Bill Pronzini : Bones

Bill Pronzini : Bones, 1985 – Italian title : Ombre sul passato – translation Marcella Dallatorre - Il Giallo Mondadori No. 1966, 1986

Who does not know Bill Pronzini? And who does not know his famous detective, Nameless? A detective with a great humanity, that combines wisdom and action. However, his adventures differ from other detectives typical of the genre Hard-Boiled. Pronzini has always been sincere about it, rejecting the subsidiary of Chandler and instead recognizing as the only novelist to have played a key role in the creation of his character, was Dewey, with his "Mac". Pronzini, however, is not alone in this, unlike many authors Hard-Boiled. He also has solid foundations and cultural history of the genre: you known, from a mile away, as his readings have not only caught in the genre Pulp and Hard-Boiled, but also in that of the Mystery Classic. And his stories have an air of light, sparkling, with remarkable leaps and grand finals, and also possess a remarkable humorous vein, sometimes irreverent, even against his character, which is very rare.
Bones, who also has a nice Locked-Room, is a novel that also speaks about bones, but it is not a thriller by Kate Reichs. No. It’s a novel that sinks its own investigation into the past. And as happened before, the plot is intertwined with the traditional mystery.

Michael Kiskadon has recently discovered to be the son of the great writer of Mystery, Harmon Crane, who died thirty years before. A sad story: depression, alcohol and then suicide. So far nothing strange, especially since  had been found a farewell letter in the typewriter. And to validate the theory of suicide was the mode of discovery: the room was locked from the inside, was on the first floor, and it was not possible then exit from the windows: in short, a situation defined. The fact is that "Nameless" starts to investigate, but is faced what might be called a "conspiracy of silence". Before Crane's wife, Amanda, who talks about his lovely family life lived with Crane until the death of her husband, but does not really talks about suicide: that flaunts a glacial that "Nameless" initially misinterpretes, then understanding how the woman has suffered such a severe shock to be assisted by his granddaughter now for more than 35 years, the years since her husband's suicide.
Then the detectives went to interview the lawyer of Crane, such Yankowski, a bad guy, who along with teacher painting of the wife of Crane, Adam Potter, he broke down the door of the room, finding Harmon Crane died,: he seems that he had shot a few minutes after talking on the phone just with him, Yankowski. Ends thrown out of the house, when Nameless, accuses him of having paid his court to Amanda for a long time.

There is also the first wife of Crane, such Corneal Ellen, who was blackmailing him. He says it Russ Dancer, a writer of Pulp failed and chronic alcoholic. Russ Crane had known, and reveals himself to Nameless in the course of a drink (but how should this American detectives!) The most interesting things: Crane not had sex with his wife was being blackmailed by his first wife, drank a lot, but it was not all depressed. The investigations shows that the day of the suicide, he had been in his cottage that had been rented by a certain Bertolucci: the chalet now no longer exists in its place there was an oyster farm, then also went to the down the drain. Bertolucci makes the taxidermist (he stuffes with straw the animals) is strange and he evasively answers, so that Nameless suspects he has not said anything about behalf of Crane. One thing he understands: to Bertolucci, Crane was strongly disliked, even if the rent he had paid him forever. He will know that Bertolucci was married (at that time in which Crane had lived), with a beautiful redhead, who then disappeared, ran away they said.
And the brother of the artist Potter, tells him the depression of Crane was initiated the day after the earthquake of 35 years before, on arrival from his vacation in the chalet of his property.
One day a new earthquake devastates San Francisco and vicinity. The earthquake to Nameless is bearer of good feelings: his girlfriend, Kerry Wade, which makes sex so rewarding for both, feeling the shock, she hears a new irresistible urge to have sex, but it is only the desire to be protected , connected to someone. But then Nameless discovers the earthquake has also brought other news: when he goes to interview the new owner of the area where once stood the chalet, he locates by chance, an old unmarked grave, anonymous, that the earthquake has helped to discover: bones have surfaced and what looks like a purse, and a ring. You will find that she is the red dead, Bertolucci's wife, Kate.

Why her bones are located close to the chalet rented to Crane? And Crane killed himself or was he killed? And if he was killed, as was rigged so that the door seemed locked from the inside? And who closed the door rigging it, was the murderer or an accomplice? Nameless will understand after that Bertolucci is killed, especially when he discovers the lifeless body of Michael Kiskadon, who died the same way of his father, found dead just from Nameless, who broke down the door of the room, alerted by the wife of Kiskadon, Lynn . Suicide or murder?
In a novel enjoyable as ever, in the midst of breathtaking descriptions of San Francisco, interspersed by quarrels with his friend investigator Eberhardt, by hilarious scuffles between Kerry and Wanda, the Eberhardt’s pupa, Nameless will find a disconcerting truth and the answer to many , too many questions left without no satisfaction by a hasty survey ended 35 years before. And the answer will own those bones, found by chance, buried in an old crevasse, opened after the earthquake 35 years ago and again revealed by the new one, and a carbon copy of a letter sent by Crane to his lawyer.
A vintage Pronzini, who does not forget the lessons of the greats of the past (Hake Talbot) and leads us, in a survey never dull, carefully constructed, with withering dialogues and well-aimed descriptions, to an ending that leaves you speechless. And knowing Pronzini, it takes also discouragement.

Because it isn’t said that all the guilties, in reality, pay the penalty for their actions. And seeking the truth takes, most of the time, sufferences. Luckily the epilogue save all, with a final reflection on the philosophy of life, which will riport attention to the things that save us every day: love, understanding, friendship.

A great Pronzini.

As always.

Pietro De Palma

Bill Pronzini-Barry N. Malzberg : The Running of Beasts, 1976

 I must admit that if I didn’t buy and if I didn’t read detective stories for sale two months ago, in italian newspaper stands, I never knew who was Barry N. Malzberg. The other author, in return, yes I know! And who doesn’t know Bill Pronzini?
Mauro Boncompagni, who signed the notes in the afterword, largely about the two writers spokes, and cites facts and circumstances which, as he told me in private, has been told by two authors: he  knows both but Bill Pronzini least I know for sure. The result is a vivid and fascinating portrait. I do not deny that, thanks to Mauro notes (that I know myself well enough), I would have wanted to read the essay by Malzberg on Cornell Woolrich: Mauro speaks of it as the best piece ever written on Woolrich.

The novel in question is The Running of Beasts. It 'a thriller and it's raining there. But it is not just a thriller, is a masterpiece of a thriller.
The story itself isn’t very original: in an U.S. citizen there is a series of deaths: three women were killed, and disembowelled. A psychiatrist, Dr. Ferrara, thinks that the murderess is a schizophrenic with multiple personalities: in other words, someone who kills perhaps not even then knowing that I did, or remembering fragments of memory that can not properly fix in his mind.

The fact is that five people want for its own reasons, get your hands on the murderer:

Daniel Smith, a state police lieutenant, Steven Hook, a former alcoholic actor, Jack Cross, a journalist rampant; Keller, a local policeman, Valeria Broome, known journalist who was born in the town. The fact is that, if attention is focused precisely on these people, it’s because obviously one of them is the murderer. Already in this, the two authors diverge from the usual survey: you would normally have had to come gradually to five suspects. But here, the five actors are already on the scene from the very first pages: they are presented individually, in their stories, in their weaknesses and in their aspirations.
And almost immediately the five begin to be attracted to each other: Cook falls in love (paid) with Valeria Broome, Keller begins to suspect Cook, but more bias than for conviction based on evidence, and Smith begins his duel with Keller. This in his turn hides the skeletons in the closet: he killed a demonstrator many years before for "excess of zeal" if not "violence" and then he preferred to take refuge in the quiet town of Bloodstone to rebuild its reputation. Bloodstone, which strange name, it has :  the blood recalls. But is not the only strange thing. I say no more.

The fact is that after a while the current deaths perk: there is an attempt of murder (odd), a strange sight, and then two killings, even with the same features: two women disembowelled, and then cut with a diamond-shaped a knife on her thigh.
What you notice is the way to accentuate the tension: the actors are presented individually in great detail, the amount of space of characters is not secondary : in fact the rate is exactly given by the progressive decrease of the space given to each character in the book. First large, then - gradually - increasingly restricted, the character whose turn is appointed, does something and immediately the action and the attention of the two authors go on another. And all of this, according to the flow of a chain of events, the one after the other, the one resulting from another, perhaps that seemed unconnected, but then slowly tend to develop in a predetermined order, that given by the suspicion which tends to materialize at a certain point. And the tension becomes frantic when paragraphs, each devoted to a different character, they become almost like flashbacks.
But is he really the murderess? This is the point.
Because Pronzini and Malzberg tend, when they point to the reflector, to take a step back and say that maybe the spotlight should have been focused on another. In short, everything and its opposite. And when the test is given, and the killer is located, and hunting seems to end, with a change of scene really amazing, the killer is identified in another. That would seem to have understood that he was the killer (the famous multiple personality), and dies. All gone? No. Because with a double final, the two writers show once again that you should never trust appearances. The fact is that "The end" of the novel is really surprising, as an ending of a novel by F. Brown or Thomas Harris almost. The true ending will remain on the stomach.
What I like to emphasize is the so-called stylistic mimesis Pronzini & Malzberg take: when identifying the murderess (which is true) underestimate him, present him with words and descriptions that tend to corroborate the fact that the murderer can not be him, despite the overwhelming evidence against him would seem. It seems almost a conviction sub-liminal. And when they point the spotlight on the fake murderess, present it in such a way that the reader becomes convinced that he is the murderer and not others. The operation of mimesis is needed to prepare the surprise ending, which would not have the force of a punch in the stomach, if you do not give for granted that the murderess had already left the scene.

Finally I would like to recall that Bill Pronzini and Barry Malzberg must have at least watched "Murder Gone Mad" by Philip MacDonald: the same journalist recalls other journalist who was there, but she hasn’t the same function and the same role, and if the atmosphere is rarefied in both the novels and the victims are killed under cover of darkness, is also to say that MacDonald generates power only with the atmosphere (like the great masters of the past, for example Connington or Rinehart and Rufus King), while two writers also resort to stylistic and technical processes. It is also to indicate the ability of visionary Malzberg (well highlighted by Boncompagni in afterword) that more than one occasion, with its baroque descriptions, convinces the reader of the insanity of the murderer.
An extraordinary thriller.

Pietro De Palma