequently lights up. A few homophone word-errors thrown in here and
there simply season the ‘this is bursting out of my skull’ impression.
Plot? It’s the third in a series of four books
featuring Lydia Strong, a crime novelist (ahem) who turns private investigator.
Yeah, I know. But it’s charming. The serial
killer who murdered her mother 16 years back has escaped from a mental asylum,
and is on the loose with Lydia in his sights. Meanwhile she and her partner in life
and in the private investigation firm, Jeffrey, have been hired to look into the
brutal murder of a famous artist’s husband. Lots of layers of history, family
feuds, layers of New York, criss-crossing of both narratives, rich succulent sensory
details throughout. The plot’s fairly intricate and though the story may be
written fast it’s certainly not been pantsed. (I can relate to that a lot.) I
was surprised, after the other books Unger books I’d read, that the tenor
seemed so different, but then the twins flit across the screen and suddenly the
language sharpens, just for a moment, and you know at once they’re at the heart
of the matter. Lost children. Over and over again. It doesn’t get old, mind,
they’re all different. Unger’s foreshadowing in this novel is a bit
heavy-handed, and the main jist of the interwoven ‘twists’ are apparent in the
early chapters but it’s all good, you can just see the general direction and
there are endless details and mini-stories to keep you going. Page-turner?
Definitely.
I was particularly grateful on a personal
level to have had the opportunity to read this. Stymied myself in a Slough of
Despond, not writing anything for months for no good reason, this bouncy
narrative might be just the inspiration to get things going. Thank you Lisa
Unger! Four happy moose-hoofs up… the one only taken off for the little errors
and gleeful carelessness. Because one has to if one’s marking, but wouldn’t
really otherwise.
