I prefer reading without distractions, so I never bother with jacket blurbs or anything that would skew my appreciation of the work of art. That being the case, I didn't realize until just a few minutes ago that the author of Rose is the writer of the detective series set in Soviet Russia which begins with Gorky Park. Well. What a surprise.In the dim recesses of my mind, I seem to recall having either read Gorky Park or watched the movie. So my smattering of familiarity acts more as a distraction than an illumination in this case.
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| Martin Cruz Smith |
At any rate, whatever Martin Cruz Smith's umpteen other novels have going for them, Rose shares much with Dante's description of Inferno. Published in 1996 and set in the 1800's, the book's action takes place in Wigan, a coal-mining town in Victorian England. A missing-person mystery/more-than-likely homicide, the book probes the different classes of English Victorian society, contrasting the gentry's life above ground with that of the miners' beneath. Smith's depiction of the brutal life engendered/required by the occupation of coal mining evokes the hot, dark, claustrophobic world a mile below the blooming flowers and cool breezes of the sunlit surface. Heat, darkness, and explosive gases comprise the world underground; Smith makes sure his reader feels the discomfort and the knife-edge of danger.
The resolution of the story, though twisting back on itself in a way that is almost too clever, satisfies by staying true to the established characteristics of the people. Though the most obvious clue (after reading) is more confusing than mystifying (while reading), the final wrap-up is at least adequate, with just deserts meted out to all.
