More on Christopher Brookmyre's attitudes
Read long enough, and you'll answer your own questions. Yesterday I wondered about the haughtily dismissive first-chapter narrator in Christopher Brookmyre's A Big Boy Did It and Ran Away. Did this narrator's withering criticism of suburbs reflect Brookmyre's views, in which case it would be fair to accuse the author of taking pot shots at an easy target? Or was the staleness Brookmyre's jab at the narrator's snarkiness and lack of imagination?
I got my answer three hundred pages later in a section narrated by another, more sympathetic character:
I got my answer three hundred pages later in a section narrated by another, more sympathetic character:
"Ray didn't fancy the place much himself back then. but wasn't so dismissive now. ... There were lots of kids playing on the pavements, bikes left unguarded outside front doors, garages open invitingly to reveal toys, garden swings and washer/driers. It was very `choose life' and twee to the point of smug, but was also obvious that crime and fear didn't stalk the place either."
Whatever Brookmyre's feelings about suburbs, suburbs of Aberdeen in particular (and perhaps that "twee to the point of smug" is a clue), he recognizes they can have appeal, and he uses this appeal to effective dramatic purpose, heightening the contrast between a villain and a relatively innocent victim.
© Peter Rozovsky 2009
Labels: Christopher Brookmyre, comic crime fiction, Scotland
posted by Peter Rozovsky at 6:24 PM
20 Comments:
Interesting. The Wall Street Journal had a good article a while back on the history of hating suburbia in the arts. Nice to see that someone else is presenting a more-balanced view.
That article was an interesting antidote to the sort of anti-suburban slant I mentioned in my first post about A Big Boy Did It and Ran Away, though it has more than its share of unsubstantiated sneers in the opposite direction -- a typical product, one might say, of the conservative-dominated American media. On the subject of suburbs, it seems a clear-headed assessment is difficult from any side.
We live and learn - apparently also Brookmyre :)
I have given your blog an award. Please come by and pick it up.
Peter,
It's nice to see that Brookmyre is taking a more balanced approach to suburbia. If people believed Hollywood films were an accurate depiction of suburban life (and unfortunately they do a lot of the time), they'd come off thinking all of middle-class America is just one big neurotic mess.
I might have to add this one to the reading list.
Dorte, I have picked up and acknowledged the award. Thanks. As with my other task, I'll try to reply and pass the honor on by the end of the week.
Given Brookmyre's generally take-no-prisoners approach to comic crime fiction, his recognition that looking death in the face can make one long for the tranquility of suburbs is admirable.
Brian, balance is never a word one ought to associate with Brookmyre. It's probably a word one ought not to associate with discussions of the suburbs, either. That Wall Street Journal article was no model of restraint, either.
The middle class has regained currency and respectability in American political discourse as experts and politicians see it disappearing. But no one has a good word for the suburbs, though.
Peter, you are welcome.
I am looking forward to your contribution and I shall do my best to translate it into beautiful Danish :)
Danish at least as good as Martin Edwards', I hope!
Oh, I think you can rest assured of that ;)
Try to make me come across as breezy, intelligent and informative in Danish if you can. Thanks.
Oh, that should be a piece of cake I´m sure (or perhaps a peace of cake as it says in my current read).
And the word verification: fly so you (not sure where I am supposed to fly, but off I go).
For anyone with small children, Brookemyre's line, "Hell, thy name is colic," is really enough to go out and buy the books.
As for suburbia, I recently found out something I thought was interesting in researching Levittown, New York: there are two distinct types of books available about the place, 1) academic, urban studies type books that all subscribe to the anti-suburbia the article mentioned above talks about and, 2) self-published memoirs by people who grew up in Levittown all about what a great place it was.
Maybe it's just me, but that says something.
The next most interesring thing I found out about Levittown were the names of its two high schools: Jonas Salk High School and General MacArthur High School.
So, at least on the school board there were some different ideas at play. I suspect that's true of the rest of the suburbs as well, they may have more depth than the dismissive articles can see.
The word-verification gods want you to use some frequent-flyer miles, Dorte.
Peace of cake -- a poetic turn of phrase, or a publisher who won't pay for a good copy editor?
John, so you know that book, or are you just compiling examples for John McFetridge's Book of Colic Quotations?
I know some black families had some trouble in the early days of Pennsylvania's Levittown. But the whole concept of "suburb" is more complicated than one would guess from anti-suburban Hollywood movies, or hand-rubbing little screeds in the culture pages of the Wall Street Journal, Early North American suburbs, such as Lawrence Park in your very own Toronto were designed to be beyond the reach of the middle classes. So the equation of "middle class" and "suburban" is limited to specific times in history. But what were "middle classes" in the early part of the twentieth century?
So you're right. The subject is more complex than even the penetrating visions of Sam Mendes or the Wall Street Journal.
I've read a few Christopher Brookmyre and enjoyed them quite a bit, though sometimes he just uses too many words ;)
I also visited Paisley, just outside of Glasgow and recognized quite a few Brookmyre references.
Suburbs have always interested me, I grew up in Greenfield Park, on the south shore of Montreal in a small development, about eight square blocks of identical houses. And, like the article said, they were populated by tradespeople, not professionals and the move to owning a house was moving up - for my parents it was from a rental on Monk Blvd.
As a teenager, of course, I hated the whole idea of the suburbs - in the exact same way every other teenager I knew hated the suburbs, so I guess there was a fair amount of conformity ;) but now I'm seeing the burbs in quite a different way.
Peter, as it was ´peace of cake´ in the first edition and ´piece of cake´ in the third, it was hardly done on purpose.
John, you thoughtful charactder. With respect to Brookmyre's wordiness, two observations: His is no stripped-down, hard-boiled prose style; that's for sure. His lengthy expository passages break the show-don't-tell rule far more than most writers do. I think he pulls it off most of the time. The other is that the flood of words can make reading two Brookmyre books back to back an intimidating experience. Make sure you're well rested before you start the second book.
My experience with suburbs may be a bit different. Cote St. Luc is a older, close-in suburb, within easy distance of Montreal. The South Shore and the West Island, farther from the city, may be more typical of what most people think of as suburbs. I remember once driving out to Pointe Claire and thinking, "What do kids do for fun out here?"
Your remark about teenagers thinking alike in their nonconformity remindds me of a passage I liked from Jo Nesbø's novel The Redeemer about the search for independence in the punk rock scene.
Dorte, the error never should have made it into the book in the first place, but it's encouraging to know that someone found it and eventually corrected it.
Peter, I am afraid the author found it herself via the same source as I did: a review in a newspaper from her area.
I have posted my review of the book in question today, "Dukkebarnet" which has not been translated into English and probably never will. It comes from one of those companies where you can pay them to publish your book - which is in all probability what she has done. It is not quite without talent, but someone should have helped her before taking her money & publishing it.
Hmm, I'm not sure such companies are big on offering editorial help. I'm not sure they have any economic incentive to do so.
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