The Taste of Ashes

Rating:
Summary: On the short list of the greatest PI novels of all time.
Review: The 4th Paul Pine novel, Browne only wrote this because his editor made him, according to his foreword. And he seems tired of the genre. But far from making this a bad novel, Browne's discomfort gives "T of A"" an unusual self-awareness which heaps on the cynicism and lonely pointlessness of the detective profession without ever crossing into parody or the coy, snide post-modernism that PI writers add today. Browne subtly deconstructs some of the genre's cliches in a Kafka-esque way, as Pine takes on the efficient bureaucracy of a well-to-do, outwardly very clean town near Chicago. In most PI novels, everyone is rude; Browne shows how people can be just as uncooperative to an investigation seeking the truth when theyre college-educated and friendly.

When Pine picks up a "plaster," or tail, his 1st-person narrative says, "How quaint." Passages like that stand out; Pine has seen it all before, again and again. He's so world-weary he's doggedly energetic. He so much didn't want the case an acquaintance's wife asked him to pursue, that eventually he took it because he couldn't quit thinking about it.

T of A messes with genre conventions in ways it would be criminal to further reveal: Suffice it to say archetypes such as the good daughter, the bad daughter, a corrupt town, cops, an old rich invalid, and a hot-pants wife are all dealt with in fine fashion. Yet one of the most interesting characters is a little girl Pine meets in the first chapter, a girl who figures into the plot frighteningly. Along the way he has to solve the murders of an heir nobody liked, a man who was not the good husband his wife (nor Pine) thought he was, and a woman who knew too much. The whole town is against him, except for one reporter, but eventually he turns against Pine, too. There are no easy answers in this novel, and the questions aren't ones anybody wants asked.

T of A is not necessarily more enjoyable than the other three Pine novels, although it is strictly a finer piece of work, with more characterization, so it achieves more real relevance in its sad poignancy. This is a slower, longer novel than the first three Pines, but never is dull. As with many of the best mysteries of this school, Pine rarely uncovers anything himself, instead serving as a catalyst to get people to reveal their misdeeds merely by his going around trying to uncover them, surviving long enough to put together the pieces. And there are a lot of pieces of shattered lives in this troubled town when everything is brought to light, with Pine doing what he can to soften the blow for nearly everyone but himself and the few remaining scraps of his idealism. Pine had broad, broad shoulders, living by a code of honor he may not even have believed in anymore, but stubbornly upholding its tenets just the same. Very like Marlowe, especially toward Chandler's end, a piercing view into humanity's bitter foibles.

At his best, Browne is not as good as Chandler at his best. But of all the thousands of hard-boiled mystery writers ever to put pen to paper, only he, Hammett and Ross MacDonald are worthy of any serious comparison with Chandler at all. So this novel belongs in rare company indeed.

Highly recommended.