Look out for this! A single recommendation this month: The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair is a novel that’s genuinely extraordinary!

I’ve been blogging on The Crime Warp for eighteen months now and written my “Look out for these!” post each month recommending up to four titles that I think are worth trying.  This month, I’m highlighting only one book through a more in depth review – The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joel Dicker - a novel that just blew me away.  I’ve read a lot of books this year, but this one stands out as genuinely extraordinary. 

It’s a weighty book set principally in Somerset, New Hampshire, a real piece of small town America, where the body of 15 year old Nola Kellergan who disappeared 33 years ago is dug up in the garden of author Harry Quebert’s seaside home.  Who killed Nola?  Well, it looks like an open and shut case, especially as a manuscript of Quebert’s first novel is found with the body and Quebert admits that he was deeply in love with Nola all those years ago.  Confused and alone, Quebert contacts his old friend and protégé Marcus Goldman, a gifted young author, who comes to Somerset to help clear his friend’s name.  

Goldman starts to investigate what really happened and as the novel unfolds, you not only see the truth revealed about Quebert, but about all the other people in Somerset.  As the investigation progresses, Goldman uses the information he learns to write his own novel to tell the story behind Harry Quebert’s relationship with Nola Kellergan, whilst going on his own personal voyage of self-discovery, revealing the truth about Goldman too.

There are so many wonderful aspects to the writing in this novel.  The sense of place and characterisation are authentic and convincing, particularly the character’s power of self-deception and their unwillingness to see what is really happening.  You see the effect of self-belief or in most cases a lack of self belief and the impact that has on the characters’ lives.  Empty and unfulfilled because of choices and compromises they made, unlike Goldman, whose life has been made good, because of the advice of his mentor Quebert, which has helped him make the most of his talents.  Everyone else has muddled through alone. 

From what I’ve written so far you can see that the book is far more than just a jobbing mystery novel.  It’s exquisitely written and what surprised me is that it’s translated from French.  Sam Taylor the translator should get real credit for the way he’s brought out Dicker’s voice and conveyed the depth of emotion in English.  One scene which lodged in my mind is centred on Jenny Quinn, a beautiful young woman, utterly dominated by the wild social ambitions of her stifling mother.  Quinn is in love with Quebert who rejects her utterly whilst she’s romantically pursued by the not too bright Travis Dawn.  After many failed attempts, Dawn finally proposes to her.  Dicker finishes the scene with a simple but heart rending sentence “And because she had no hope left, she accepted his proposal”.

In contrast, there are some pure laugh out loud comedy moments, ranging from the scene where Quebert lectures Goldman’s college class about the Lewinsky affair, to Goldman’s telephone conversations with his mother, who asks the most bizarre questions including whether he is naked in his hotel room or whether he’s “homosexualising” with a man. 

I could gush for hours about this book – I leave the final comment to Mrs Romancrimeblogger who said that in nineteen years, she’s never seen me so excited about a book.  The release date is Wednesday 30 April – I think it would make a great read over the bank holiday weekend.

Romancrimeblogger