A Fine Dark Line
Joe R Lansdale Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 320pp, £16.99
ISBN 0297845594
Stanley Mitchell is an "unsophisticated" 13-year-old living in the quiet town of Dewmont, Texas, in the summer of 1958. His discovery of a box of old love letters buried in the garden piques his interest in an unsolved murder mystery. Under the guidance of his (coloured) friend and mentor, Buster Lighthorse Smith, he starts putting the clues together.
Part detective story, part horror chiller and part Huck Finn adventure yarn, Joe Lansdale's A Fine Dark Line abounds with familiar tropes - there are haunted houses, a corpse and even a loyal dog to help the hero out of "scrapes". But we are soon forced out of this kitsch comfort zone. A sinister web of violence lies beneath the town's sleepy façade, and Stanley's investigation becomes an education in the harsh realities of race and the abuse of privilege.
Unfortunately this "education" is uneven. While Lansdale reminds us that "Big Bubba Joe" is the damaged product of a deeply racist society, he actually approaches racial stereotyping himself in his depiction of Rosy, the fat black house servant who is forever "baking cookies". His novel vividly captures the atmosphere of an isolated, backwards little town, but it would have benefited from some more ironic distance.
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