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The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels
3/5. Mystery novel in mixed media format (which I always think of as ‘documentation challenge’ format, which is me telling you I’ve been in fandom for decades without telling you I’ve been in fandom for decades, if you know you know). Here, a true crime writer tries to dig into a case of some supposedly satanic murders from years ago involving a cult and escaped teenagers and a vanishing baby.
This was sold to me as a good proper mystery, no domestic suspense stuff, no unfair plot reveals. This is correct, so if that’s what you’re looking for in today’s avalanche of awful people doing awful things to each other and calling it mystery/suspense, here you go. Not to say there isn’t a twisty psychological element here, because there is. But there’s also a slow-unfolding set of nesting reveals, which is a nice effect.
I was too distracted by the mixed media element, which yes, is serving a specific structural and plot purpose, and which yes, is done pretty well. Unfortunately, I’m just not sure anyone can do mixed media well enough to carry a whole book without making me say “oh come on” at least once. There’s a lot of she would never ever ever write that down here, and no fucking way she’d send this recording to the transcriptionist, come on, and the like. It works well when the format helps to conceal some secrets of mental state, but strains credulity when we suddenly have to document everyone’s secrets and lies, and we have to do it by having everyone write down everything, rather than by exploring their interiority in a more traditional narrative. Picky picky, I know. Other people will like this more than I did.
Content notes: References to violence, bullying.
3/5. Mystery novel in mixed media format (which I always think of as ‘documentation challenge’ format, which is me telling you I’ve been in fandom for decades without telling you I’ve been in fandom for decades, if you know you know). Here, a true crime writer tries to dig into a case of some supposedly satanic murders from years ago involving a cult and escaped teenagers and a vanishing baby.
This was sold to me as a good proper mystery, no domestic suspense stuff, no unfair plot reveals. This is correct, so if that’s what you’re looking for in today’s avalanche of awful people doing awful things to each other and calling it mystery/suspense, here you go. Not to say there isn’t a twisty psychological element here, because there is. But there’s also a slow-unfolding set of nesting reveals, which is a nice effect.
I was too distracted by the mixed media element, which yes, is serving a specific structural and plot purpose, and which yes, is done pretty well. Unfortunately, I’m just not sure anyone can do mixed media well enough to carry a whole book without making me say “oh come on” at least once. There’s a lot of she would never ever ever write that down here, and no fucking way she’d send this recording to the transcriptionist, come on, and the like. It works well when the format helps to conceal some secrets of mental state, but strains credulity when we suddenly have to document everyone’s secrets and lies, and we have to do it by having everyone write down everything, rather than by exploring their interiority in a more traditional narrative. Picky picky, I know. Other people will like this more than I did.
Content notes: References to violence, bullying.