Let Me Tell You about Some Shit I Read

Michael Gregorio, A Visible Darkness

The third installment of the adventures of Hanno Stiffeniis, a Prussian magistrate during the Napoleonic occupation of what is now Germany.

Can I just state, for the record, how fucking stupid these books all are?  I read a couple of blurbs snarking about how they were “thinking people’s” mysteries, but my God.  MY GOD, Y’ALL.  No, they are not.  The presence of obscure history and existential angst DOES NOT AUTOMATICALLY MAKE SOMETHING DEEP.  Especially not when your main character is a moronic blank.

And now we will cut, because I cannot rant without spoilers, spoilers, SPOILERS!

Hokay, so:  A Visible Darkness starts off the way most of Hanno’s adventures do—he’s puttering around in his little town with his eight million children when suddenly an official shows up and says, “There’s been a heinous murder.  We heard you’re good at solving those, even though you have never actually solved one on your own, ever.  Come along, the corpse isn’t getting any fresher.”  In this case, a young amber-gatherer has been slaughtered:   the murderer took her jaw.  Later, Hanno finds another young woman half-eaten in a pig-sty; the killer cut out her larynx before letting the pigs have their share.  Oh, and for extra ickiness, a piece of amber is found shoved up the first girl’s hoo-ha.  And did I mention that there’s a woman with progeria running around, and that she looks about 10 but is actually 22 and MAKES HER LIVING AS A PROSTITUTE/AMBER SMUGGLER?

Yeah, this book was hella gross.  And really stupid.  When you finally find out why the killer was murdering all these women, it’s just like, “Huh what?”  Mostly because instead of going, “This shit is fucked up, yo,” the authors try to make it mean something about the Prussian soul or whatnot, and really, guys, he’s making giant wax figure of the perfect woman and is fully convinced that doctors will be able to animate her.  HE’S NUTS, OKAY.  Also, that is just ridiculous.  Come on.

Oh, and as for Hanno?  He continues to never see anything coming, ever.  I knew who the murderer was within about fifty pages of the ending (not good, authors), but Hanno was still stubbornly clinging to an earlier suspect, even though that suspect made no sense.  The murderer was switching between two kill sites—first one city, then the other.  Obviously, he had to be a highly mobile individual whose absence wouldn’t be much commented on, and yet Hanno suspected…the village doctor.  Because that made SO MUCH SENSE.

Meanwhile, the random guy who showed up halfway through the book claiming to be an apprentice magistrate?  The guy no one had ever heard of and who was very willing to not be seen by any officials?  Yeah, Hanno thought that guy was perfectly safe.  Hanno even sent him to go visit his PREGNANT WIFE AND THREE SMALL CHILDREN.

Oh, and Hanno’s not just wrong about the identity of the murderer:  when he feels like being wrong, he feels like being REALLY wrong.  He actually spends the last 20 pages of the book racing home to face a threat that doesn’t exist.

Guys, I like plenty of mysteries wherein the lead character is not exactly Sherlock Holmes.  But I like them because no one ever claims that they’re particularly good at what they do.  Hanno, on the other hand, is talked up by everyone, and really?  He’s never solved a case on his own.  Never.  Also, he has no personality to speak of.  The end.

Recommended for:  Nobody.  EVER.