I know nothing about this author. I have not heard or read of any of her books, so when The Strange case of the Composer and his Judge arrived I did not know what to expect. The blurb is promising:
"New Year's day 2000. Hunters on their way home through a forest in the Jura stumble across a half-circle of dead bodies lying in the snow. They are questioned and sent away. As they descend the mountain, a large dark car rises past them in the gloom. The woman within barely acknowledges their presence"
The woman in the car is the Judge, Dominique Charpentier, and she is in charge of the investigation - she and the Commissaire, Andrew Schweigen, have encountered this suicide pact before, have seen that those who died were in a state of joy and ecstasy at the time of their death. All of those who have died are people in the higher echelons of their chosen professions, doctors, lawyers, politicians and musicians. But one person is dead, not from her own hand, but by a bullet and so it is a murder investigation. While searching for clues they find a strange leather bound book containing maps of the stars and written in a strange code and this Book of Faith leads them to the Composer, Friedrich Grosz, who is connected to every one of the dead. He is the Leader of the Faith, but there are schisms within its members and he is trying to prevent these suicides.
"The rhetoric of the Apocalypse is common to many religions. But some of our number were bewitched away from the path of truth. They were unable to hold their souls in patience......Our tasks are set in this world and we are forbidden to leave before we are called to die. The only person who is permitted to step forth through fire into darkness is the Guide himself. We know that our real lives begin beyond the grave, but suicide is forbidden...we must live out our appointed days. I tried harm to calm this insidious, spreading enthusiasm, but as you know, I failed..."
The Composer who is also the Guide mentioned in the previous paragraph, is a physically large dynamic man with a personality and a powerful presence to match and he has fallen in love with the Judge. She tries to resist being drawn into this dangerous and dark world and Andre, the Commissaire, himself in love with Dominique, is fearful for her. Friedrich persuades her to attend a performance of an opera he is conducting and it was no surprise to me that it was Tristan and Isolde, which ends with the Liebestod, the Love Death, the final scene as the two lovers prefer to die together rather than be separated.
"Now the soprano was speaking directly to the audience, her arms outstretched, her face radiant with joy. For the Night beckoned, that Endless Night of pleasure, the lavish promise of eternity and the enraptured dream....what awaits us on the other side of death? Glory, glory, glory I have seen it with my own eyes and I give you my word..."
I found this book to be powerful, moving and unsettling all at the same time. I read it over three days, kept putting it down as I found I needed to break away from it at intervals, but in the end it exerted a strange fascination over me and I sat up late one night to finish it. The ending is inevitable and shocking and I found that the effect Patricia Dunker's book had on me, that of a slight feeling of a prickling at the back of my neck and an uncomfortable sense of uneasiness, stayed with me for some while. I finished this book last weekend, but found I needed to think about it before posting.
The writing I found quite beautiful "A giant mass of wild acanthus masked the point where the wall encountered the cliff. The leaves spread out like dark green skirts, clinging to the red earth and the rising rocks. They walked forwards in the lush, damp world. The Judge heard water and the sound of water falling into waters, all the foliage appeared to breathe as the garden reposed in the midday heat, animate, sleeping"
The two main characters of the Judge and the Composer who are both almost larger than life, too dazzling in many ways, are counter balanced by the Commissaire, a bulky, shambling figure who has loved the judge for years and makes no attempt to hide it. He is not sophisticated, he loses his temper with her, he has no patience but he has an honesty and a good heart. Then there is her Assistant, Gaelle, with her sharp tongue, her mini skirts and outrageous dress whose constant moaning and insolence do not quite hide the fact that she adores the Judge and is as determined to protect her as is Andre, the Commissaire. It was good to have these two characters contrasting the impact of the Composer and the Judge who, together, can be overwhelming.
I don't think I have managed, in any way, to convey to you just how totally fascinated I was by this book. And the thing is, I am not sure why, can't put my finger on it. On the surface, not an enjoyable book, but one that grips and holds the reader and thoroughly turns you inside out and makes you think. I was bowled over by it and, as well as this going on my list of Books of the Year 2010, it has made me want to find more by this author. Is there a pattern to her writing, to her style, to her subject matter or was this particular title a one-off? I shall have to find her other titles to see and I am looking forward to this discovery.
To sum up - baffling, unsettling, strange, beautiful - it will stay with me for some considerable time.
Note: just came across this in The Guardian Books page - interesting review of above
