Good news about reading!
Earlier this month, National Endowment of the Arts released study that shows that “for the first time since 1982 … the proportion of adults 18 and older who said they had read at least one novel, short story, poem or play in the previous 12 months has risen,” according to a report in The New York Times. The numbers aren’t dramatic, and there are still lots more folks out there to reach. But any uptick is welcome!
The Maltese Falcon (1930) by Dashiell Hammett
The study credits programmatic reasons for the reversal: the NEA’s own fabulous Big Read program and book clubs such as Oprah’s. I took part in Big Read activities in Kansas spring, and was thrilled with the quality of the NEA materials, and with the creative ways in which Johnson County librarians and the booksellers at I Love a Mystery (the Kansas City area mystery bookstore) came together to celebrate Dashiell Hammett’s American classic, The Maltese Falcon. The study also cites the influence of civic leaders, librarians and teachers, in promoting reading.
But there’s another important reason that people are turning to fiction: fiction offers us our best opportunity to understand our world. Traditional news reporting (to the extent that you can still find it in today’s difficult media environment) offers facts. It’s through fiction that we come to appreciate what those facts mean, to truly understand a time, place or culture. Fiction immerses us. Fiction puts us into another person’s shoes, and allows us to see the world through another person’s eyes. Two new novels, published this month by Soho, are perfect examples of this.
The Collaborator of Bethlehem (2007) by Matt Benyon Rees
There’s no better way to understand what’s going on on the West Bank today than to read Matt Benyon Rees‘ The Samaritan’s Secret, and its predecessors The Collaborator of Bethlehem and A Grave in Gaza. Rees puts us right in the middle of the conflict in a way that no news story ever can. The perspective that Rees offers through his series protagonist Omar Yussef, a teacher, is compelling, heartbreaking and inspiring. The novels are based on Rees’ own work as a reporter on the ground: he was Time Magazine‘s Jerusalem bureau chief. (Isn’t it telling that veteran journalists such as Rees and The Baltimore Sun‘s Dan Fesperman write both fiction and nonfiction?)
Leighton Gage’s novels Blood of the Wicked and Buried Strangers are also great examples of how a talented writer is using the mystery novel to describe a society. Gage’s books are darker than Rees’, violent, intense and chilling. We see Brazil through the eyes of Mario Silva, who, as a federal police officer, is more honest than most of the country’s law enforcement professionals. But Silva is no saint, and he’ll go outside the system and take matters into his own hands when he feels he must. When Gage speaks about Brazil during his personal appearances, his love for his adopted homeland is evident. But his books – compelling as they are – will not lure tourists. Instead, they offer frightening portraits of how people live in a culture where corruption is routine.
Both Matt Benyon Rees and Leighton Gage are published in the Soho Crime program, a line that also includes Colin Cotterill, Peter Lovesey, Cara Black and many more. Soho Crime is today’s most intriguing and exciting mystery publishing program, in part because of its openness to international settings. You can pretty much trust in every book with the Soho Crime name on it. It’s worth making the effort to find their distinctively designed books on the shelves of better bookstores and larger libraries.
These mystery novels are worth seeking out, not just because they’re good reads, but because they help us understand our world. As does all good fiction.
- Jim Huang has sold mystery books for 20 years, including stints in Boston, Kalamazoo, Michigan, and now Carmel, Indiana, where he and his wife own The Mystery Company, a bookstore devoted to the genre. For over 20 years (1982-2005), Huang edited and published The Drood Review, a mystery book review newsletter. He has edited reference books for mystery lovers, including 1100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century (winner of the Anthony and Agatha Awards for best nonfiction of 2000), They Died in Vain: Overlooked, Underappreciated and Forgotten Mystery Novels (winner of the Agatha, Anthony and Macavity Awards for best nonfiction of 2002) and Mystery Muses: 100 Classics That Inspire Today’s Mystery Writers (a nominee for the Agatha Award for best nonfiction of 2006), the latter co-edited with Austin Lugar. Since 2000, he has volunteered as the Program Director for Magna Cum Murder, a festival for mystery lovers that takes place each October in Muncie, Indiana. He is the co-chair of the 2009 Boucheron, the World Mystery Convention scheduled for Indianapolis in October 2009. In 2006, Huang was elected to the board of Sisters in Crime, an international organization devoted to combating discrimination against women in the mystery genre; he is the first “brother” to serve on the board in this organization’s 20 year history. Huang lives with his wife, Jennie Jacobson, and their two daughters in Carmel, where he recently completed a term as president of the Friends of the Library board.
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