FictionMichael Collins's new novel opens with the discovery of the body of a young girl in a pile of leaves beside the road. It is Halloween night and the little girl is dressed as an angel. It is this kind of striking imagery that underpins what is, as the hero of the novel says himself, a tragedy in "Hicksville USA".
For, once again, Collins has set his novel in small town mid-West America: a territory that he has increasingly - and successfully - made his own with his last two novels The Keepers of Truth (which was nominated for the Booker Prize) and The Resurrectionists.
It is a world of Denny's all-night diners, of Prom Queens and Quarterbacks: a world we know well from countless movies and TV dramas, as well as literature. As with his previous novels, though, beneath this veneer of the ordinary and the mundane, exists a nether world of dark deeds and hidden passions. Also, as with his previous novels, the narrative centres on a flawed hero whose task is to discover the truth behind a mystery. A cast of stock characters fills the pages: the local mayor who also owns a car lot, the Bible-thumping mother of one of the suspects, and numerous middle-aged women with bad bouffant hairdos and fashion problems.
The success of this type of thriller depends greatly on the central figure and once again, in Lawrence - the local sheriff, divorced and with drink problems - Collins has drawn a well-rounded character: a cynical know-it-all, as well as a clownish figure caught up in events far beyond his control and knowledge. While there are some gaps and inconsistencies in the characterisation, Lawrence possesses sufficient integrity to serve as the barrier that perilously holds chaos at bay in this world.
What elevates this work beyond the workaday and humdrum thriller is the author's self-conscious knowingness. It is a trait that has been vital to Michael Collins's writing from his earliest Irish short stories and novels. For instance, The Life and Times of a Teaboy played with readers' expectations of what an Irish novel might be, cleverly undermining the supremacy of the controlling authorial voice. Such playfulness and ingenuity, though, did not always hit home in his Irish work but most certainly does in his American-centred work.
The difference is in the measured tone of his narrator, which generates the impression, in Elizabeth Bowen's phrase, of "life with the lid on". The style is one of containment rather than excess. Collins brilliantly deploys a cold, precise prose in his descriptions of the theatricalities and absurdities of American life. Lawrence, for example, has a revelation as he sees himself and his image on TV, momentarily recognising how reality is distorted by the media through which it is viewed. And, throughout, the narrative is punctuated with the sights and sounds of middlebrow television, with its game shows and sitcoms and easy answers to the complexities of modern living.
As in his previous novels, Collins attempts to make a comment about the wider malaise of 1980s life, as the world moved rapidly into a new age. Lost Souls does not possess the breath and depth of The Keepers of Truth which so successfully captured the tensions and fears of that time of transition. Nor is the plot as intricately woven as the previous two, but there are enough well-executed twists and turns to keep the reader eagerly turning the pages to find out where Lawrence will be led next in his efforts to find the girl's killer.
Murder mysteries are, in a way, lullabies for the modern age: present-day fairytales that, despite their immersion in a seedy, dark underworld, offer reassurance to readers. For, at least, all the loose strands are satisfyingly tied up at the end and a kind of stark, uncomplicated justice is meted out with the bad getting their comeuppance and the good, while not perhaps being fully rewarded, being given the opportunity of a second chance. At the moment, it would seem that Michael Collins is one of the chief practitioners within this genre and Lost Souls a good example of its possibilities.
Derek Hand is a lecturer in English in St Patrick's College, Drumcondra. His book, John Banville: Exploring Fictions, was published by Liffey Press last year
Lost Souls By Michael Collins Phoenix House, 280pp. €11.99