Z/Web

Author: Iris Johansen

I really like the way Iris bases her novels on character over plot. In this particular novel, however, she’s a little heavy-handed. In addition to the whole “serial killer on the loose” plot, we’re in the middle of a romance/war between the best friend, the heroine, and the wealthy lover. Some of the conflicts in this felt forced and overdone, and the outcome was brutally obvious from the beginning (which it was supposed to be, since the woman was closing her eyes to her best friend as a lover, but since we could see it from the beginning, it made wading through hundreds of pages of her hemming and hawking tedious). The serial killer plotline is superior, with an unknown killer telephoning our heroine with frighting threats and hints of future violence. She’s lost her young daughter to a killer years ago and that motivated her to become a top forensic sculpture (she creates facial models from skulls to help identify bodies). By threatening to kill a little girl, the killer forces the woman to bond with the new child (who’s physically similar to her own), with the plan to kill them both after they’ve bonded: diabolically cruel, to say the least. The chase is on, the killer always several steps ahead. Who is he? I fell for the red herring candidate, but right from the beginning, which made the ending uncomfortable. While the killer’s identity was thus a surprise, it felt a bit artificial, almost like Iris decided on the twist after the novel was originally written with the other guy as the killer. (I doubt she did that; my perception is clouded by my pre-judgement of the situation.) A good novel, exciting and tense, with some interesting bits on police work and serial killer stuff. There were stereotypical aspects I didn’t like — the killer’s dad was a religious fanatic (gee, that’s original) — and there were some odd technical mistakes toward the end (please, I retouch digital photos and if it’s done right, no one can tell). But overall this was an excellent book. Interestingly, two of the best characters in the book, Monty, a cadaver dog and his partner, a hard woman named Sarah, apparently feature in Iris’ next novel, of which this paperback included an excerpt. I’m definitely going to have to read that book.

This is an amazing film, probably the best film I’ve seen all year. I could be biased, however, because I’m writing a novel that features young teens in similar situations. The story is wonderfully simple: it’s about an ordinary, clean-cut, modest girl who wants to be popular. She manages to make friends with the hottest, coolest girl in school, and under her influence, is soon doing drugs, shoplifting, and getting tattoos and body piercings. Her mother (separated from her dad) struggles with these changes in her daughter while trying to keep her own crappy life together (she’s apparently in AA or something similar). The film’s really about the mother-daughter relationship and how that changes as the girl becomes a teen, but it touches on so many aspects of life: adulthood, sex, popularity, friends, rebellion, independence, drug use, cutting, suicide, and more. (On an interesting side note, driving home I happened to hear Avril Lavigne’s “Anything But Ordinary” which could be the theme song for this film as it explains why kids want to do these crazy things — they don’t want to be ordinary. Since Avril was sixteen when her album was released, she was probably not much older than these characters when she wrote the song.) The film’s ending is abrupt and unresolved. We’re given hints that tragedy may be avoided, but there are no guarantees or pat sitcom answers here, just a faint moment of hope. I liked everything about this film. The acting was astonishingly awesome, from all the precocious teens (Evie is played by Nikki Reed who was thirteen when she wrote the story) to Holly Hunter who plays the mom. Someone in this cast has to win an Academy Award or there is no justice. The story is rough and realistic, and for once we see teens and adults arguing like they do in real life, not sitcom-speak. This movie is similar to the controversial Kids, but focuses more on the loss of innocence and is less into salacious activity for the sake of a movie and more into a documentary-style capture of real modern teen life. You must see this film.

I remember struggling to read this “classic” novel as a kid and not getting very far. It’s a strange tale about kids in a private school, an obssessive teacher/headmaster, and a chocolate sale fundraiser. The main kid, a loner/loser type, refuses to “volunteer” for the sale, wreaking havoc on the whole order of things. The main “gang” (secret society) at the school sets out to force him to comply. The odd thing is the kid has no reason why he won’t sell the chocolates. It starts out as a whim, but ends up a war. Supposedly there’s something deep in there, and I get a glimmer of it, but just like the book, the film’s not very illuminating. This is a good production, and to the best of my memory faithful (I can’t remember if I even finished the book), but it ends up with the same flaws as the book: it’s pretentious and confusing. At least the all Peter Gabriel soundtrack’s awesome.