Snow Angels by James Thompson (2009. Putnam. ISBN 978-0-399-15617-5)
Sometimes good writing is simply that and nothing more.
James Thompson, an American living in Helsinki with his wife who writes full-time after working stints (according to the dust jacket of the book being reviewed) as a “bartender, bouncer, construction worker, photographer, rare coin dealer, and soldier” is obviously a guy with the command of the English language. But knowing the author is based in Finland’s largest city how does a crime novel written in that venue fair with a wider audience?
Having previously read, enjoyed, and reviewed three other crime novel/thrillers based in Finland for The New World Finn (my favorite being Raid and the Blackest Sheep by Harri Nykanen; you can find an archive of all my prior reviews at www.cloquetriverpress.com), I knew that my latest assignment for the NWF, two relatively new books by Mr. Thompson, would bring to mind those past reads. I also knew that my assignment, given the darkness of Finnish crime fiction, would not be uplifting. But I thought (given my sisu) that I was ready for blood, mayhem, sex, boozing Finns, eternal winter night, and all the rest.
I was wrong.
Thompson’s debut novel, Snow Angels pulls together themes that I’ve written about in my own fiction: Sex (Pigs, a Trial Lawyer’s Story); black women and female circumcision (Esther’s Race); the Finns (Suomalaiset: People of the Marsh); and serial killers (the soon-to-be-released Laman’s River). But putting it all together in one package in the name of the crime fiction genre? I wasn’t too sure a writer, even a gifted writer like Thompson, could pull it off. Still, I was willing to give the book its due and, over the first few chapters, Thompson’s prose pulled me in. This passage, a description of the seasonal changes of the Lapland sky, is an example of high quality prose:
Here, the sky is arched, and there’s almost no pollution. In spring and fall the sky is dark blue or violet, and sunsets last for hours. The sun turns into a dim orange ball that transforms clouds into silver-rimmed red and violet towers. In winter, twenty-four hours a day, uncountable stars outline the vaulted ceiling of the great cathedral we live in. Finnish skies are the reason I believe in God.
Unfortunately, the story, the setting, and the characters share the darkness foretold by this beautiful passage. Unfortunately, God, or at the very least, morality, disappears and what follows is a story with absolutely no redemptive qualities. There’s not an ounce of compassion, kindness, happiness, laughter, thoughtfulness, or any other positive emotion displayed by Inspector Kari Vaara, his parents, their Lap neighbors, the other Finnish police officers who weave in and out of the story, or any of the potential killers of a B list Somalian actress who is brutally butchered, and whose last minute flailing (as her killer tries to mimic an unsolved American sex crime) against freshly fallen snow results in a grisly snow angel outlined in blood (and of course, the book’s title). About the only character with any redeeming qualities at all is Kate, Vaara’s wife, an American beauty who longs for sunlight and happiness in an unhappy land and who has the unenviable task of trying to keep the good inspector’s head on straight amidst the carnage of at least five murders and/or suicides in the span of a few days.
A gruesome scene (spoiler alert) depicting the torture and burning of Vaara’s ex-wife, a woman who is one of the prime suspects in Vaara’s murder investigation, is especially troubling and, in this humble writer’s view, overly gratuitous.
If you’re a fan of disturbing, peddle-to-the-metal crime fiction (think Pulp Fiction or Scarface reduced to the novel format), then you will appreciate Thompson’s writing style, his characters, and his message. But if you’re like me, a writer who, at the end of the day, wants something redemptive to take place before the final page is turned, then pick another Finnish crime novelist to read.
Well crafted but far too violent and disturbing for this reader.
3 stars out of 5.
(This review also appears in the current issue of New World Finn. See “Links” for the newspaper’s website and subscribe!)
