“Perfume: The Story of a Murderer” by Patrick Süskind

 

272 Pages, Knopf Doubleday, ISBN-13: 978-0375725845

I read Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind for a history course on the French Revolution; my Prof. assigned it not so much for its subject matter – more on that in a minute – but because of how the writer described pre-Revolutionary Paris, especially its awful slums. And make no mistake, Paris under the ancien régime comes to life once more under Süskind’s pen (keyboard?) in all its filthy glory. It turns out that Perfume was also Kurt Cobain’s favorite book, and upon completion of this bleak work I could see why. In the man’s own words, “I’ve read Perfume about ten times and I can’t stop reading it. It’s like something that’s just stationary in my pocket all the time. It just doesn’t leave me. I read it over and over. It just effects me”. Depending on what you think of Cobain, this is either an echoing endorsement or a resounding rejection.

Perfume follows the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a person born with a seemingly supernatural sense of smell in a world in which he is forsaken and unloved. Given birth by his mother at a market stall among rotting fish guts and the stench of corpses – she even uses a fish knife to cut the umbilical cord – Grenouille is eventually discovered in the street, covered in flies and offal (his mother is found and executed for infanticide). Thus orphaned at birth, he is passed between wet nurses, one of whom, Jeanne Bussie, saying of him: “He’s possessed by the devil…This baby makes my flesh creep because it doesn’t smell the way children ought to smell… like fresh butter”. Loved by none and unwanted by all, Jean-Baptiste grows to hate humanity as much as humanity hates him. In so many respects he was damned from the very beginning.

Eventually, Grenouille lands an apprenticeship with a perfumer where that remarkable nose of his can truly come into its own. As he learns his craft and eventually eclipses his employer, he aspires to become the greatest perfumer of the age, an olfactory artisan par excellence whose creations move their wearers like no perfume ever has before. Indeed, it is Grenouille’s ambition to create scents that are so overwhelming that they will allow him to control them and bend them to his will even – and this is key to his motivation – force them to love him. But in order for this godly scent to come into creation, Grenouille must harvest the most pure, delightful and innocent scents from their source – and that source is living, virgin girls. The lengths he goes to in order to bring forth his obsession are monstrous, but what obsessive can corral his demons?

This is grim stuff, and so I find it eminently believable that Kurt Cobain drew inspiration from it for Nirvana’s 1993 album In Utero; the second song, Scentless Apprentice, draws directly from the novel with lyrics such as, “Like most babies smell like butter/His smell smelled like no other/He was born scentless and senseless/Every wet nurse refused to feed him” and a chorus that shrieks “Go away/Get away”, coming from a line in the novel in which “Grenouille no longer wanted to go somewhere, but only to go away, away from human beings”. On could easily argue that many more songs on In Utero were inspired by Perfume, but I won’t belabor the point. As I said above, Cobain’s love of this novel may serve either as a recommendation or a damnation; for me it was neither, as I viewed the thing through its own prism.

Perfume is one of those books that sticks with you, whether you want them to or not. There can be no doubt that Süskind’s descriptive powers are second to none, and that the character he created and the tale he crafted affects one for their sheer detail if nothing more. Paris under the kings comes alive, Grenouille himself virtually walks off the pages and the scents he creates virtually waft around the reader as he takes it all in. And the murders…the murders of all of those young girls strike at one’s heart, so much so that you wish you could reach into the page and throttle Grenouille before he can harm anyone else. I guess I can see how Cobain was inspired by this dark work, but as to why he carried a copy with him everywhere always escapes me – then again, I’m not a drug-addled manic depressive with black thoughts.

“Byzantium”, by Stephen Lawhead

 

645 pages, Zondervan, ISBN-13: 978-0061092961

Stephen Lawhead’s Byzantium tells the tale of Aidan, a 10^th Century Irish monk sent to take the Book of Kells to the Byzantine Emperor in Constantinople. During his quest he becomes separated from his fellow pilgrims and undergoes a variety of exotic adventures, from being captured and enslaved by Vikings, to engaging in political intrigue at the court of the Byzantine Empire and enslavement (again) in the caliph’s mines. Throughout it all his faith in God and Man are tested, and whether or not he comes to the end of his journey a better, bigger man – well, you’ll just have to find out, wontcha?

Byzantium is one of those books that, while I read it lo, many moons ago, has stayed with me ever since. The tense situations Aidan are thrown into time and again are well drawn and fairly exciting, especially the sea battle towards the end of the book, a battle that hums with energy and tension. Throughout each event, Aidan must rely on his wits and various abilities to stay alive and hope to complete the mission he set out on. Lawhead certainly has the ability to create intriguing set pieces, whether in a Danish festhall, an Arab palace, or the city of Constantinople itself. An excellent piece of historical fiction.

But there is more to it than that, for Byzantium is also a tale of a Christian man whose faith is tested time and again. As Aidan is tossed upon the seas of faith, his trust in God is likewise tossed about, and as he witnesses Man’s inhumanity towards Man, that faith becomes ever-more frayed until – to repeat myself, you’ll just have to find out, wontcha? It is to Lawhead’s credit that his writing never turns into preaching, and that his message is delivered with the subtlety of a brushstroke rather than of a sledgehammer. And Aidan’s encounter at the end of the book with the Viking who enslaved him at the beginning…there is no finer example of a Christian apologia in popular fiction.

So Byzantium is great historical fiction with a subtle Christian message that is all the more powerful for being so. It is also great entertainment that kept me engrossed the whole time I was reading it, a rare trifecta of literary skill that Lawhead should be applauded for.

“The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes”, by Arthur Conan Doyle, illustrated by Sidney Edward Paget

 

636 pages, Castle Books, ISBN-13: 978-0890090572

I got the omnibus The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes from…hell, I don’t remember, but it is every Sherlockian’s dream, collecting as it does 37 short stories originally published in the famed British magazine The Strand and later collected in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes and The Return of Sherlock Holmes, as well as the novel The Hound of the Baskervilles (I just wish it contained the stories collected in His Last Bow and The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes, but oh well). This edition was originally published way the hell back in 1976, so I’m sure I must have picked it up from a used bookstore or a garage sale or something like that – but no matter; it was this edition of the classic tales that launched my Sherlockmania and got me interested in reading and whatnot, so there’s that.

If you’ve read these classics or, at least, have seen their interpretations on television – Jeremy Brett being the best Holmes – THE BEST, I tell ya – although there are many more to choose from – then they will all be familiar to you, from A Scandal in Bohemia to The Adventure of the Copper Beeches, from The Adventure of Silver Blaze to The Final Problem, from The Adventure of the Empty House to The Adventure of the Second Stain – and, of course, The Hound of the Baskervilles. After reading each story you will be reminded why Conan Doyle’s creation left such an indelible mark on the public’s imagination (much to his later chagrin), as Holmes, using his prodigious mind, depthless knowledge and observational magnificence solves the most intriguing and vexing mysteries using only reason and the scientific method.

One mustn’t forget Sidney Edward Paget, the original illustrator of these tales for The Strand and the man just as responsible for the look of Holmes as his creator was. The illustrations presented in this volume are all reproductions of the artist’s original drawings and, by default, the template from which all subsequent interpretations of the character are based upon. While one, of course, must not discount Conan Doyle’s descriptions of his most famous creation, without Paget’s pen the imaginations of most people would not be able to conjure up what this most peculiar of detectives was supposed to look like. While lacking a gourd Calabash (but not the deerstalker), the way in which Paget drew Holmes is the way in which the world will always remember him and in which actors the world over will portray him.

I’m sure that there have been many more such omnibus’ that have been published since this one – which, hopefully, include the last two collections and maybe even the other novels. But when I was a kid The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes was all I needed to get me started on my reading and love of this strange, driven, dedicated and utterly unique crusader for justice.

“American Gods”, by Neil Gaiman

 

750 pages, William Morrow, ISBN-13: 978-0062472106

Ostensibly, Neil Gaiman’s American Gods is a blend of Americana, fantasy and strands of ancient and modern mythology in which one Mr. Wednesday (note that name, will you?), aided and abetted by Shadow, a recently released convict, attempt to recruit others like him – that is, Old Gods – in order to fight in the war that is coming against the New Gods – the American Gods of the title. The book was first published in 2001 and won the 2002 Hugo and Nebula awards; my copy is the Tenth Anniversary Edition that contains the Author’s Preferred Text – kinda like the Director’s Cut of a movie, if you like, so this is the tale that Gaiman really wanted to tell. As to what it’s really about…well, why don’t I let Neil tell you himself:

It’s about the soul of America, really. What people brought to America; what found them when they came; and the things that lie sleeping beneath it all. That was the goal. That was the destination… [that he set his story] in a country where the message on the Statue of Liberty was something you could take seriously was as uncontroversial as making sure people of all races and skin colors were represented in a book about America… [where the decision to make Shadow a] mixed-race hero feels so apolitical as to be obvious…I had wanted it to be a number of things. I wanted to write a book that was big and odd and meandering, and I did and it was.

So…yeah. This book is more than just fantasy or philosophy or what have you. It is a take on America from the viewpoint of a transplanted English author – again, in Neil’s words:

I moved to America in 1992. Something started, in the back of my head. There were unrelated ideas that I knew were important and yet seemed unconnected: two men meeting on a plane; a car on the ice of a frozen lake; the significance of coin tricks, and more than anything, America: this place I now found myself living in that I knew I didn’t understand. But I wanted to understand it. I was an immigrant, although a reluctant one, and I was living in a huge strange country that resembled the America I’d encountered in books and in films so much less than I had expected. The place was filled with oddness and, it seemed to me, with the kind of hubris that gets authors into trouble, that I thought I ought to point out to Americans how very odd it actually was.

Thanks, Neil, for pointing out our oddness from a country in which blood pudding is a thing, everyone is emotionally repressed and drive on the wrong side of the road…but I digress. Because American Gods is not what it seems, as misdirection is the name of the game, something that Shadow knows about and is displayed while teaching a young boy a coin trick: “After several attempts the boy mastered the move. ‘Now you know half of it,’ said Shadow. ‘Because the moves are only half of it. The other half is this: put your attention on the place where the coin ought to be. Look at the place it’s meant to be. Follow it with your eyes. If you act like it’s in your right hand, no one will even look at your left hand, no matter how clumsy you are.’”

That’s American Gods for ya: a con game in which misdirection is as important to the story as the plot and the prose. Throughout most of the book Gaiman has us looking in one direction when we should be looking elsewhere – has us looking at his right hand when we should be looking at his left – until the big reveal at the end. And when you understand just what has been going on in the story and why, you want to kick yourself for not seeing it sooner, after all of the hints and clues that Gaiman scattered throughout. It’s enough to make one think that it is Neil Gaiman who is the natural-born son of Mr. Wednesday, the master trickster and father of the con. But it’s a believable con that validates the story and makes you glad you read it.

But why? Why did we keep looking in the wrong place at the wrong time? In a word: Faith. Too many people are susceptible to the siren call of faith – whether religious or secular, mind you – and, thus, easy marks for the Mr. Wednesdays of the world. Gods Old and New are sustained by faith, but people only worship gods they believe in, and so all of these gods have become consummate grifters, forever trying to get ever-more believers to sacrifice and sustain them. Most people, I think, would argue that faith is a positive virtue, but in Gaiman’s telling, it is currency to be accumulated, invested and then spent – whether said currency is positive or negative (or both?) Gaiman doesn’t say (although it’s probably both).

American Gods, then, is many things, but it is first and foremost clever, especially in the way it breathes life into Old Gods – and New – and makes one believe that they live still.

“Vicious”, by V. E. Schwab

 

400 pages, Tor Books, ISBN-13: 978-1250160263

Vicious by V. E. Schwab is yet another book I assigned to the Books on Tap book club sponsored by the Fraser Public Library. The first in the Villains series (which I didn’t know at the time), the book focuses on Victor Vale and Eliot Cardale (later known as Eli Ever), collegiate colleagues who discover that an after-death trauma, under the right conditions, can create an “EO” (short for ExtraOrdinary), a person with superhuman abilities. The reason (I think) that Schwab called this her Villains series is because most of the characters, while thinking themselves as heroes, are nothing like. Eli’s power allows him to heal at an extraordinary rate and, evidently, granted him immortality, as the parts set ten years after he gains his abilities make it clear that he hasn’t aged a day. Victor gains the power to inflict pain with a thought or, just as useful, to remove it. Other EO’s appear, as well – Serena, a modern-day siren who can make anyone do her bidding; her little sister Sydney who can resurrect the dead; among others – but the story revolves around Eli and Victor and their feud.

The story basically flips back and forth between past and present, the past being ten years before the current tale (along with several side-treks, from a few years to a few hours). During that time we see what Eli and Victor have been up to, which boils down to Victor cooling his heels in prison where he tests and perfects his power before finally escaping with super-hacker (and behemoth) Mitch in tow, to Eli launching his God-inspired crusade in which he seeks out and murders every fellow EO he can find (secretly aided and abetted by the police), seeing as he has come to the conclusion that they are unnatural and must be returned to their proper, dead state. With the story bouncing back and forth between past and present, we watch as Victor and Eli – both thinking themselves heroes; both in fact villains with contrary motives – pursue their goals and one another, all of it cannonballing to a final (for now) confrontation at the end. Who will triumph? Who do we want to? Do either of these self-righteous egoists deserve to “win”? Wouldn’t the world be better off without all of them?

Vicious keeps you interested and involved in the lives of its characters, even the supporting ones. The fact that Victor and Eli are so disreputable and unlikable make them all the more intriguing; it put me in mind of the tagline for the Mel Gibson vehicle Payback: “Get Ready To Root For The Bad Guy”. For make no mistake: both Victor and Eli are villains, pursuing their respective goals at the expense of everyone and everything around them. Just when you find yourself sympathizing with the one, the other pops up and makes you see the world from their perspective. The supporting characters are just as noteworthy: Serena makes every girl who ever manipulated you seem like a saint; Sydney is the little sister you always wanted; Mitch the big bro you need in your corner. It takes real skill to invent fictional people to care about, and Schwab does it again and again over the course of the book. And in spite of the fact that she is dealing with EO’s and all that, the world she has written is as real as our own, an aspect that adds to the realism of the subject and makes the story that much more intriguing.

I think I’ll read the rest of the series, but not yet; I need to take a break from EO’s for a while. But I will look forward to more viciousness in the future as all of these superpowered egomaniacs make life harder for the rest of us.

“Before Watchmen”, by various artists and writers

 

“Minutemen/Silk Spectre”, written and illustrated by Darwyn Cooke, illustrated by Amanda Conner (collects Minutemen #1-6 & Silk Spectre #1-4)
288 pages, DC Comics, ISBN-13: 978-1401238926

“Comedian/Rorschach”, written by Brian Azzarello, illustrated by J.G. Jones and Lee Bermejo (collects Comedian #1-6 & Rorschach #1-4)
256 pages, DC Comics, ISBN-13: 978-1401245139

“Nite Owl/Dr. Manhattan”, written by J. Michael Straczynski, illustrated by Adam Hughes and Joe Kubert (collects Nite Owl #1-4, Dr. Manhattan #1-4 & Moloch #1-2)
288 pages, DC Comics, ISBN-13: 978-1401245146

“Ozymandias/Crimson Corsair”, written by Len Wein, illustrated by Jae Lee and John Higgins (collects Ozymandias #1-6, Dollar Bill #1 & Crimson Corsair #1)
256 pages, DC Comics, ISBN-13: 978-1401245153

The Before Watchmen limited comic series was first published in 2012; the books I am reviewing here are a set of four omnibus editions that were published the following year. Each series (there were 10 such) act as a prequal to the 1986 Watchmen limited series by writer Alan Moore and artist Dave Gibbons (the omnibus of which was reviewed way back on June 25^th, 2012). For the most part, Before Watchmen was an excellent addition to the Watchmen mythos, seeing as it added to the characterizations of each series’ respective subject (except for Minutemen, which sucked); the artwork was also fantastic (except for Minutemen, which sucked). Mind you, not all of that addition works, but overall there was a deal of depth added to each character.

Minutemen is without question the weakest of the series, with subpar artwork and a story that rewrites characters without adding anything to the lore. We learn that not all of our heroes were heroic and that they were not what they seemed to be – all written for “modern audiences” that favor identity politics over good-storytelling or deeper themes. All I knew about Silk Spectre was that she was more-or-less forced to become a superhero by her mother and that she had a thing for the color blue. But her own comic expands on the character and gives her a chance to prove that she is more than just a pretty face. A coming-of-age story that proves that the groovy 60s counterculture wasn’t all it has been romanticized as being.

I’m glad that The Comedian, Eddie Blake, got his own miniseries, as the uber-cynic needed a vehicle in which his bleak worldview could be explored. From the Minutemen to Vietnam to the Watchmen – and Robert F. Kennedy? – we find that good ole’ Eddie had depths we knew nothing about (kinda) and wish he could have been a better man and superhero. If you’re like me then Rorschach was your favorite Watchman, messed-up weirdo that he was, and the series dedicated to him really does the character justice (he appears in other series, too, much as he should be written). It is as gritty and bleak as a Rorschach comic should be, and Lee Bermejo’s art captures our beloved mental-case in all his dystopian glory.

Nite Owl – the second one, Dan Dreiberg – is a straight-up superhero story that explores (because we have to nowadays) the sexual repression hinted at in the original graphic novels along with the fetishism linked to men and women who play dress-up and pummel bad guys. While not really adding much to the topic, the story is solid and gives a glimpse into the character’s past exploits. Dr. Manhattan, a true superhero with godlike powers, is expanded on here, if you can believe that, seeing as he was already given so much depth in the original series. This comic should be used to teach how to craft a proper prequel as Straczynski builds on what came before without detracting from the original. Really, we learn more about the Doc and what makes him tick. I really don’t see the point of a series – granted, made up of only two comics – dedicated to the villain Moloch. I’m all for fleshing out characters and giving them depth and motivation, but this guy’s only purpose was to give Rorschach some background facts he needed to pursue his investigations – which I guess accounts for his two-and-done series.

Ozymandias (Adrian Veidt, the heavy of the original graphic novels) is explored here, especially his desire to copy Alexander the Great…in which case, why name himself after an Egyptian pharaoh? Whatever, just read the story and marvel at the artistry of Jae Lee who looks to be a modern-day comic book legend whose work will outlast whatever story he is illustrating. Remember Dollar Bill? Y’know, the original Minuteman who died ‘cause his cape got caught in a revolving door while he was trying to foil a robber? Well, he gets a one-and-done comic of his own – and, well, so what? We learn that he wasn’t meant to be a hero, just a corporate shill for a bank, an idea that could have been explored further but wasn’t. Then we have Crimson Corsair, another bleak pirate-themed tale that was meant for Tales of The Black Freighter, the comic-within-the-comic series from Watchmen – and while Higgins’ art is excellent, this tale is also rather a waste as it adds nothing at all to the series. Really, the one-off feels like it’s nothing but filler, maybe as a way to get the series to an even number.

So I liked Before Watchmen, surprisingly as I was prepared for the original series to be up-ended and ruined by modern politics. But it wasn’t for the most part (except for Minutemen, which sucked) and I think any fan of the original Watchmen miniseries will welcome this addition to their library of geekdom.

“’Salem’s Lot”, by Stephen King

 

405 pages, Doubleday & Co., Inc., ISBN-13: 978-0965772419

I first became aware of Stephen King’s ’Salem’s Lot when I saw the 1979 miniseries starring the recently deceased David Soul, the recently deceased Lance Kerwin, Bonnie Bedelia (mmmmm…Bonnie Bedelia), James Mason and, can’t forget, Reggie Nalder as Barlow, the scariest vampire there ever was. I thought the series rocked and it scared the bejesus out of me – of course, it was made at a time when vampires were still thought as being evil, undead things that wanted to suck your blood and kill in order to survive, not as a bunch of pussified emos who whined about everything and were as scary as a hamster. No, these were real vampires, and so while in the midst of my high school Stephen King kick I read ’Salem’s Lot in order to compare it with what I already knew.

Mostly, the book is as good as the series, although there are numerous differences between the two – especially the character of Barlow (or Kurt Barlow, if you really want to know). In the series he’s scary AF, with grey skin, evil red eyes and incisor fangs (rather than canines) which were weird and scary and…well, just damn. Kurt Barlow from the book, however, is rather more mundane, a prototypical vampire who dresses well, is urbane and well-spoken and not nearly as frightening – or interesting, truth be told. I guess it just shows what an impact the series made on me that I can find a vampire to be so pedestrian; if I had read the book first then maybe my disappointment would be reversed and I’d be let down by a monstrous Barlow.

The rest of the characters in the book are fleshed out and given personalities so that, when they are turned, their loss actually feels real (those instances when they speak as vampires are surreal). For ’Salem’s Lot is vintage early King, one of the books that cemented his reputation as a master of modern horror. There are chills and frights and gore and blood aplenty, but it is the characterizations that set him apart in that he invests the time needed to make his characters real people so that, if and when something awful happens to them, it hits you the reader that much harder. My experience with King petered out sometime in the 90s, so I don’t know if he kept this up, but its there for all to see here in ’Salem’s Lot.

And, damnit, ’Salem’s Lot is a horror book about vampires as they’re meant to be, as I said in my screed above. While once human, they are something else now and just don’t continue on living – er, make that “living” – as if nothing happened, or as if their new vampirism is just a lifestyle choice. The idea that we would want to become one of them should be absurd, if not downright evil. All of which is obvious as one reads this book, for the one thing that is made clear is not only are vampires a mockery of the living, they also no longer have any free agency, seeing as they are now pawns of Barlow and must follow his dictates. This, then, is perhaps the evil at the heart of ’Salem’s Lot: the reduction of people to drones.

I haven’t picked up a Stephen King book in an age, but after having read ’Salem’s Lot that’s all I need to know as to how good a writer he is (or at least, was).