The Dinner / Herman Koch

Herman Koch's The Dinner (FIC KOCH and AD FIC KOCH) is a meal best served piping hot, with no spoilers to distract you from the author's masterful reveal of one family's inner life and what that family's choices say about privilege, violence and modern-day parenthood.

The tale, already a bestseller in Europe, brings to mind Yasmina Reza's darkly comic play "God of Carnage," which gives audience members ring-side seats to the slowly devolving discussion between two couples over a spat between their two young sons. (Find the film version of the play, called simply Carnage, in our DVD collection.) Here's the trailer:



Similarly, Dutch author Koch brings together two married couples over a meal at a fancy restaurant. The polished setting contrasts greatly with the altogether grim subject matter they have convened to discuss. But whereas Carnage is liberally seasoned with helpings of humor, The Dinner is laced with menace and foreboding.

Without revealing too much, we learn that the men in both couples are brothers: Paul, a former teacher, and Serge, a prominent politician. Both have teen-aged sons. The Dinner is told through the eyes of Paul. On the surface, he comes across as an educated man and a devoted father living a comfortable life with his wife and son. But over the course of the dinner, Koch peels back layer by layer, and every onion skin adds another disturbing element to the mix.

What makes The Dinner such a delicious treat is the thoughtful pace at which Koch writes, dropping a nugget here and a morsel there, tempting us further into dark recesses hidden by civility. It's also a terrifying read for its complete plausibility, forcing us to ponder our own moral boundaries. How far are we willing to go to preserve the peace of family? What transgressions are we willing to overlook for that, and what transgressions are we willing commit?

Gigantic / by Marc Nesbitt

A black laborer and his partner work are hired at the home of a wealthy white Southern businessman only to find out that their "job" is to pose as a human lawn ornament during an especially odd party. Things get even more strange when the man's daughter's sexual misadventures turn violent. Then a downtrodden mattress salesman in his thirties witnesses an especially gruesome car accident up close, a shocking event sending him spiraling toward a new revelation concerning his relationship with his father. A young man has kept his imaginary girlfriend from childhood throughout his life only to find out how unstable his "companion" becomes when he betrays her. When sanitation worker is summoned to pick up roadkill on an isolated highway only to endure a life-threatening incident which terrorizes him to his core.

Nesbitt's little collection of short stories, while very different, is as thoroughly engrossing as it is peculiar. His sentences, descriptions and metaphors, especially his metaphors, are something to behold. Or at least something to take note of. "We stand there watching the quiet between our faces." "Snow drops in bright white pieces like the stars are crumbling." 'Her hand jerks like a leather spider." "The train whispers something about distance." It's not hard to see why some of the literary world's more eclectic figures have praised the work immensely. It's an arresting worldview that Nesbitt imbues, an uncommonly vague yet poetically engendering place where troubled, bemused and disenfranchised young men dwell in a sort-of demented whirlpool of outcomes. And while nearly all of the protagonists are unnamed, you get the sense of that being the intended objective of the author: it's an everyman's kind of insane world. (FIC NESBITT)

Serial Menace: Newer Mystery and Crime Fiction Novels on Serial Killers

Whisper in the Dark / by Robert Gregory Browne
When Detective Frank Blackburn discovers an unidentified young woman dead and with a pair of scissors in her left hand, he has a tentative hunch that the murder may be the work of Vincent Van Gogh, a notorious serial killer with an artistic bent. In need of a profiler who can provide some insight in the mind of the madman, Blackburn contacts psychiatrist Dr. Michael Tolan, a man with his own persona experience with Van Gogh—his wife was one of his victims. (FIC BROWNE)

Abomination / by Colleen Coble

Recently divorced detective Nick Andreakos is after a serial murderer whose been targeting young girls and women, When certain clues lead him to believe that his ex-wife Eve could be the killer’s next target, the case takes on another dimension. Eve has already had one close call with the murderer and seems to know that it won’t be the last time she sees the man known as Gideon. (FIC COBLE)

BoneMan’s Daughters / by Ted Dekker
In Texas, a malicious serial killer known as “Bone Man” has been stalking and murdering young girls. Meanwhile in Iraq, a high-ranking military officer has been captured and is being held captive by the enemy. In an effort to extort information, they’ve blackmailed their prisoner using the life and well-being of his wife and daughter back home in Texas—and there seems to be link between the captors and the Bone Man. (Also see The Bride Collector by Ted Dekker) (FIC DEKKER)

Born To Die / by Lisa Jackson
When two women who look remarkably similar to herself suddenly die of seemingly natural causes, Dr. Kacey Lambert chalks it up as a coincidence. But when it’s discovered that one of the dead bodies contained traces of poison, it becomes a murder case headed by Detectives Selena Alvarez and her partner Regan Pescoli. As more women, all resembling Dr. Lambert, are murdered under ever more brutal circumstances, both the detectives and the now targeted Lambert become more than a little anxious. (FIC JACKSON)

Still Missing / by Chevy Stevens

Real estate agent Annie Moresby never knew what she was getting into when she agreed to show a house to a mysterious stranger. The stranger turned out to be a psychopath who forcefully held Annie captive in a remote mountain cabin for over a year before she managed an escape. Only now her former captor, a serial killer, is still on the loose and he may be after Annie one last time. (FIC STEVENS)
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Bloodline / by Mark Billingham

A madman is on the loose in London. A very clever and very malevolent serial killer has been murdering the children of the victims of Raymond Garvey, a notorious serial murderer from the city’s past. Murder Squad Detective Tom Thorne is on the case and thinks he’s caught a lead when a pregnant woman is found murdered. But what he finds instead is an even more complicated puzzle than he’d previously been working on. (MYS BILLINGHAM)

Mister X / by John Lutz
Five years ago a madman brutally murdered six women, having mutilated their bodies and carving an X into their flesh. Then the murders suddenly stopped and ex-homicide detective Frank Quinn still can’t figure out why. That is, until a sister of one of the victims convinces Frank to reopen the now cold case. Now with the case renewed, the murders have started again. (MYS LUTZ)

The Snowman / by Jo Nesbo; trans. from the Norwegian by Don Bartlett
With the first snowfall of the season in Oslo comes the disappearance of a local woman from her home. In her yard has been constructed the figure of a distorted, sinister looking snowman. It doesn’t take Detective Harry Hole long to realize that this is only one in a string of multiple disappearances—disappearances which are almost certainly the work of a serial killer. (MYS NESBO)

The Four Stages of Cruelty / by Keith Holihan

19-year-old Joshua Riff, an inmate at Ditmarsh Penitentiary in Minnesota, has been temporarily relocated to the infirmary where he's made a friend with another inmate, Jon Crowley. Crowley is currently writing a book, a comic book, on the history of Ditmarsh prison for which Josh is helping to illustrate. Monitoring the infirmary portion of the prison is Kali Williams, a corrections officer who's been with the prison longer than most of the prisoners. Something puzzles Kali Williams about the pair and even more so when Crowley suddenly disappears. No one has a clue where he might have gone to. But as Williams begins investigating, using the unfinished comic history and Josh's crazy story as a clue, she begins to find more than she ever could have bargained. For beneath the surface of things, indeed beneath the prison itself, is a long-abandoned isolation chamber called "the City" of which none but the oldest surviving prisoners, Crowley among them, are aware of.

This book is a lot of fun. Hollihan creates a story that, while not as original as some others, is certainly a page turner with his three central characters all well-fleshed out and the plot grounded in a suprisingly real context. There are lots of twists and turns leading to a great and very satisfactory ending and the themes of prisoners feeling more "free" than their jailers who seem more "jailed". It's a story and characters for which the reader will surely be able to identify with--haunted prisons (both metaphorically and metaphysically) a genre unto itself--and the writing keeps the pages turning in a satisfying manner. (FIC HOLLIHAN)

The Giant of the French Revolution: Danton, A Life / by David Lawday

Among the more epic events which have ruffled the course of western civilization, the French Revolution is one incident remembered within a notably violent context. It was indeed a very bloody affair. Ending the reign of a monarchy that had ruled for nearly a millenium, the 1789 storming of the Bastille and removal of the aristocracy were only the beginning as unending political insurgency, the Reign of Terror and the struggle for power witnessed heads rolling (literally) from the executioner's guillotine for a solid ten year period until the tensions eased and Napoleon ascended to power. Perhaps no one individual had as much influence on the initial onset of the revolution than Georges Jacques Danton, a robust proponent of political reform who stirred the public with his masterful oratory gifts and forceful, impassioned call to action.
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Despite his physically imposing presence, which coupled with his skillful rhetoric abetted his rise to power among the revolutionary ranks, Danton is depicted by author David Lawday as a gentle giant of a somewhat sentimental nature. A family man with two children, he was fonder of the power of speech than physical aggression and more prone to ordered diplomacy when it came to restructuring the government than the systematic execution of the aristocracy. The overthrow of the Bastille saw him made the Minister of Justice when he was then only 29, a position allowing him the freedom to employ the tactics needed to uphold the movement's threshold of power and keep those constituents loyal to the monarchy at bay during the Revolution's most critical stages. The political counterpart to Robespierre, whose trail of bloodshed seemingly knew no end, Danton boldly walked the line between patriotism and rebellion, strongly opposed to the anarchy he saw sweeping throught the country. Heading this new French regime proved costly however. His legislation included initiatives which, though successful in meeting mutually agreed upon objectives, inevitably drew the ire of his more bloodthirstly opponents who convicted him of treason and sentenced him to death in 1793 when he was only 34. Lawday, a former professor of history at Oxford, leads us from Danton's roots as a magistrate's son to the blood-red streets of Revolutionary Paris where the statesman would make destiny his own. (B DANTON)

Wake Up Dead: A Thriller / by Roger Smith

When car thieves Disco and Godwynn pull a job on a spiffy-looking Mercedes one sweltering Cape Town night, little do they suspect they're stealing more than just a car, because more than one person is just a tad bit interested in this particular vehicle, its contents and passengers. The victims of the carjacking, Roxy Palmer, a former runway model, and her husband Joe had been on their way to deliver a hefty sum of laundered cash to a local mercenary outfit when the hit came, leaving Joe murdered and Roxy temporarily at a loss for her next move before she makes a daring choice to pursue her husband's murderers and retrieve the money.

Meanwhile, Billy Afrika, a marine just returned from a soldiering stint in Iraq, knows that Roxy knows where the money, his money--funds owed him by his mercenary boss--can be found and will stop at nothing to get it. Just out of jail, a dangerous psychopath named Piper is also looking for something of 'his'--former cellmate Disco. Piper does things with regard for his convenience only, evidenced with his exceedingly bloody break out of prison after which he wastes no time in employing the same murdering tactics to find his former lover. As the action and suspense escalates, so does the tension as all the players involved sense that this cat and mouse game will soon culminate in nothing short of an all out bloodbath.

Hailing from South Africa, Roger Smith has crafted a gripping thrillride of a novel and a worthy follow-up to his breakout debut, the unanimously lauded Mixed Blood. Reminiscent of Elmore Leonard where sequencing, action and violence are at the forefront of the story, Smith handily incorporates enough clever dialogue to match his fast-moving characters and their volatile situations. Don't look for too much depth to the protagonists; most won't be around long enough for you to get a feel for anyway. In addition to the rapid pace and sleek narrative, another element adding texture to the book is the setting. Cape Town is currently a burgeoning metropolis, uniquely located, economically lucrative and as socially diverse as any of its Northern Hemisphere counterparts. It's a hotbed for well-conceived fiction like this to use as a background. (FIC SMITH) 

Taxi Driver (1976) DVD / a film by Martin Scorcese; w/ screenplay by Paul Schrader; starring Robert Deniro

"The days go on and on... they don't end. All my life needed was a sense of someplace to go. I don't believe that one should devote his life to morbid self-attention, I believe that one should become a person like other people."

Travis Bickle is a man cut off, shut out so systematically, so repeatedly by others that he's become an individual on the edge--in more ways than one. An ex-GI in New York City, he drives a taxi as both a means to make money and to remedy his chronic insomnia,"I ride around most nights--subways, buses--but you know, if I'm gonna do that, I might as well get paid for it". Even as an outcast Travis is immersed in the world around him, existing on the periphery of that "other" world to which he can never belong yet which he finds alluring nonetheless. His job introduces him to broad cross section of the detestably vulgar society he inhabits: sleazy businessmen nightly copulating with prostitutes in the backseat, preoccupied politicians with their scheming agendas, haughty, unobtainably beautiful women and enraged husbands plotting revenge against their cheating wives. It's a culture he's both repulsed by and awkwardly drawn to, his own social alienation and sexual frustration routinely outlet through frequent visits to adult bookstores and porno theatres where hard-core films offer a voyeuristic glimpse of the deviant world operating around him. But as his thoughts and habits grow more obsessive and the veracity of his isolation is laid out before him ("Loneliness has followed me my whole life. Everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man . . ."), Travis' mental stability falters as insanity creeps in replacing his rationality with a radical vision for an ultimate resolution.

In Scorcese's timeless film adapted from Paul Schrader's inimitable screenplay, Travis Bickle really is "God's lonely man", if merely because he's everyman's "lonely man". Everyone can empathize with the emotional status of Travis' situation and most know the feeling resulting from limited social interaction or an inability to connect. Most deal with it better than Travis does. Taxi Driver is a brilliant nightmare*, and, like most real nightmares, little to nothing is gathered as to the particulars of unfolding events. The audience never learns about Travis background, where he's from or why he lives in New York; only that he was once a marine and that likely he served in Vietnam, and even that's barely hinted at. The film relies heavily (considerably more so than most other American movies) on suggestive characterization, barely establishing the framework for a story, subtly insinuating mood and offering ambiguous at best inferences for the motives and subsequent action. Symbolism and allegory are heavily involved: the taxi cab acting as Travis' portal to the world, his vessel (and insulation) on the road of life; long, panning shots seen from the cab's point of view mirroring the exterior world's separate, unattached livelihood; intimate, close-ups during the film's most violent sequences as opposed to the more distant, retreating shots observed during Travis' conversations with others emphasizing personal rejection having greater weight than a destructive mindset, etc. Perhaps more than any other Scorcese film, Taxi Driver warrants the conscious involvement of the viewer, demanding attention at an interpretive level and requiring evaluation, analysis and judgement through individualized perceptions, a likely reason it continues as a classic in American cinema. (DVD TAXI)

*Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times